YouTube Transcript and Subtitle Downloader
Paste a YouTube link and keep the words: the subtitles as an SRT file, a clean plain-text transcript, or captions built into the MP4. Save them with the video, or save just the transcript.
- SRT subtitles
- Plain-text transcript
- Captions embedded in the MP4
- More than one language
- Transcript only, no video
Built by the team behind Hoverify, trusted by 26,000+ developers
Everything you need to save YouTube transcripts and subtitles.
One paste, and it’s yours, at the quality and format you want.
SRT, text, or built in
Save the subtitles as an SRT file next to the video, as plain text you can read and search, or embedded in the MP4 as a subtitle track that players can switch on and off.
A transcript you can actually read
YouTube's auto-captions repeat each line as they scroll. In plain-text mode Vidferry drops the timestamps, strips the markup and collapses those repeats, so you get the words once.
Just the words, if that's all you need
Hit Just the transcript and Vidferry saves the subtitles without downloading the video at all. Handy for a lecture, an interview or a talk you want to quote.
Every language the video has
Vidferry lists the languages a video actually offers. Pick one or several and each comes down as its own file, or its own track in the MP4.
The words, without the video
Sometimes the useful part of a video is what was said. A lecture you want to search, an interview you need to quote, a tutorial you’d rather read than watch at 2x. Vidferry saves the subtitles as a file you keep: press Just the transcript and it fetches the words alone, with no video download. Or turn on Save transcript and the subtitles come along next to the video, named to match.
Clean text, not caption soup
If you’ve ever copied YouTube’s auto-generated captions, you’ve seen the mess: every line appears two or three times, because the captions scroll in a rolling window, and timestamps sit between every phrase. Set Transcript format to Plain text and Vidferry cleans that up for you. It drops the timing, strips the formatting tags and collapses the repeated lines, so what you get reads like a transcript instead of a log file.
When a video has subtitles written by the uploader, Vidferry takes those first, since they’re usually more accurate than the automatic ones. The auto-captions are the fallback.
Subtitles that travel with the file
For watching rather than reading, keep the timing. An SRT file sits next to the MP4 and any player picks it up. If you’d rather have one file, choose Embed in video and the captions go inside the MP4 as a real subtitle track, one per language, that you can switch on and off. Pick several languages and each one gets its own file or track. It’s all done on your own Mac or PC, part of the same $12 app that handles the video downloads and clips.
How to download a YouTube transcript
Three steps, about a minute. No setup, no sign-up.
- 1
Copy the YouTube link
Copy the URL from the address bar or the Share button.
- 2
Turn on Save transcript
Paste it into Vidferry, switch on Save transcript and pick the languages. Or press Just the transcript to skip the video.
- 3
Save it
The subtitles land next to the video, named after it, or inside the MP4 if you chose Embed in video in Settings.
YouTube transcript and subtitle FAQ
Paste the link into Vidferry and press Just the transcript. It saves the video's subtitles without downloading the video itself. Set Transcript format to Plain text in Settings if you want clean text instead of an SRT file with timestamps.
An SRT file keeps the timing, so a video player can show each line at the right moment. Plain text drops the timing and the formatting and keeps only the words, which is what you want for reading, quoting or searching. Vidferry saves either, or embeds the subtitles in the MP4 so players show them as a normal subtitle track.
Usually, yes. Vidferry takes the uploader's own subtitles when a video has them, and falls back to YouTube's auto-generated captions when that's all there is. If a video has neither, there's no transcript to save.
Yes, on a single video. Vidferry lists the languages that video really has, and you can pick several. Each one comes down as its own file, or as its own track when you embed them. Playlists and batches use the one default language from Settings.
Yes. Set Transcript format to Embed in video, and the captions go into the MP4 as soft subtitles: a track you can turn on or off in VLC, QuickTime and most players, not text burned into the picture. Audio-only downloads get a separate file instead, since there's no video to embed into.
Yes. Turn on Save transcript before you download a playlist or channel and every video brings its subtitles along, in your default language. Just the transcript works on one video at a time.
Vidferry is $12 once for Mac and Windows, and transcripts come with it. Free transcript websites work for a single video, but they see every link you paste. Vidferry does the work on your own computer, with no account.
Ready to ferry?
Paste your first link in under a minute. $12 once, yours to keep, on Mac and PC.