Privacy Policy

1. What we collect

When you create an account via Google OAuth, we receive your name, email address, and Google account ID. We store these to identify your account, track your credit usage, and associate your download history with your account.

When you submit a YouTube URL for processing, we store that URL and the resulting job metadata (status, video count, format selected, timestamps) in order to display your history and allow re-downloads.

We do not store the transcript content itself after your ZIP file has been generated and downloaded.

2. How we use your data

Your data is used to provide the service (process transcript jobs, track credits, show download history), send transactional emails (receipts, credit low alerts), and improve the product based on aggregate usage patterns.

We do not sell your personal data. We do not use your data to train AI models.

3. Third-party services

We use the following third-party services to operate YouTube Video Transcript:

• Google OAuth for authentication. Google's privacy policy applies to that interaction.
• Stripe for payment processing. Stripe handles your payment information and billing. We do not store card details.
• TranscriptAPI.com for fetching YouTube transcript data. YouTube URLs you submit are sent to this service.
• Vercel for hosting the frontend. Request logs may be retained by Vercel per their data policy.
• Hetzner for hosting the backend and database. Servers are located in the EU.

4. Data retention

Download history is retained for 30 days. Account data is retained for as long as your account exists. You may request deletion of your account and associated data at any time by contacting us.

5. Cookies and analytics

We use a session cookie to keep you logged in. This cookie is strictly necessary and is always set.

With your consent, we also use Google Analytics 4 to understand how visitors use the site. Google Analytics sets cookies (typically _ga and _ga_*) and collects anonymous data such as pages viewed, device type, approximate location (country or region), referrer, and session duration. If the site hits a rendering error, we also send the error type, the page route you were on, and up to 100 characters of the React component stack to Google Analytics for diagnostics — we explicitly do not send the error message, URLs you paste, or anything you type. Your IP address is used only transiently by Google to derive that approximate location — it is not stored on our side, and GA4 forces IP anonymization for visitors in the EU. We do not collect your name, email, or any other personally identifying information through analytics.

Analytics is opt-in. The cookie banner you saw on your first visit controls this — clicking "Reject" prevents analytics from ever loading. You can change your choice at any time via the "Cookie settings" link in the footer. Google's handling of this data is governed by their privacy policy.

To measure which channels bring us new users, we also record the UTM parameters (utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign) or the referring site from your first visit and store them in your browser's localStorage. If you later create an account, this attribution label (for example reddit or referral:producthunt.com) is sent to Google Analytics alongside the sign-up event. It is never shared with any third party other than Google Analytics, and it contains no personally identifying information about you.

We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.

6. Your rights

You may request a copy of the data we hold about you, request correction of inaccurate data, or request deletion of your account. Email us at hello@youtubevideotranscript.io with your request.

7. International users and GDPR

Our backend servers are hosted in the EU (Hetzner, Germany). If you are located in the European Economic Area, you have additional rights under the GDPR including the right to access, rectify, erase, restrict processing, and port your personal data. To exercise these rights, contact us at hello@youtubevideotranscript.io. We will respond within 30 days.

8. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy to reflect changes to our practices or applicable law. We will notify users of material changes via the email address on your account.

9. Contact

Questions about privacy? Contact us at hello@youtubevideotranscript.io.