YouTube Transcript Extractor MCP server

YouTube Transcript Extractor is a command-line tool that extracts transcripts from YouTube videos. It supports various URL formats and can output transcripts with optional timestamps, making it easy to obtain text content from any YouTube video.

Installation

To install the YouTube Transcript Extractor:

git clone https://github.com/tlofreso/mcp-youtube-transcripts.git
cd mcp-youtube-transcripts

The tool automatically manages its dependencies through the script header. You'll need Python 3.12 or higher installed on your system. The required packages (click and youtube_transcript_api) will be handled automatically.

Usage

Basic Command Format

python youtube_transcript.py <youtube-url> [options]

Available Options

• -o, --output: Specify output file path (default: prints to console)
• --timestamps/--no-timestamps: Include or exclude timestamps (default: include)

Examples

Extract transcript to console (with timestamps)

python youtube_transcript.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"

Save transcript to file without timestamps

python youtube_transcript.py "https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ" -o transcript.txt --no-timestamps

Process a YouTube embed URL

python youtube_transcript.py "https://www.youtube.com/embed/dQw4w9WgXcQ"

Supported URL Formats

The tool works with multiple YouTube URL formats:

• Standard watch URLs (youtube.com/watch?v=...)
• Shortened URLs (youtu.be/...)
• Embed URLs (youtube.com/embed/...)

Output Format

With Timestamps (Default)

[00:00:00] First line of the transcript
[00:00:03] Second line of the transcript
[00:00:07] Third line of the transcript

Without Timestamps

First line of the transcript
Second line of the transcript
Third line of the transcript

Error Messages

The tool provides helpful error messages when encountering issues such as:

• Videos with disabled transcripts
• Invalid or malformed YouTube URLs
• Network connectivity problems
• File permission issues
• Missing or invalid video IDs

How to install this MCP server

For Claude Code

To add this MCP server to Claude Code, run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add-json "youtube-transcript-extractor" '{"command":"python","args":["youtube_transcript.py"]}'

See the official Claude Code MCP documentation for more details.

For Cursor

There are two ways to add an MCP server to Cursor. The most common way is to add the server globally in the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file so that it is available in all of your projects.

If you only need the server in a single project, you can add it to the project instead by creating or adding it to the .cursor/mcp.json file.

Adding an MCP server to Cursor globally

To add a global MCP server go to Cursor Settings > Tools & Integrations and click "New MCP Server".

When you click that button the ~/.cursor/mcp.json file will be opened and you can add your server like this:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "youtube-transcript-extractor": {
            "command": "python",
            "args": [
                "youtube_transcript.py"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Adding an MCP server to a project

To add an MCP server to a project you can create a new .cursor/mcp.json file or add it to the existing one. This will look exactly the same as the global MCP server example above.

How to use the MCP server

Once the server is installed, you might need to head back to Settings > MCP and click the refresh button.

The Cursor agent will then be able to see the available tools the added MCP server has available and will call them when it needs to.

You can also explicitly ask the agent to use the tool by mentioning the tool name and describing what the function does.

For Claude Desktop

To add this MCP server to Claude Desktop:

1. Find your configuration file:

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

2. Add this to your configuration file:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "youtube-transcript-extractor": {
            "command": "python",
            "args": [
                "youtube_transcript.py"
            ]
        }
    }
}

3. Restart Claude Desktop for the changes to take effect