Publish Owl Publish Owl
Start for Free
Features

YouTube Video Mode

Overview

YouTube Video Mode converts YouTube videos into articles by extracting transcripts, metadata, comments, and screenshots. Use it to repurpose video content into written blog posts, summaries, or analysis articles.

YouTube mode works as a specialized workflow type. Select it when creating a new workflow and enter YouTube URLs in the Keywords/Input tab. Both standard YouTube video URLs and YouTube Shorts URLs (youtube.com/shorts/ID) are supported.

Requirements

  • Supadata API Key (required) — for transcript extraction. Free tier available at supadata.ai (100 requests/month free)
  • YouTube Data API Key (optional) — for video metadata and comments. Get from Google Cloud Console
Plan Requirement: YouTube Video Mode requires a Standard plan or higher. Add your API keys in Settings under the YouTube Video Mode section.

Setup

  1. Add your Supadata API key in Settings
  2. Create or edit a workflow
  3. Select YouTube as the workflow type from the Create page — a YouTube step is automatically added as the first workflow step
  4. In the Keywords/Input tab, toggle to YouTube URL mode and enter your video URLs (standard URLs and Shorts URLs are both supported)
  5. Add a writing step after the YouTube step to transform the extracted data into an article

YouTube Video Settings

Comments

  • Include Comments: Fetch top comments for added perspective (requires YouTube Data API key)
  • Max Comments: How many comments to fetch (1-100, default 10)

Screenshots

Capture frames from the video to embed in your article. Two modes available:

  • AI-Selected (recommended): AI analyzes the transcript and picks the most relevant timestamps to capture. Configure:
    • AI Provider & Model: Which AI selects the timestamps (OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini, Grok, OpenRouter, Perplexity)
    • System Prompt: Customizable instructions for how to pick timestamps
  • Fixed Interval: Capture screenshots at regular intervals (e.g., every 30 seconds)

Screenshot Captions

  • None: No captions on screenshots
  • Timestamp: Show the video timestamp (e.g., "2:34")
  • AI Description: AI generates a human-style description of what's shown in the screenshot (only available in AI-selected mode). Captions are written as natural descriptions suitable for alt text and article context.

Embed Video

Enable this to automatically add the YouTube video embed at the end of the generated article.

Video Thumbnail as Featured Image

You can use the YouTube video's thumbnail as your article's featured image. In the workflow's image settings, select Video Thumbnail in the featured image provider dropdown. This pulls the highest-resolution thumbnail available from YouTube without any additional API calls.

If you use image templates, you can also map YouTube Video Thumbnail as the source for an image variable, allowing you to composite the video thumbnail into a branded template.

YouTube Shorts

YouTube Shorts are fully supported. Enter Shorts URLs in the keyword input using the youtube.com/shorts/ID format. Publish Owl automatically detects and processes Shorts the same way as standard videos — transcripts, metadata, comments, and screenshots all work as expected.

Channel Monitoring

Automatically create articles whenever new videos are posted on a YouTube channel. This works like RSS monitoring but for YouTube — the system checks the channel's feed every 5 minutes and triggers your workflow for each new video.

Setup

  1. Open the YouTube workflow step settings
  2. Under Channel Monitoring, click + Add YouTube Channel
  3. Paste the channel URL (e.g. youtube.com/@channelname) — it will be verified automatically
  4. Save the workflow to activate monitoring

Filtering Options

  • Video type: Choose between all videos, only Shorts, or only long-form (non-Shorts) videos
  • Include keywords: Only trigger when the video title contains at least one of these words
  • Exclude keywords: Skip videos whose title contains any of these words

Note: When you first add a channel, only videos posted after that point will trigger jobs. Existing videos on the channel are not processed. The workflow must use keywordType: youtube with a YouTube workflow step configured.

Data Available to Your Workflow

The YouTube step extracts and passes the following data to subsequent workflow steps:

  • Transcript: Full video transcript with timestamps
  • Video Title: The YouTube video title
  • Video Description: The video's description text
  • Comments: Top comments (if enabled)
  • Screenshots: Captured frame URLs (if enabled)
Tip: Write your AI prompt to reference this data explicitly. For example: "Using the transcript and comments provided, write a comprehensive summary article that covers the key points and includes viewer perspectives from the comments."

Troubleshooting

Transcript extraction failed

The video may not have captions/subtitles available. Auto-generated captions work too, but some videos disable them entirely. Try a different video to verify your API key works.

Comments not appearing

Comments require the YouTube Data API key (separate from Supadata). Add it in Settings. Also check that comments aren't disabled on the video.

Screenshots not captured

Ensure screenshots are enabled in the YouTube step settings. For AI-selected mode, verify the AI provider/model has a valid API key configured.

Was this helpful?