How to Get the Transcript of a YouTube Video

Which method should you use?

It depends on whose video it is and whether you want to read, copy, or save the text.

3 ways to get a YouTube video transcript

All three methods are free. Pick the one that matches what you need to do with the text.

1. How to see the transcript on YouTube

YouTube can show a transcript for videos that have captions. The exact layout changes from time to time, but the steps usually look like this:

1. Open the video on YouTube in a desktop browser.
2. Click ...more under the video to expand the description.
3. Scroll down and click Show transcript. The transcript opens in a panel next to the video.
4. Click any line to jump to that moment in the video, or use the panel's search box to find a word.
5. To copy it, select the text in the panel. Each line is shown with its timestamp, so the times usually come along when you copy.

The panel has no download button, and in our check of the desktop layout on October 18, 2026, there was no visible option to hide the timestamps. If you want clean text or a file, use the second method.

In the YouTube mobile app, tap the video title or description, then scroll to Show transcript. Copying long passages on a phone can be fiddly, which is where a transcript tool helps.

If you don't see Show transcript, the video probably has no captions YouTube can display. Check that the description is fully expanded first, since the button sits near the end of it.

2. Copy or download it with PasteQuill

A transcript tool gets the whole text in one step, so you don't have to scroll and select. With the tool at the top of this page:

1. Copy the video link. Copy the link to one public YouTube video.
2. Get the transcript. Paste it into the tool at the top of this page and choose Get transcript. PasteQuill checks the video's existing captions first.
3. Copy or download. Read the text with timestamps, select Copy text, or download TXT (plain text) or SRT (timed subtitles).

Standard watch links, youtu.be links, Shorts, embed, and live links work. Playlist links don't. Results stay available for 24 hours. To copy the full text in one click, see how to copy a YouTube transcript; to save SRT or TXT files, use the subtitle downloader.

This is also the easiest route on a phone: open PasteQuill in your mobile browser, paste the link you copied from the YouTube app with Share and then Copy link, and use Copy text to get everything at once.

3. Download captions in YouTube Studio (your own videos)

If you uploaded the video, you can download its caption file from YouTube Studio:

1. Sign in to YouTube Studio.
2. From the left menu, select Subtitles.
3. Click the video.
4. Under Subtitles, click Edit next to the language you want.
5. Click Options and select Download subtitles.

These steps follow YouTube Help. Your browser downloads a file containing the caption track, which you can edit and upload again.

This only works for videos on a channel you manage. For anyone else's video, use the first or second method.

Auto-generated captions vs. creator captions

Every transcript method on this page reads a caption track, and YouTube videos can have two kinds. Creator captions are written or uploaded by the channel, so they usually have proper punctuation and correct spelling of names. Automatic captions are generated by YouTube's speech recognition. They're a huge help when a creator hasn't added captions, but they can mishear accents, names, numbers and technical terms, and they often come with little punctuation.

You can't change which captions a video has, but you can plan for them. If the text looks like one long run-on sentence, it's probably automatic. Read it with that in mind, add punctuation where you need it, and check anything you quote against the video.

What if the video has no transcript?

A transcript comes from the video's captions. If the creator didn't add captions and YouTube didn't generate them, there is nothing for Show transcript or a caption-based tool to return. For public videos up to 3 minutes, PasteQuill may offer free AI transcription, which you confirm before it starts. Private videos and age- or region-restricted videos may not work at all.

What to do with the transcript next

Once you have the text, the next step depends on your goal. To keep it, see how to download a YouTube transcript as a file, including where downloads go on a phone. To condense a long video, our guide to summarizing a YouTube video with ChatGPT has prompts you can copy. And if you're weighing other tools, see our comparison of the best YouTube transcript generators in 2026.

Check the transcript before you use it

Automatic captions can mishear names, numbers, and technical terms, and a transcript doesn't include slides or on-screen text. Use the timestamps to jump to the moment in the video and check any line you plan to quote. To turn the transcript into notes, see YouTube video to notes.

It also helps to keep the video link next to the text. A transcript without its source is hard to trust later, and the link lets you or anyone you share it with jump back to the exact moment a line was said. If you're collecting transcripts from several videos, put the title, channel and date at the top of each one so they stay easy to tell apart.

Ready to try it? Paste a link into the free YouTube transcript generator and copy the text or download TXT or SRT. No sign-up needed.