Legal

By accessing or using TranscriptFetch (the “Service”) - including the website, API, MCP server, and the free transcript tool - you agree to these terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.

The service

TranscriptFetch fetches publicly available YouTube transcripts and video metadata and returns them as structured data. We do not host video content; we retrieve captions and metadata on your request.

Content & intellectual property

TranscriptFetch does not own the transcripts, captions, or metadata returned by the Service; those remain the property of their respective creators and rights holders. No ownership or intellectual-property rights in any fetched content are transferred to you, and you are responsible for obtaining any rights necessary for your intended use of that content. We grant you only a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to access the Service and use the API in accordance with these terms; the TranscriptFetch name, software, and site remain our property, and these terms grant you no rights in them beyond that use.

Accounts & API keys

You are responsible for activity under your account and API keys. Keep your keys secret; you can revoke and rotate them at any time from your dashboard. Notify us promptly of any unauthorized use.

Acceptable use

Use the Service lawfully. Do not abuse, overload, or attempt to circumvent rate limits or access controls; do not resell raw access in violation of these terms. You are responsible for ensuring your use of fetched transcripts complies with YouTube's Terms of Service, applicable copyright law, and the rights of content owners.

The Service is intended solely for publicly available content. Do not use it to access, or attempt to access, private, unlisted, age-gated, members-only, or otherwise access-restricted content, or any content requiring authentication.

Where content you fetch includes personal data, you must have a lawful basis to process it and must comply with all applicable data-protection laws (including the GDPR and CCPA where they apply).

Credits & billing

The API is credit-based: one credit per successful response. New accounts receive free starter credits. Paid plans and one-time top-ups are billed through Stripe and grant credits per the pricing page. Subscriptions renew until cancelled; you can manage or cancel billing from your dashboard. Except where required by law, payments are non-refundable.

Free tool

The free transcript tool is rate-limited and provided for personal, evaluation use on an “as is” basis. For higher limits and programmatic access, use the API.

Availability, warranties & liability

The Service is provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. We do not guarantee uninterrupted availability or that any specific video has an available transcript, and we do not warrant that fetched transcripts, captions, or metadata are accurate, complete, or free of third-party rights. You are solely responsible for determining whether your use of any fetched content is lawful. To the maximum extent permitted by law, TranscriptFetch is not liable for indirect, incidental, or consequential damages, and our total liability is limited to the amount you paid us in the three months preceding the claim.

Indemnification

You agree to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless TranscriptFetch and its officers, employees, and agents from and against any claims, damages, liabilities, losses, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or related to (a) your use of the Service, (b) your use of any content fetched through the Service, (c) your violation of these terms, or (d) your violation of any law or the rights of any third party, including any platform's terms of service or any content owner's intellectual-property rights.

Governing law & disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of the State of [your LLC's state], United States, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. Any dispute arising out of or relating to these terms or the Service will be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the state and federal courts located in [your LLC's state], United States, and you consent to personal jurisdiction there. Nothing in this section limits any mandatory consumer-protection rights you may have under the laws of your place of residence.

Termination & changes

We may suspend or terminate access for violations of these terms or to protect the Service. We may update these terms; material changes take effect when posted here, and continued use constitutes acceptance.

This policy explains what we collect, how we use it, and who we share it with.

Information we collect

• Account data - your email and authentication details, handled by our auth provider (Clerk).
• Usage data - API requests, the sources you fetch, credits used, timestamps, and IP address, used for billing, rate limiting, and abuse prevention.
• Free-tool data - for the unauthenticated free transcript tool we record your IP address and a device fingerprint (a hash derived from browser/device properties such as screen size, timezone, language, and graphics capabilities) solely to rate-limit and prevent abuse of the paid infrastructure behind it. This is a legitimate-interest use; it does not use cookies or local storage, and these records are automatically deleted after 30 days.
• Payment data - processed by Stripe. We do not store full card numbers.
• Support data - messages you send us.

Cookies & analytics

We use privacy-focused product analytics (Microsoft Clarity) to understand how the site is used, and advertising/conversion measurement (Google) for our marketing. API-key fields are masked from session recordings.

Processors we use

We share data only with the service providers needed to run the Service: Clerk (authentication), Stripe (payments), Neon (database), Cloudflare (DNS, CDN, and TLS), Groq (speech recognition), Resend (transactional email), Microsoft Clarity (analytics), and Google (advertising). We do not sell your personal data.

A note on speech recognition, because it is the one case where content leaves our infrastructure: when a video you request has no caption track, we extract its audio and send it to Groq to be transcribed. This applies to most TikTok and Instagram posts. If you would rather never have audio sent to a third party, use only videos that already have captions. The current per-provider detail is on the security page.

Retention & security

We retain account and usage data for as long as your account is active and as needed for legal, billing, and security purposes. Anonymous free-tool records (IP address and device fingerprint) are automatically deleted after 30 days. We use reasonable technical and organizational measures to protect your data, but no method of transmission or storage is completely secure.

Your rights

You may request access to, correction of, or deletion of your personal data by contacting [email protected]. Deleting your account removes your associated data, subject to records we must retain by law.

Children

The Service is not directed to children under 13 (or the minimum age in your jurisdiction), and we do not knowingly collect their data.

Changes

We may update this policy; the “last updated” date above reflects the latest version.