TranscriptFetch MCP Server

A Model Context Protocol server that gives any MCP client (Claude Desktop, Cursor, and others) access to the TranscriptFetch API: a production transcript API for YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, with AI transcription when captions are missing. Fetch transcripts, search videos, list channels and playlists, and check your credit balance.

Get an API key

1. Create a free account at transcriptfetch.com. No card needed.
2. Open Dashboard, then API keys and create a key. It starts with tf_live_.
3. Put it in TRANSCRIPTFETCH_API_KEY in the client configuration below.

Every account gets 50 free credits a month. Failures are free: a fetch that returns no transcript is never charged.

Runs locally over stdio and calls the TranscriptFetch API with your key. Prefer a hosted, remote server? Point your client at https://transcriptfetch.com/mcp instead (OAuth or API key). The hosted server waits inline for short-form AI transcription, so no polling is needed there.

Tools

Tool	What it does
get_transcript	Transcript for a video: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, or a direct media URL. When a video has no captions but has speech, the audio is transcribed automatically; ai_fallback: true goes straight to the audio. Optional markdown (timestamped, linked paragraphs), chunks (about 500 tokens each, for a vector store) and timestamps: false for text only
search_videos	Search YouTube (default), TikTok or Instagram. On YouTube, filter by upload_date, duration and captions, and sort by views
search_channels	Find YouTube channels (default) or playlists by keyword
list_channel_videos	A YouTube channel's videos, Shorts or live streams (tab), sorted newest, popular or oldest, or searched with query; also a TikTok or Instagram profile
list_channel_playlists	A YouTube channel's playlists, or its podcasts
list_playlist_videos	A YouTube or TikTok playlist's videos
get_credits	Remaining credit balance for the key. Never billed

These are the same seven tools, with the same inputs, as the hosted server at https://transcriptfetch.com/mcp: npm run sync-tools regenerates them from its public card.

Pricing is per successful result: a caption fetch or a video list costs 1 credit, and AI transcription of the audio costs 1 credit per started 5 minutes of audio, charged only on delivery. Failed, blocked and empty results are never charged, which matters on short-form video where many clips have no speech at all.

Install

No install needed. Run it on demand with npx:

TRANSCRIPTFETCH_API_KEY=tf_live_... npx -y transcriptfetch-mcp

Or install globally:

npm install -g transcriptfetch-mcp

Requires Node 18+.

Run from source

git clone https://github.com/TranscriptFetch/mcp-server
cd mcp-server && npm install && npm run build

Then point your client at the built entrypoint with "command": "node" and "args": ["/absolute/path/to/mcp-server/dist/index.js"].

Client configuration

Claude Desktop

Add this to claude_desktop_config.json (Settings then Developer then Edit Config):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "transcriptfetch": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "transcriptfetch-mcp"],
      "env": { "TRANSCRIPTFETCH_API_KEY": "tf_live_..." }
    }
  }
}

Cursor

Add the same block under mcpServers in your Cursor MCP settings.

Restart the client, and the five tools appear.

Example

Once connected, ask your assistant naturally:

Get the transcript for https://youtu.be/aircAruvnKk and summarize the key points.

Search YouTube for "how transformers work" and list the top 5 videos.

List the latest videos from @lexfridman and pull the transcript of the newest one.

How many TranscriptFetch credits do I have left?

The assistant picks the matching tool and works from the returned transcript or video list.

Configuration

Env var	Required	Default
TRANSCRIPTFETCH_API_KEY	yes	none
TRANSCRIPTFETCH_BASE_URL	no	https://transcriptfetch.com

Docker

The server speaks MCP over stdio, so there is no port to expose. -i is required: without an attached stdin the transport closes immediately and the container looks like it crashed.

docker build -t transcriptfetch-mcp .
docker run --rm -i -e TRANSCRIPTFETCH_API_KEY=tf_live_... transcriptfetch-mcp

Links

• API docs: https://transcriptfetch.com/docs?utm_source=github&utm_medium=mcp&utm_campaign=youtube-tiktok-instagram-transcript-mcp
• MCP docs: https://transcriptfetch.com/docs/mcp?utm_source=github&utm_medium=mcp&utm_campaign=youtube-tiktok-instagram-transcript-mcp
• Node SDK: https://github.com/TranscriptFetch/transcript-api-node
• Python SDK: https://github.com/TranscriptFetch/transcript-api-python

License

MIT