youtube-transcript-mcp

Why This MCP Server?

Connect Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, or any MCP client to YouTubeTranscript.dev — no custom code. Your AI assistant gets tools to extract transcripts, list history, and manage content at scale.

• ⚡ Fast caption extraction — Manual or auto captions, returns in seconds

• 📚 Transcript history — List, search, and paginate your transcripts

• 🎯 Full control — Get stats, delete transcripts, fetch by video ID

• 🔌 One config — Works with Claude, Cursor, Windsurf, VS Code, Cline

• 🔒 User-owned keys — API key per connection, no server-side secrets

→ Get your free API key

Related MCP server: youtube-summarize

Quick Start

1. Get Your API Key

Sign up at youtubetranscript.dev and grab your API key from the Dashboard.

2. Connect Your Client

Connect to https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev with header x-api-token: YOUR_API_KEY. No local setup required.

See QUICK_TEST.md for step-by-step setup and testing.

Run locally (optional): npm install && npm run build && npm run start:http — then connect to http://localhost:8080.

MCP Connection Settings

Claude Code

claude mcp add --transport http ytscribe https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev --header "x-api-token: YOUR_API_KEY"

Claude Desktop

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ytscribe": {
      "url": "https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev",
      "headers": { "x-api-token": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
    }
  }
}

Cursor

.cursor/mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ytscribe": {
      "url": "https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev",
      "headers": { "x-api-token": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
    }
  }
}

Windsurf

~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ytscribe": {
      "serverUrl": "https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev",
      "headers": { "x-api-token": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
    }
  }
}

VS Code + Copilot

settings.json:

{
  "mcp": {
    "servers": {
      "ytscribe": {
        "url": "https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev",
        "headers": { "x-api-token": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
      }
    }
  }
}

Cline

Add to your Cline MCP config (format may vary by Cline version):

{
  "ytscribe": {
    "url": "https://mcp.youtubetranscript.dev",
    "headers": { "x-api-token": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
  }
}

Replace YOUR_API_KEY with your API key from youtubetranscript.dev/dashboard/account.

Configuration

Server Environment (for deployment)

Note: The API key is not set in server env for HTTP mode. Users provide it via x-api-token or Authorization: Bearer when connecting. For stdio mode, set YTSM_API_KEY in env.

Tools Reference

get_stats

Credits left, transcripts created, plan, rate limit. No parameters.

transcribe_v2

Fast caption-based transcript (no ASR). Uses manual or auto captions only.

list_transcripts

List transcript history for the authenticated user.

get_transcript

Get full transcript by video_id.

delete_transcript

Delete transcript records.

*Provide at least one of ids or video_id.

Deployment (Optional)

For production, deploy to a service that supports long-lived connections (e.g. Cloud Run, Railway, Fly.io). Avoid serverless (Vercel, Lambda) for MCP — timeouts and concurrency limits cause issues.

docker build -f Dockerfile.cloudrun -t gcr.io/YOUR_PROJECT/youtube-transcript-mcp .
docker push gcr.io/YOUR_PROJECT/youtube-transcript-mcp
gcloud run deploy youtube-transcript-mcp --image gcr.io/YOUR_PROJECT/youtube-transcript-mcp ...

Stdio (Alternative)

Run as a subprocess instead of HTTP. Required: set YTSM_API_KEY in env (API key is not passed per-request for stdio).

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ytscribe": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["dist/index.js"],
      "env": { "YTSM_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY" }
    }
  }
}

Run from the project directory after npm run build. For globally installed package, use the path to dist/index.js in the package.

Development

npm install
npm run build
npm test
npm run start:http   # Local HTTP server (port 8080)

Quick test all tools (requires YTSM_API_KEY in env):

npm install && npm run build
export YTSM_API_KEY=your_key   # bash/mac
$env:YTSM_API_KEY="your_key"   # PowerShell
npm run test:all

See QUICK_TEST.md for full testing instructions.

Links

• 🌐 YouTubeTranscript.dev

• 🔌 Hosted MCP

• 📖 API Documentation

• 💰 Pricing

License

MIT License — see LICENSE for details.