I’m struggling to get accurate transcripts from YouTube videos, and the ones I’m using keep missing words or get the timing wrong. I really need a reliable tool to generate transcripts from YouTube videos for my project. Has anyone found a generator that works well?
Man, YouTube’s own transcripts are bad enough to make you question if AI actually stands for “Absolutely Incoherent.” For decent results, you gotta look outside. Otter.ai is solid, but you only get so much free. Temi’s cheap and actually spits out stuff that sounds like the human language most of the time. Sonix is another, super accurate, but they act like bill collectors—won’t let you download squat unless you pay up. For free stuff, there’s YouTubeTranscript.com or that DIY hack: get the video’s auto-generated subtitles, plug 'em into Happy Scribe (you get a free trial), and correct whatever gibberish it makes up about three-headed llamas or whatever. If you want the nuclear option and have zero standards, Google Docs’ Voice Typing—play the video out loud and let it transcribe in another tab. Not the most elegant, but hey, desperate times. Bottom line, nothing is 100%—expect to do a little clean up, ‘cause the robots are still learning to speak YouTube.
Tbh, @kakeru covered a lot of ground, but I’m not sold on Otter.ai for anything with music or multiple speakers—last time I used it for a podcast, the transcript looked like a fever dream. Honestly, if you NEED line-by-line timestamps that actually match the vid, check out Descript. It’s not free, but the sync is solid and you get basic editing tools right there. I’ve also lucked out with Trint—it’s not perfect (weird accents trip it up), but you can zap through the transcript and it highlights the audio segment, which is a godsend if your source jumps around.
One hack nobody ever mentions: downloading the SRT subtitle file from YouTube using 4K Video Downloader or similar, then importing that into an app like Subtitle Edit. Helps with timing, and Subtitle Edit will auto-correct some stuff for you. And if you’re a coder, the YouTube API + some Python scripting can get you really granular control, but that’s way more headache than most people want.
PS—Don’t trust any “totally free and unlimited” online tool unless you want someone in Belarus reading your cat video analysis project. Still haven’t found anything perfect—every tool needs some cleanup, but I’d rather wrangle lines in Subtitle Edit than decipher what Google Docs Voice Typing thinks is English.
Let’s break this down with a pragmatic, no-BS checklist vibe. If YouTube auto-transcripts are failing you—that’s the universal pain—and Otter.ai, Temi, Sonix, and Trint (shoutout to the crew referencing these) aren’t cutting it or eat up your wallet, you’re clearly in the market for something rock-solid. However, nobody’s flagged ’ yet. This tool comes up if you’re scouring alternative lists and is worth a glance for getting readable, time-aligned transcripts.
Pros:
- Decent accuracy if the input audio is clear (no truck engines in the background, please).
- Gives you a text transcript in a snap—no labyrinthine UI or forced registration hurdles.
- Supports multiple export formats, which is a win if you’re toggling between SRT, TXT, or VTT for different workflows.
Cons:
- Not always perfect with timestamps, especially if people are talking over each other (common YouTube problem—blame the creators, not the tools).
- Free version usually comes with limits—expect to hit a wall if you binge-transcribe.
- As with most online tools, whisper-quiet on data privacy. Never throw confidential vids into any random website unless you’re fine with them ending up in some AI training dataset.
Competitors like Otter.ai (free tier is meh if you’re looking at more than a handful of transcripts) or Descript (elite if you want to tweak directly in the transcript) are solid, but '. slips in as a handy option when you want minimal friction. Best workflow? Use ’ for the initial capture, do a quick scan, and clean up with Subtitle Edit or even plain old Notepad if surplus timestamps and bracketed gibberish show up.
Bottom line: None of these solutions are magic. You’ll always need to sanity-check the transcript. ’ isn’t a silver bullet, but it speeds up what is otherwise painful. For most practical uses, especially if you’re cool with a quick-and-dirty approach, it deserves a test run in your next YouTube transcript sprint.