youtube-full — YouTube transcript, search, channels & playlists via TranscriptAPI

YouTube transcripts, video search, channel browsing, in-channel search, playlist extraction, and new-upload monitoring — all via TranscriptAPI. Processes 500K+ transcripts daily, fast. No yt-dlp, no headless browsers, no Google API key.

This is the API-backed alternative to ingest-youtube. Where ingest-youtube uses yt-dlp (which stops working on cloud server IPs), youtube-full calls TranscriptAPI's API and works from any runtime — local machine, cloud server, serverless function, or CI environment. 686 installs via the skills CLI (skills.sh/zeropointrepo/youtube-skills).

When to Use This Skill

• User asks to get, fetch, or retrieve a YouTube video transcript
• User asks to search YouTube for videos on a topic
• User wants to monitor a channel for new uploads
• User needs channel metadata, video lists, or playlist contents
• Agent is deployed on a cloud server where yt-dlp calls fail (YouTube blocks cloud IPs)
• Building a research corpus from YouTube conference talks, tutorials, or interviews
• Competitive intelligence: monitoring competitor channels for new content

Do NOT use for:

• Downloading actual video or audio files (use yt-dlp directly with -f best)
• YouTube comments, likes, or engagement data (not in API)
• Private or age-restricted videos (not accessible without user authentication)
• Live stream transcripts (not stable until stream ends)

How It Works

Step 1: Install the skill

npx skills add ZeroPointRepo/youtube-skills --skill youtube-full

100 free credits included. API key is provisioned automatically via TranscriptAPI OAuth on first invocation — no manual setup.

Step 2: Use it by asking Claude

Get the transcript of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID
Search YouTube for "LLM reasoning 2026" and summarize the top 3 results
What are the latest uploads on @3Blue1Brown?
List all videos in this playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAYLIST_ID

Step 3: Available operations

Failed or rate-limited calls cost zero credits.

Examples

Example 1: Research corpus from conference talks

Search YouTube for "NeurIPS 2025 keynote" and get transcripts for the top 5 results. 
Summarize the main themes across all talks.

The agent calls search_youtube, selects the top 5 results, calls get_transcript for each, and synthesizes.

Example 2: Competitive channel monitoring

Check @AnthropicAI and @OpenAI channels for any new videos in the last week. 
For each new video, get the transcript and extract any product announcements.

The agent calls channel_latest (free) for each channel, fetches transcripts of new uploads, and extracts signal.

Example 3: Direct transcript with timestamps

Get the full transcript with timestamps for https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ

The agent calls get_transcript(video_id, timestamps=true) and returns the full text.

Best Practices

• Use channel_latest (free) before get_transcript to check if a video is new
• Cache transcripts in your workflow — each get_transcript call costs 1 credit
• Use search_in_channel when you already know the channel to avoid broad search noise
• Prefer get_playlist_videos for course or lecture series — cheaper than searching by query
• Don't batch-transcribe entire channels unless the user explicitly requested it
• Don't use search_youtube when you already have the video URL — jump straight to get_transcript

Limitations

• This skill does not replace environment-specific validation, testing, or expert review.
• Stop and ask for clarification if required inputs, permissions, or safety boundaries are missing.
• Transcripts are available only when YouTube has captions (manual or auto-generated). Some videos have no captions.
• API key is required for paid usage beyond the free 100-credit tier. Get one at transcriptapi.com.
• Rate limits apply: 200 RPM on Monthly plan, 300 RPM on Annual. Contact support for higher limits.

Security & Safety Notes

• This skill makes HTTPS API calls to transcriptapi.com. No local data is written.
• The API key is stored in the agent's credential store, not in this SKILL.md.
• No shell commands, no binary execution, no local system mutation. Risk level: safe.

Common Pitfalls

• Problem: yt-dlp fails when the agent runs on a cloud server.
  Solution: This is exactly the use case for youtube-full. The API routes through TranscriptAPI's infrastructure and works from any cloud runtime.

• Problem: Credit balance runs out mid-workflow.
  Solution: Use channel_latest (free) to check before fetching; use targeted search to fetch only the videos you need.

• Problem: Transcript is not available for a video.
  Solution: The API returns a structured error (zero credits charged). Ask the user to provide an alternative source.

Related Skills

• @ingest-youtube — yt-dlp-based local ingestion to a markdown vault; works locally but not on cloud servers
• @deep-research — General-purpose research skill that can incorporate youtube-full as a data source
• @ai-research-corpus — Building searchable knowledge bases; pairs well with youtube-full for video content