Video Transcript API: video URL in, full text out
Paste the URL of a TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, X, Facebook, LinkedIn or Reddit video and get back its public transcript as text: language, word count and every word said. Flat 5 credits, only charged when a transcript exists.
5
Credits per transcript
~$0.018-0.025 per video
0
Credits when none exists
no transcript, no charge
7
Platforms, one endpoint
TikTok to LinkedIn
secs
First live fetch
instant repeats for 7 days
What Video Transcript gives you
One URL in, the whole script out
The request is a single field, the video URL. The response is the full transcript text plus the facts around it: which platform the video is on, what language the transcript is in, and how many words it runs.
- Full transcript text
- Language of the transcript
- Word count
- Platform detected from the URL
Seven platforms, one endpoint
TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, X (Twitter), Facebook, LinkedIn and Reddit all go through the same endpoint with the same request shape. You never tell us the platform; the URL is enough, so one integration covers every video your users paste.
- TikTok, Instagram, YouTube
- X, Facebook, LinkedIn, Reddit
- One request shape
- One integration
Flat 5 credits at any length
A 30-second TikTok and a two-hour YouTube upload both cost 5 credits, because we pull the public transcript that already exists instead of transcribing audio by the minute. Long-form content is where the flat price pays off most.
- 5 credits, any duration
- No per-minute meter
- Long videos cost the same
- Predictable spend per URL
Zero credits when there is no transcript
Not every video has a transcript. When one does not, the response says transcript_available false and bills nothing, and upstream errors bill nothing either. You only ever pay for text you actually received.
- 0 credits on no transcript
- 0 credits on upstream errors
- Applies to bulk CSV jobs too
- Pay only for delivered text
About two cents per video
5 credits per found transcript is roughly $0.025 on the Starter plan and $0.018 on Growth. A 1,000-video sweep costs about $18 to $25, and only the videos with a transcript bill at all. Bulk runs take a CSV with a single url column.
- ~$0.018 per video on Growth
- ~$0.025 per video on Starter
- 1,000 videos for ~$18-25
- Bulk CSV, one url column
Seconds live, instant from cache
Each first lookup is a live fetch of the video's public transcript: typically a few seconds, up to a few minutes in the worst case, never sub-second. Repeat lookups of the same URL within 7 days return instantly from cache, so retries and re-reads are painless.
- Live fetch in seconds
- Worst case a few minutes
- Repeats instant for 7 days
- Built for async pipelines
URL in, script out
Send the video URL
POST the URL of any public video on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, X, Facebook, LinkedIn or Reddit. One field, one request shape, all seven platforms.
$ POST /v1/video-transcript
"url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX9..."
> any of 7 platforms, same request
We fetch the transcript live
We detect the platform from the URL and pull the video's public transcript, typically in a few seconds, up to a few minutes worst case. Repeats on the same URL within 7 days come straight from cache.
Platform detected: youtube
Public transcript located
Language and word count read
Fetching full text, a few seconds
Read the full text
Language, word count and the complete transcript land in one JSON payload, ready for an LLM, an editor or a compliance screen. A found transcript bills 5 credits; a video without one bills zero.
transcript_availabletrue
languageen
word_count1,284
One endpoint. A public video URL from any of 7 platforms in, structured data out.
Same authentication, same credit balance, and the same response envelope as every other 1Lookup product. If you have already integrated one endpoint, this one is a URL change.
curl -X POST https://app.1lookup.io/api/v1/video-transcript \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX92bT4aQ7c"
}'{
"classification": {
"matched": true,
"transcript_available": true,
"platform": "youtube",
"language": "en",
"word_count": 1284
},
"insights": {
"video_transcript_result": {
"platform": "youtube",
"url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX92bT4aQ7c",
"transcript_available": true,
"language": "en",
"word_count": 1284,
"transcript": "Today I want to walk you through exactly how I plan a week of content in one afternoon. The first thing I do is open last month's numbers..."
}
},
"metadata": { "credits_used": 5, "cache_hit": false }
}One URL, the whole script
A video URL either resolves to the full script or it does not. 1,284 words of what the creator actually said, with language and word count attached, is text you can feed to an LLM, quote in a blog post, or run through a compliance screen. A video with no transcript says so immediately and costs zero credits.
- PlatformYouTube
- Video URLyoutube.com/watch?v=kX92bT4aQ7c
- Transcript availabletrue
- Languageen
- Word count1,284
- Opens with“Today I want to walk you through exactly how I plan...”
- Billed5 credits, flat at any length
{
"classification": {
"matched": true,
"transcript_available": true,
"platform": "youtube",
"language": "en",
"word_count": 1284
},
"insights": {
"video_transcript_result": {
"transcript_available": true,
"language": "en",
"word_count": 1284,
"transcript": "Today I want to walk you through exactly how I plan a week of content in one afternoon..."
}
},
"metadata": { "credits_used": 5 }
}Every field you get back
No hidden tiers. Every field below is returned on a successful lookup at the price shown above.
Video
- platform
- url
Transcript status
- transcript_available
- language
- word_count
Content
- transcript
Who uses Video Transcript
AI products feeding video to LLMs
Your app needs to know what a video says before a model can summarise it, classify it or answer questions about it. One call turns any pasted video URL into clean text with a word count, ready to chunk, embed or drop straight into a prompt.
Content teams repurposing video
A video that performed becomes a blog post, a newsletter section and five quote graphics, but someone has to get the words out first. Pull the transcript in seconds and start editing text instead of scrubbing a timeline and retyping.
Compliance and brand-safety review
Nobody can watch every video a creator or affiliate publishes, but you can screen every transcript for claims, banned phrases and missing disclosures. Text is searchable at a scale video never is, and videos with no transcript cost nothing to check.
Researchers and SEO teams mining creator speech
What creators say in video mostly exists nowhere as text. Pull transcripts across a topic to count mentions, lift quotes for articles, or study how a product actually gets described, at about two cents per video.
Frequently asked questions
What does the Video Transcript API return?
Send the URL of a public social video and you get back the platform, whether a transcript exists, its language, a word count, and the full transcript text in one JSON response. It works on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, X (Twitter), Facebook, LinkedIn and Reddit videos. The request has a single field, url, so the whole integration is one POST call.
Which platforms are supported?
Seven: TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, X (Twitter), Facebook, LinkedIn and Reddit. Every platform uses the same endpoint and the same one-field request, just the video URL. You do not tell us which platform the video is on; we detect it from the URL and return it in the response, so one integration covers all seven.
Am I charged when a video has no transcript?
No. The lookup is success-billed: 5 credits are deducted only when a transcript is actually found, which the response marks with transcript_available true. A video with no transcript returns transcript_available false and costs zero credits. The same rule covers upstream errors: if we cannot hand you a transcript, the attempt bills nothing.
Does video length change the price?
No. It is a flat 5 credits per transcript whether the video runs 30 seconds or two hours, because we pull the public transcript that already exists rather than transcribing the audio by the minute. If you need per-minute transcription of your own files, with timestamps and speaker labels, that is our separate Audio Transcription product at 6 credits per minute.
How long does a lookup take?
The first lookup of a URL runs a live fetch of the video's public transcript. That typically takes a few seconds and can stretch to a few minutes in the worst case; it is never sub-second, so treat it as an async step rather than an inline blocking call. Repeat lookups of the same URL within 7 days return instantly from cache.
What does it cost in dollars?
5 credits per found transcript: about $0.025 on the Starter plan ($99 for 20,000 credits) and $0.018 on Growth ($299 for 85,000). Pulling transcripts for 1,000 videos costs roughly $18 to $25, and only the videos where a transcript is found bill at all. Credits come from the one balance shared by all 40 1Lookup products, so there is no separate subscription.
Should I use Video Transcript or Audio Transcription?
Use Video Transcript when the video is already public on a social platform and you want its existing transcript: flat 5 credits at any length, returned as plain text with language and word count. Use Audio Transcription when you have your own audio or video files by URL and need the audio transcribed: 6 credits per minute, with timestamps and speaker labels. A one-hour file is 360 credits there versus 5 here, so check for a public transcript first.
Can I run it in bulk?
Yes. Upload a CSV with a single url column and every row runs as one lookup in a single job. Billing matches single calls exactly: 5 credits per row where a transcript is found, zero for rows where none exists. A 10,000-row file where 80% of videos have transcripts costs 40,000 credits, about $141 on the Growth plan.