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/transcriptapi

@41b232e
by Zero Point Studiozeropointrepo/youtube-skills987 stars
110

Use when YouTube is or could be relevant — even if not mentioned: pasted video/channel/playlist links, video IDs, @handles, creator lookups, video summaries, quotes, translations, topic research, tutorials, talks, lectures, expert discussions, product reviews, how-to guides, new product announcements, or anything where video content is fresher or richer than text search. Covers transcripts, video/channel search, channel browsing, playlists, and within-channel search. Not for uploads, account management, or written-source-only research.

Ask your Agent

Use this Skill: https://skilld.dev/gh/zeropointrepo/youtube-skills/transcriptapi

This session only. Nothing lands on disk.

SKILL.md

≈140 tokens always: the name and description. ≈2.7k when used: this file. ≈2.6k more on demand in 2 files.

TranscriptAPI

Full YouTube data toolkit via TranscriptAPI.com. Transcripts, search, channels, playlists — one API key.

Setup

If $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY is not set, read references/auth-setup.md and follow the instructions there to get and store the key.

Required Headers

Every request needs two headers:

  • Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
  • User-Agent: your agent's name and version if known (e.g. HermesAgent/0.11.0, ClaudeCode/1.0). Version is optional — agent name alone is fine. Do not omit this header or send a bare default — Cloudflare will return a 403 (error code 1010) and block the request.

API Reference

Full OpenAPI spec: transcriptapi.com/openapi.json — consult this for the latest parameters and schemas.

Auth

All requests: -H "Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY"

Endpoints

Channel endpoints accept channel — an @handle, channel URL, or UC... ID. No need to resolve first. Playlist endpoints accept playlist — a playlist URL or ID.

GET /api/v2/youtube/transcript — 1 credit

GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/transcript?video_url=VIDEO_URL&format=text&include_timestamp=true&send_metadata=true
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Default Validation
video_url yes — YouTube URL or 11-char video ID
format no json json or text
include_timestamp no true true or false
send_metadata no false true or false

Accepts: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ID, https://youtu.be/ID, youtube.com/shorts/ID, or bare ID.

Response (format=json):

{
  "video_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "language": "en",
  "transcript": [
    { "text": "We're no strangers...", "start": 18.0, "duration": 3.5 }
  ],
  "metadata": { "title": "...", "author_name": "...", "author_url": "..." }
}

GET /api/v2/youtube/search — 1 credit

GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/search?q=QUERY&type=video&limit=20
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Default Validation
q yes — 1-200 chars (trimmed)
type no video video or channel
limit no 20 1-50

Response (type=video):

{
  "results": [
    {
      "type": "video",
      "videoId": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
      "title": "Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up",
      "channelId": "UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw",
      "channelTitle": "Rick Astley",
      "channelHandle": "@RickAstley",
      "channelVerified": true,
      "lengthText": "3:33",
      "viewCountText": "1.5B views",
      "publishedTimeText": "14 years ago",
      "hasCaptions": true,
      "thumbnails": [{ "url": "...", "width": 120, "height": 90 }]
    }
  ],
  "result_count": 20
}

Response (type=channel):

{
  "results": [
    {
      "type": "channel",
      "channelId": "UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw",
      "title": "Rick Astley",
      "handle": "@RickAstley",
      "subscriberCount": "4.2M subscribers",
      "verified": true,
      "rssUrl": "https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=UC..."
    }
  ],
  "result_count": 5
}

GET /api/v2/youtube/channel/resolve — FREE (0 credits)

GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/resolve?input=@TED
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Validation
input yes 1-200 chars — @handle, URL, or UC... ID

Response:

{ "channel_id": "UCsT0YIqwnpJCM-mx7-gSA4Q", "resolved_from": "@TED" }

If input is already a valid UC[a-zA-Z0-9_-]{22} ID, returns immediately without lookup.

GET /api/v2/youtube/channel/videos — 1 credit/page

# First page (100 videos)
GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/videos?channel=@NASA
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0

# Most-viewed first (channel Videos tab, ~30 videos)
GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/videos?channel=@NASA&sort=popular
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0

# Next pages (repeat the same sort)
GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/videos?continuation=TOKEN&sort=popular
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Validation
channel conditional @handle, channel URL, or UC... ID
tab no videos (default), shorts, or streams
sort no latest, popular, or oldest (omit for the uploads feed)
continuation conditional non-empty string (next pages)

Provide exactly one of channel or continuation.

Sorting. Add sort=latest, popular, or oldest to channel/videos to get a channel's videos in the order you want, for example its most-popular uploads first. A sorted page returns about 30 videos (an unsorted page returns about 100), and every page costs the same 1 credit.

When paging, send the same sort on each request.

Every item carries members_only, true only when YouTube badges it "Members only", and those items have no viewCountText. Items from tab=streams carry lengthText and publishedTimeText (for example Streamed 2 years ago); tab=shorts returns null for both, because YouTube's Shorts grid publishes neither. On the channel-tab feeds (tab=videos with sort, tab=shorts, tab=streams) channelId, channelTitle, channelHandle and index are null.

Response:

{
  "results": [{
    "videoId": "abc123xyz00",
    "title": "Latest Video",
    "channelId": "UCsT0YIqwnpJCM-mx7-gSA4Q",
    "channelTitle": "TED",
    "channelHandle": "@TED",
    "lengthText": "15:22",
    "viewCountText": "3.2M views",
    "publishedTimeText": "2 years ago",
    "thumbnails": [...],
    "index": "0",
    "members_only": false
  }],
  "playlist_info": {"title": "Uploads from TED", "numVideos": "5000"},
  "continuation_token": "4qmFsgKlARIYVVV1...",
  "has_more": true
}

GET /api/v2/youtube/channel/latest — FREE (0 credits)

GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/latest?channel=@TED
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Validation
channel yes @handle, channel URL, or UC... ID

Returns last 15 videos via RSS with exact view counts and ISO timestamps.

Response:

{
  "channel": {
    "channelId": "...",
    "title": "TED",
    "author": "TED",
    "url": "..."
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "videoId": "abc123xyz00",
      "title": "Latest Video",
      "published": "2026-01-30T16:00:00Z",
      "viewCount": "2287630",
      "description": "Full description...",
      "thumbnail": { "url": "...", "width": "480", "height": "360" }
    }
  ],
  "result_count": 15
}

GET /api/v2/youtube/channel/search — 1 credit

GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/channel/search?channel=@TED&q=climate+change&limit=30
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Validation
channel yes @handle, channel URL, or UC... ID
q yes 1-200 chars
limit no 1-50 (default 30)

GET /api/v2/youtube/playlist/videos — 1 credit/page

# First page
GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/playlist/videos?playlist=PL_PLAYLIST_ID
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0

# Next pages
GET https://transcriptapi.com/api/v2/youtube/playlist/videos?continuation=TOKEN
Authorization: Bearer $TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY
User-Agent: YourAgent/1.0
Param Required Validation
playlist conditional Playlist URL or ID (PL/UU/LL/FL/OL prefix)
continuation conditional non-empty string

Credit Costs

Endpoint Cost
transcript 1
search 1
channel/resolve free
channel/search 1
channel/videos 1/page
channel/latest free
playlist/videos 1/page

Errors

Code Meaning Action
401 Bad API key Check key, re-run setup
402 No credits Top up at transcriptapi.com/billing
403/1010 Cloudflare block Add or fix User-Agent header
404 Not found Video/channel/playlist doesn't exist or no captions
408 Timeout/retryable Retry once after 2s
422 Validation error Check param format
429 Rate limited Wait, respect Retry-After

Tips

  • When user shares YouTube URL with no instruction, fetch transcript and summarize key points.
  • Use channel/latest (free) to check for new uploads before fetching transcripts — pass @handle directly.
  • For research: search → pick videos → fetch transcripts.
  • Free tier: 100 credits, 300 req/min. Starter ($5/mo): 1,000 credits, 300 req/min.

Copy-paste examples

Every request in this file as a ready-to-run one-liner: references/curl-examples.md

Source: SKILL.md on GitHub

Third-party checks

1 alert10d5 checks · Risk SAFE
  • Gen Agent Trust Hub10d

    The skill provides a toolkit for YouTube data research. It includes automated authentication setup instructions that direct the agent to persist credentials in shell configuration files and use specific techniques to bypass output redaction filters during the signup process. It also processes external YouTube transcript data, creating a potential surface for indirect prompt injection.

  • Socket10d

    1 alert: gptMalware

  • Snyk10d

    Risk: MEDIUM · 1 issue

  • Runlayer7mo

    2/2 files flagged

  • ZeroLeaks5mo

    Score: 93/100 · 2 sections analyzed

Provenance

Signed by skilld at 41b232e. This ties the file your Agent reads to that commit on GitHub. It does not review the instructions.

Last checked against GitHub last week.

Activeupdated last week

Capability

version
1.5.4
user-invocable
true
Other metadata
compatibility
Requires internet access to reach transcriptapi.com. No additional runtimes or dependencies needed.
required_environment_variables
[
  {
    "name": "TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY",
    "prompt": "Your TranscriptAPI key (starts with sk_)",
    "help": "Free account at https://transcriptapi.com — 100 credits, no card required. Or let the agent create one for you.",
    "required_for": "all API requests"
  }
]
metadata
{
  "openclaw": {
    "emoji": "▶️",
    "requires": {
      "env": [
        "TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY"
      ]
    },
    "primaryEnv": "TRANSCRIPT_API_KEY",
    "homepage": "https://transcriptapi.com"
  },
  "hermes": {
    "tags": [
      "youtube",
      "transcripts",
      "video",
      "search",
      "channels",
      "playlists",
      "captions"
    ],
    "category": "media"
  }
}

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