Free YouTube transcript
Get the text from a YouTube video
Paste a public link. Search the captions, copy them, or download SRT. From the same result you can save the audio, translate, or get a short recap — without pasting again.
How it works
Paste the link
A watch URL, Shorts, youtu.be, or the video id. No account. We read YouTube’s public caption tracks — we do not invent speech from the audio.
Read and export
Search lines, skip intros, copy the text, or download TXT, SRT, VTT, or Markdown. MP3 is the default audio download.
Stay on this video
The result URL uses ?v= and mode=text (not indexed). Audio, translation, a recap, and SRT stay on that same page.
Pick the job Google sent you for
Each landing is a different task. The box on this page is the same tool.
YouTube to text
Searchable transcript from public captions. Quotes, notes, timestamps.
YouTube to MP3
Soundtrack only. MP3 by default, or M4A, Opus, WAV.
Translate captions
YouTube tlang keeps cue times. Not a paragraph dump into a chat.
Chapter summary
Extractive recap from the captions, plus a prompt for your own model.
SRT / VTT
Timed subtitle files for VLC, editors, and HTML5 tracks.
FAQ
Is YouTubeForge free to use?
Yes. No account, no sign-up. Public YouTube captions are extracted as-is. Ads may appear around the tool.
How do I access the transcript after generating it?
Every result lives on the home URL with v= and mode=text. Optional query params: lang, tlang, and mode (audio, translate, summary, srt). Those URLs are noindex.
Can I download the transcript?
Yes. Download TXT, SRT, VTT, Markdown with timestamp links, or JSON. Copy and Copy Markdown are also available.
Is there a limit to the length of the video?
If YouTube has captions for a public video, YouTubeForge can load them. There is no extra length cap on our side.