Why Your YouTube Transcript Isn't Working
YouTube's transcript button is unreliable. It depends on UI state, device, region, and how the creator configured the video — and it breaks in a handful of common ways. The captions almost always still exist; YouTube just isn't showing them. Here's what's going on, and how to get the transcript anyway.
Transcript button is missing entirely
The "Show transcript" option only appears under the "..." menu on desktop, and only if YouTube has surfaced captions for the player. On mobile web and the YouTube app, the button is buried or absent. Embedded players never show it. Paste the URL above and we read the caption track directly, regardless of what the player UI is doing.
"Transcript is not available for this video"
YouTube shows this when the player can't fetch a caption track for your session — but auto-generated captions usually exist server-side. Our tool requests the caption track from YouTube's player API directly, so it works even when the front-end says it doesn't.
Transcript is greyed out
A disabled transcript control typically means you're watching from a restricted region, on a device that doesn't support captions for that video, or in an embed. The captions are still in the manifest — we pull them out.
Brand-new video has no transcript yet
YouTube needs 5–30 minutes to run automatic speech recognition on freshly uploaded videos. If you're hitting a video that just dropped, give it a few minutes and try again — our tool will pick up the ASR track as soon as it's available.
Creator disabled captions
Some creators turn off auto-generated captions in YouTube Studio. In that case there's no caption track at all — no third-party tool can extract one. Your only option is a separate transcription service (e.g. Whisper) that downloads the audio and re-transcribes it.
Livestream replay or YouTube Short
Livestream replays usually get auto-captions once post-processing finishes (can take an hour after the stream ends). YouTube Shorts frequently have no captions at all — that's a platform-side decision, not a bug in any tool.
Private or age-restricted video
Private and unlisted videos require sign-in, so an external tool can't reach them. Age-restricted videos sometimes work, sometimes don't — try pasting the URL above; if it returns "no captions," the restriction is the cause.
YouTube 逐字稿按鈕失效時，如何取得字幕
大家用 YouTube 逐字稿做什麼
不用再反覆暫停和倒帶。取得完整逐字稿，貼到筆記 App，或讓 AI 幫你整理成結構化筆記。
在看外語影片？複製逐字稿，讓 ChatGPT 或 Claude 翻譯成你的母語。
沒時間看完整影片？把逐字稿貼到 AI，幾秒就能拿到精簡摘要。
把 YouTube 影片內容改寫成部落格文章、社群貼文、電子報或節目筆記 — 讓 AI 承擔繁重工作。
擷取引用、搜尋特定資訊，或讓 AI 從長篇講座或訪談中歸納出提到的每一個事實。
把任何教學影片變成學習指南。讓 AI 根據 YouTube 逐字稿製作單字卡、測驗或考前摘要。
常見問題
為什麼有些影片沒有 YouTube 逐字稿按鈕？
只有當 YouTube 已備好字幕、且創作者沒有停用時，逐字稿按鈕才會出現。它在年齡限制影片、自動字幕仍在處理的新上傳影片、直播回放和 Shorts 上經常被隱藏。在上方貼上影片連結，我們會直接擷取字幕軌 — 無需逐字稿按鈕。
YouTube 顯示「此影片沒有逐字稿」，怎麼辦？
YouTube 只有在其介面無法呈現字幕時才會顯示該訊息，但字幕通常仍存在於伺服器端。我們的工具讀取原始字幕軌（包括自動產生的 ASR），並以乾淨的文字顯示。只需在上方貼上連結。
為什麼手機上不顯示 YouTube 逐字稿？
YouTube 手機 App 把逐字稿選項藏在好幾層選單裡，iOS Safari 版本則常常根本不顯示。我們的工具在任何裝置的任何瀏覽器上都能用 — 貼上 YouTube 連結，即時拿到完整逐字稿。
逐字稿是灰色的 — 還能取得嗎？
逐字稿變灰通常代表 YouTube 播放器無法在你目前的檢視（手機網頁、嵌入播放器或受限地區）算繪字幕。字幕其實仍然存在 — 在上方貼上連結，我們直接幫你擷取。
為什麼剛發布的 YouTube 影片沒有逐字稿？
YouTube 的自動產生字幕在上傳後需要 5–30 分鐘處理。如果影片剛剛發布，等幾分鐘再試。字幕軌一備好，我們的工具就會抓到。
直播或 YouTube Shorts 能取得逐字稿嗎？
大多數直播回放在處理完成後會有自動字幕。Shorts 往往根本不產生字幕 — 那就沒有任何工具可擷取的內容。需要登入的私人或非公開影片，外部工具無法擷取。
這個工具免費嗎？
是的，完全免費。無需註冊、無需帳號、沒有限制 — 貼上 YouTube 連結就能複製逐字稿。
這和 SubKun 是什麼關係？
同一個團隊。如果你想在觀看時取得即時雙語字幕或 AI 摘要，可以試試 SubKun。