How to Use YouTube Transcripts in Claude

Without help, Claude can open a YouTube page but not the captions behind it, so what it knows about a video is the title and description. TranscriptAPI is an MCP server: once it is added as a connector, Claude gets tools to fetch transcripts, search YouTube and browse channels and playlists, and it uses them whenever you paste a link.

claude.ai, Claude Desktop and mobile

1. Get a key

Sign in at transcriptapi.io/login and copy the key from the dashboard. It starts with ta_. The free key comes with 20 credits and doesn't need a card.

2. Add a custom connector

On claude.ai open Customize → Connectors, select Add, then Add custom connector.

Name

TranscriptAPI

Remote MCP server URL

https://api.transcriptapi.io/mcp/ta_your_key

claude.ai Add custom connector dialog with name TranscriptAPI and URL https://api.transcriptapi.io/mcp/ta_your_key — Replace `ta_your_key` with your own key, then press Continue. The key sits in the URL because connectors cannot send headers, so there is no OAuth screen.

The connector belongs to your account, so the Claude desktop and mobile apps pick it up as well. On Team and Enterprise plans an owner may need to allow custom connectors first.

3. Paste a link

Nothing to switch on per chat. Paste a YouTube link with a question, and Claude calls the transcript tool by itself. You will see Fetched YouTube transcript above the answer:

Claude fetches the transcript of Andrej Karpathy's Intro to Large Language Models and summarises it with timestamps — A 59-minute talk summarised from the transcript, with details that are not in the description: 140 GB of weights, 6,000 GPUs for 12 days, about $2M. (We named our test connector “yt”.)

Quotes work the same way. Ask what the speaker says about something and you get their words and the timestamp:

Claude quotes a sourdough rule of thumb word for word at 52:34 — A rule of thumb quoted at 52:34 of a one-hour video. Without the transcript, assistants answer this with general advice from the web.

Claude Code

Claude Code can send headers, so the key goes in a header and the URL stays clean:

terminal

claude mcp add --transport http transcriptapi \
  https://api.transcriptapi.io/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer ta_your_key"

Or run the server process on your own machine from npm, the same package every other MCP client uses:

terminal

claude mcp add transcriptapi \
  -e TRANSCRIPTAPI_KEY=ta_your_key \
  -- npx -y transcriptapi-mcp

Restart the session and run /mcp to check that transcriptapi is connected. In Claude Code this is useful for turning a tutorial into code: give it a conference talk or a library walkthrough and ask it to build what was shown.

What Claude can do with it

Five tools, and Claude chains them on its own:

get_youtube_transcript: the transcript, with timestamps, as plain text, SRT or VTT, optionally translated
search_youtube: find videos by keyword
get_channel_videos: a channel's latest uploads
search_channel_videos: find the video where a channel talks about something
get_playlist_videos: a playlist, in order

Prompts that use them:

Find the video where @AndrejKarpathy builds a tokenizer and list every step he takes, with timestamps.

Summarise the last 5 uploads from @channel in 3 bullets each. Which one is about pricing?

Read this playlist and write a study guide: one section per video, key terms in bold. [playlist link]

Give me the SRT subtitles for this video, translated to Spanish. [link]

Search YouTube for reviews of X from the last year and compare what the reviewers disagree on.

For the first prompt, Claude searches the channel, finds Let's build the GPT Tokenizer (2 h 13 min), and reads the transcript. That's two credits.

Limits

Videos without captions have no transcript; the tool says so, and the call is refunded.
Private, members-only and age-restricted videos can't be read.
It reads what is said, not what is shown on screen.
Very long videos (three hours and more) use a lot of context. Ask for one part at a time if Claude starts skimming.

Frequently asked questions

Can Claude watch YouTube videos?

Not by itself. Claude can fetch the YouTube page, which gives it the title and description, not what is said. With a transcript connector it reads the captions with timestamps, so it can quote and summarise the actual content.

Do I have to set it up again for Claude Desktop and the mobile app?

No. A connector added on claude.ai belongs to your account, so it also appears in the Claude desktop and mobile apps. Claude Code is configured separately with one terminal command.

I don't see 'Add custom connector'.

On Team and Enterprise plans an owner may have to allow custom connectors first. If you are on a personal plan and the option is missing, update the app or use claude.ai in the browser.

What does it cost?

A free key has 20 credits and needs no card. Each transcript or search is one credit, a transcript you already fetched is free from cache, and failed calls (for example, a video without captions) are refunded.

Is it safe to put my key in the URL?

The URL is stored in your Claude account like any connector setting. Our access logs record the path as /mcp without the key, and you can rotate the key from the dashboard at any time.

Setup for Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf and other clients is on the MCP server page.