https://github.com/jdepoix/youtube-transcript-api

This is a python API which allows you to get the transcript/subtitles for a given YouTube video. It also works for automatically generated subtitles and it does not require an API key nor a headless browser, like other selenium based solutions do!
https://github.com/jdepoix/youtube-transcript-api
asr captions cli python subtitle subtitles transcript transcripts translating-transcripts youtube youtube-api youtube-asr youtube-captions youtube-subtitles youtube-transcript youtube-transcripts youtube-video
Last synced: about 1 month ago
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Host: GitHub
URL: https://github.com/jdepoix/youtube-transcript-api
Owner: jdepoix
License: mit
Created: 2018-04-20T13:55:04.000Z (about 7 years ago)
Default Branch: master
Last Pushed: 2025-04-23T07:30:48.000Z (2 months ago)
Last Synced: 2025-05-07T10:52:33.201Z (about 2 months ago)
Topics: asr, captions, cli, python, subtitle, subtitles, transcript, transcripts, translating-transcripts, youtube, youtube-api, youtube-asr, youtube-captions, youtube-subtitles, youtube-transcript, youtube-transcripts, youtube-video
Language: Python
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Watchers: 39
Forks: 444
Open Issues: 15
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- Funding: .github/FUNDING.yml
- License: LICENSE
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README

        


  ✨ YouTube Transcript API ✨





  

    

  

  

    

  

  

    

  

  

    

  

  

    

  

  

    

  





  This is a python API which allows you to retrieve the transcript/subtitles for a given YouTube video. It also works for automatically generated subtitles, supports translating subtitles and it does not require a headless browser, like other selenium based solutions do!





 Maintenance of this project is made possible by all the contributors and sponsors. If you'd like to sponsor this project and have your avatar or company logo appear below click here. 💖





  

    

      

      

      

    

  

        

  

    

      

      

      

    

  

        

  

    

      

      

      

    

  



## Install

It is recommended to [install this module by using pip](https://pypi.org/project/youtube-transcript-api/):

```

pip install youtube-transcript-api

```

You can either integrate this module [into an existing application](#api) or just use it via a [CLI](#cli).

## API

The easiest way to get a transcript for a given video is to execute:

```python

from youtube_transcript_api import YouTubeTranscriptApi

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi()

ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

```

> **Note:** By default, this will try to access the English transcript of the video. If your video has a different 

> language, or you are interested in fetching a transcript in a different language, please read the section below.

> **Note:** Pass in the video ID, NOT the video URL. For a video with the URL `https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12345` 

> the ID is `12345`.

This will return a `FetchedTranscript` object looking somewhat like this:

```python

FetchedTranscript(

    snippets=[

        FetchedTranscriptSnippet(

            text="Hey there",

            start=0.0,

            duration=1.54,

        ),

        FetchedTranscriptSnippet(

            text="how are you",

            start=1.54,

            duration=4.16,

        ),

        # ...

    ],

    video_id="12345",

    language="English",

    language_code="en",

    is_generated=False,

)

```

This object implements most interfaces of a `List`:

```python

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi()

fetched_transcript = ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

# is iterable

for snippet in fetched_transcript:

    print(snippet.text)

# indexable

last_snippet = fetched_transcript[-1]

# provides a length

snippet_count = len(fetched_transcript)

```

If you prefer to handle the raw transcript data you can call `fetched_transcript.to_raw_data()`, which will return 

a list of dictionaries:

```python

[

    {

        'text': 'Hey there',

        'start': 0.0,

        'duration': 1.54

    },

    {

        'text': 'how are you',

        'start': 1.54

        'duration': 4.16

    },

    # ...

]

```

### Retrieve different languages

You can add the `languages` param if you want to make sure the transcripts are retrieved in your desired language 

(it defaults to english).

```python

YouTubeTranscriptApi().fetch(video_id, languages=['de', 'en'])

```

It's a list of language codes in a descending priority. In this example it will first try to fetch the german 

transcript (`'de'`) and then fetch the english transcript (`'en'`) if it fails to do so. If you want to find out 

which languages are available first, [have a look at `list()`](#list-available-transcripts).

If you only want one language, you still need to format the `languages` argument as a list

```python

YouTubeTranscriptApi().fetch(video_id, languages=['de'])

```

### Preserve formatting

You can also add `preserve_formatting=True` if you'd like to keep HTML formatting elements such as `` (italics) 

and `` (bold).


```python

YouTubeTranscriptApi().fetch(video_ids, languages=['de', 'en'], preserve_formatting=True)

```

### List available transcripts

If you want to list all transcripts which are available for a given video you can call:

```python

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi()

transcript_list = ytt_api.list(video_id)

```

This will return a `TranscriptList` object which is iterable and provides methods to filter the list of transcripts for 

specific languages and types, like:

```python

transcript = transcript_list.find_transcript(['de', 'en'])

```

By default this module always chooses manually created transcripts over automatically created ones, if a transcript in 

the requested language is available both manually created and generated. The `TranscriptList` allows you to bypass this 

default behaviour by searching for specific transcript types:

```python

# filter for manually created transcripts

transcript = transcript_list.find_manually_created_transcript(['de', 'en'])

# or automatically generated ones

transcript = transcript_list.find_generated_transcript(['de', 'en'])

```

The methods `find_generated_transcript`, `find_manually_created_transcript`, `find_transcript` return `Transcript` 

objects. They contain metadata regarding the transcript:

```python

print(

    transcript.video_id,

    transcript.language,

    transcript.language_code,

    # whether it has been manually created or generated by YouTube

    transcript.is_generated,

    # whether this transcript can be translated or not

    transcript.is_translatable,

    # a list of languages the transcript can be translated to

    transcript.translation_languages,

)

```

and provide the method, which allows you to fetch the actual transcript data:

```python

transcript.fetch()

```

This returns a `FetchedTranscript` object, just like `YouTubeTranscriptApi().fetch()` does.

### Translate transcript

YouTube has a feature which allows you to automatically translate subtitles. This module also makes it possible to 

access this feature. To do so `Transcript` objects provide a `translate()` method, which returns a new translated 

`Transcript` object:

```python

transcript = transcript_list.find_transcript(['en'])

translated_transcript = transcript.translate('de')

print(translated_transcript.fetch())

```

### By example

```python

from youtube_transcript_api import YouTubeTranscriptApi

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi()

# retrieve the available transcripts

transcript_list = ytt_api.list('video_id')

# iterate over all available transcripts

for transcript in transcript_list:

    # the Transcript object provides metadata properties

    print(

        transcript.video_id,

        transcript.language,

        transcript.language_code,

        # whether it has been manually created or generated by YouTube

        transcript.is_generated,

        # whether this transcript can be translated or not

        transcript.is_translatable,

        # a list of languages the transcript can be translated to

        transcript.translation_languages,

    )

    # fetch the actual transcript data

    print(transcript.fetch())

    # translating the transcript will return another transcript object

    print(transcript.translate('en').fetch())

# you can also directly filter for the language you are looking for, using the transcript list

transcript = transcript_list.find_transcript(['de', 'en'])  

# or just filter for manually created transcripts  

transcript = transcript_list.find_manually_created_transcript(['de', 'en'])  

# or automatically generated ones  

transcript = transcript_list.find_generated_transcript(['de', 'en'])

```

## Working around IP bans (`RequestBlocked` or `IpBlocked` exception)

Unfortunately, YouTube has started blocking most IPs that are known to belong to cloud providers (like AWS, Google Cloud 

Platform, Azure, etc.), which means you will most likely run into `ReuquestBlocked` or `IpBlocked` exceptions when 

deploying your code to any cloud solutions. Same can happen to the IP of your self-hosted solution, if you are doing 

too many requests. You can work around these IP bans using proxies. However, since YouTube will ban static proxies 

after extended use, going for rotating residential proxies provide is the most reliable option.

There are different providers that offer rotating residential proxies, but after testing different 

offerings I have found [Webshare](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) to be the most reliable and have 

therefore integrated it into this module, to make setting it up as easy as possible.

### Using [Webshare](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g)

Once you have created a [Webshare account](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) and purchased a 

"Residential" proxy package that suits your workload (make sure NOT to purchase "Proxy Server" or 

"Static Residential"!), open the 

[Webshare Proxy Settings](https://dashboard.webshare.io/proxy/settings?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) to retrieve 

your "Proxy Username" and "Proxy Password". Using this information you can initialize the `YouTubeTranscriptApi` as 

follows:

```python

from youtube_transcript_api import YouTubeTranscriptApi

from youtube_transcript_api.proxies import WebshareProxyConfig

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi(

    proxy_config=WebshareProxyConfig(

        proxy_username="",

        proxy_password="",

    )

)

# all requests done by ytt_api will now be proxied through Webshare

ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

```

Using the `WebshareProxyConfig` will default to using rotating residential proxies and requires no further 

configuration.

Note that [referral links are used here](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) and any purchases 

made through these links will support this Open Source project, which is very much appreciated! 💖😊🙏💖

However, you are of course free to integrate your own proxy solution using the `GenericProxyConfig` class, if you 

prefer using another provider or want to implement your own solution, as covered by the following section.

### Using other Proxy solutions

Alternatively to using [Webshare](#using-webshare), you can set up any generic HTTP/HTTPS/SOCKS proxy using the 

`GenericProxyConfig` class:

```python

from youtube_transcript_api import YouTubeTranscriptApi

from youtube_transcript_api.proxies import GenericProxyConfig

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi(

    proxy_config=GenericProxyConfig(

        http_url="http://user:[email protected]:port",

        https_url="https://user:[email protected]:port",

    )

)

# all requests done by ytt_api will now be proxied using the defined proxy URLs

ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

```

Be aware that using a proxy doesn't guarantee that you won't be blocked, as YouTube can always block the IP of your 

proxy! Therefore, you should always choose a solution that rotates through a pool of proxy addresses, if you want to

maximize reliability.

## Overwriting request defaults

When initializing a `YouTubeTranscriptApi` object, it will create a `requests.Session` which will be used for all

HTTP(S) request. This allows for caching cookies when retrieving multiple requests. However, you can optionally pass a

`requests.Session` object into its constructor, if you manually want to share cookies between different instances of

`YouTubeTranscriptApi`, overwrite defaults, set custom headers, specify SSL certificates, etc.

```python

from requests import Session

http_client = Session()

# set custom header

http_client.headers.update({"Accept-Encoding": "gzip, deflate"})

# set path to CA_BUNDLE file

http_client.verify = "/path/to/certfile"

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi(http_client=http_client)

ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

# share same Session between two instances of YouTubeTranscriptApi

ytt_api_2 = YouTubeTranscriptApi(http_client=http_client)

# now shares cookies with ytt_api

ytt_api_2.fetch(video_id)

```

## Cookie Authentication

Some videos are age restricted, so this module won't be able to access those videos without some sort of

authentication. To do this, you will need to have access to the desired video in a browser. Then, you will need to

download that pages cookies into a text file. You can use the Chrome extension

[Cookie-Editor](https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/cookie-editor/hlkenndednhfkekhgcdicdfddnkalmdm?hl=en) and

select "Netscape" during export, or the Firefox extension [cookies.txt](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/cookies-txt/).

Once you have that, you can use the following to access age-restricted videos' captions like so.

```python  

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi(cookie_path='/path/to/your/cookies.txt')

ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

```

## Using Formatters

Formatters are meant to be an additional layer of processing of the transcript you pass it. The goal is to convert a

`FetchedTranscript` object into a consistent string of a given "format". Such as a basic text (`.txt`) or even formats 

that have a defined specification such as JSON (`.json`), WebVTT (`.vtt`), SRT (`.srt`), Comma-separated format 

(`.csv`), etc...

The `formatters` submodule provides a few basic formatters, which can be used as is, or extended to your needs:

- JSONFormatter

- PrettyPrintFormatter

- TextFormatter

- WebVTTFormatter

- SRTFormatter

Here is how to import from the `formatters` module.

```python

# the base class to inherit from when creating your own formatter.

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import Formatter

# some provided subclasses, each outputs a different string format.

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import JSONFormatter

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import TextFormatter

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import WebVTTFormatter

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import SRTFormatter

```

### Formatter Example

Let's say we wanted to retrieve a transcript and store it to a JSON file. That would look something like this:

```python

# your_custom_script.py

from youtube_transcript_api import YouTubeTranscriptApi

from youtube_transcript_api.formatters import JSONFormatter

ytt_api = YouTubeTranscriptApi()

transcript = ytt_api.fetch(video_id)

formatter = JSONFormatter()

# .format_transcript(transcript) turns the transcript into a JSON string.

json_formatted = formatter.format_transcript(transcript)

# Now we can write it out to a file.

with open('your_filename.json', 'w', encoding='utf-8') as json_file:

    json_file.write(json_formatted)

# Now should have a new JSON file that you can easily read back into Python.

```

**Passing extra keyword arguments**

Since JSONFormatter leverages `json.dumps()` you can also forward keyword arguments into 

`.format_transcript(transcript)` such as making your file output prettier by forwarding the `indent=2` keyword argument.

```python

json_formatted = JSONFormatter().format_transcript(transcript, indent=2)

```

### Custom Formatter Example

You can implement your own formatter class. Just inherit from the `Formatter` base class and ensure you implement the 

`format_transcript(self, transcript: FetchedTranscript, **kwargs) -> str` and 

`format_transcripts(self, transcripts: List[FetchedTranscript], **kwargs) -> str` methods which should ultimately 

return a string when called on your formatter instance.

```python

class MyCustomFormatter(Formatter):

    def format_transcript(self, transcript: FetchedTranscript, **kwargs) -> str:

        # Do your custom work in here, but return a string.

        return 'your processed output data as a string.'

    def format_transcripts(self, transcripts: List[FetchedTranscript], **kwargs) -> str:

        # Do your custom work in here to format a list of transcripts, but return a string.

        return 'your processed output data as a string.'

```

## CLI

Execute the CLI script using the video ids as parameters and the results will be printed out to the command line:  

```  

youtube_transcript_api   ...  

```  

The CLI also gives you the option to provide a list of preferred languages:  

```  

youtube_transcript_api   ... --languages de en  

```

You can also specify if you want to exclude automatically generated or manually created subtitles:

```  

youtube_transcript_api   ... --languages de en --exclude-generated

youtube_transcript_api   ... --languages de en --exclude-manually-created

```

If you would prefer to write it into a file or pipe it into another application, you can also output the results as 

json using the following line:  

```  

youtube_transcript_api   ... --languages de en --format json > transcripts.json

```  

Translating transcripts using the CLI is also possible:

```  

youtube_transcript_api   ... --languages en --translate de

```  

If you are not sure which languages are available for a given video you can call, to list all available transcripts:

```  

youtube_transcript_api --list-transcripts 

```

If a video's ID starts with a hyphen you'll have to mask the hyphen using `\` to prevent the CLI from mistaking it for 

a argument name. For example to get the transcript for the video with the ID `-abc123` run:

```

youtube_transcript_api "\-abc123"

```

### Working around IP bans using the CLI

If you are running into `ReqestBlocked` or `IpBlocked` errors, because YouTube blocks your IP, you can work around this 

using residential proxies as explained in 

[Working around IP bans](#working-around-ip-bans-requestblocked-or-ipblocked-exception). To use

[Webshare "Residential" proxies](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) through the CLI, you will have to 

create a [Webshare account](https://www.webshare.io/?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g) and purchase a "Residential" proxy 

package that suits your workload (make sure NOT to purchase "Proxy Server" or "Static Residential"!). Then you can use 

the "Proxy Username" and "Proxy Password" which you can find in your 

[Webshare Proxy Settings](https://dashboard.webshare.io/proxy/settings?referral_code=w0xno53eb50g), to run the following command:

```

youtube_transcript_api   --webshare-proxy-username "username" --webshare-proxy-password "password"

```

If you prefer to use another proxy solution, you can set up a generic HTTP/HTTPS proxy using the following command:

```

youtube_transcript_api   --http-proxy http://user:pass@domain:port --https-proxy https://user:pass@domain:port

```

### Cookie Authentication using the CLI

To authenticate using cookies through the CLI as explained in [Cookie Authentication](#cookie-authentication) run:

```

youtube_transcript_api   --cookies /path/to/your/cookies.txt

```

## Warning  

This code uses an undocumented part of the YouTube API, which is called by the YouTube web-client. So there is no 

guarantee that it won't stop working tomorrow, if they change how things work. I will however do my best to make things 

working again as soon as possible if that happens. So if it stops working, let me know!  

## Contributing

To setup the project locally run the following (requires [poetry](https://python-poetry.org/docs/) to be installed):

```shell

poetry install --with test,dev

```

There's [poe](https://github.com/nat-n/poethepoet?tab=readme-ov-file#quick-start) tasks to run tests, coverage, the 

linter and formatter (you'll need to pass all of those for the build to pass):

```shell

poe test

poe coverage

poe format

poe lint

```

If you just want to make sure that your code passes all the necessary checks to get a green build, you can simply run:

```shell

poe precommit

```

## Donations

If this project makes you happy by reducing your development time, you can make me happy by treating me to a cup of 

coffee, or become a [Sponsor of this project](https://github.com/sponsors/jdepoix) :)  

[![Donate](https://www.paypalobjects.com/en_US/i/btn/btn_donateCC_LG.gif)](https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=BAENLEW8VUJ6G&source=url)
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✨ YouTube Transcript API ✨
