How to download, read, or summarize any video with vidstill

vidstill does one thing: you paste a video link, and it gives you back something you can keep. Here is what each option does and when to use it.

1. Paste the link

Copy the link from the app or browser you are watching in. All of these work:

• YouTube videos, Shorts, and youtu.be links
• TikTok videos, including vm.tiktok.com short links from the app
• Instagram Reels and video posts
• X (Twitter) posts with video, including t.co links

Paste it into the box on the homepage and press Go. The video card appears with three tabs.

2. Download

For YouTube, the 360p option is instant: your browser saves the file straight from YouTube. 720p, 1080p, and best quality are prepared first, usually in a few seconds, because YouTube stores HD video and audio separately and we merge them for you. MP3 audio works the same way.

For TikTok, Instagram, and X, pick MP4 best quality or MP3 audio and click Prepare download.

Prepared files stay available for about an hour.

3. Transcript

The Transcript tab shows the full text with optional timestamps. Copy it, or export it as TXT, SRT, VTT, or Markdown.

YouTube transcripts come from the video's captions. For videos without captions, and for TikTok, Instagram, and X, vidstill listens to the audio and transcribes it, which takes up to a minute.

4. Summary

The Summary tab writes a summary from the transcript in one of three styles: a short TL;DR, a list of key points, or a chapter-by-chapter breakdown with timestamps. Pick a style and click Summarize.

Public pages and privacy

Every video you run gets a page you can share, with its transcript and any summaries. Pages are public by default. Sign in to make yours private, and to find everything you have run under My videos.

Limits

Anonymous visitors get a few downloads and transcripts a day. Sign up for more. Speech-to-text is limited to videos under 30 minutes for now.