Use this checklist when the youtube transcriber panel does not load, copy, or seek as expected. Start on a desktop YouTube watch page with a URL containing /watch?v=….
The panel does not appear
- Confirm that the extension is enabled in Chrome.
- Open the video directly on youtube.com rather than in an embedded player, a Short, or a mobile layout.
- Wait for the desktop right column to load. The panel is placed in that column near the related videos.
- Reload the tab. This restarts the extension on the current watch page.
- If the panel is collapsed, use the chevron in its title row to expand it.
The panel appears but stays empty
- Open the player's settings and check whether Subtitles/CC lists a caption track.
- Select Refresh in the panel. This clears the temporary per-video cache and requests the current caption data again.
- If you navigated between videos without a full reload, reload the tab to synchronize the player, page address, and panel.
- Test a different video that has visible captions.
Videos without captions cannot produce a transcript. Music uploads, active live streams, and some restricted videos may also return no usable track. See why a YouTube transcript may not be available.
Copy does not work
- Try copying from the top-level youtube.com watch tab, not an embedded player on another site.
- Keep the tab active and select Copy or Copy + time again.
- Check whether Chrome or the page shows a clipboard permission or access error.
- Reload the watch tab and retry after the transcript has loaded.
Copy writes plain text. Copy + time includes timestamps. A loaded transcript does not guarantee clipboard access: Chrome can reject writes in embedded or restricted contexts.
Selecting a line does not seek correctly
- Start playback once so the player is active.
- Select a transcript line and allow the player a moment to seek.
- Confirm that the visible transcript belongs to the current video. If not, select Refresh.
- Reload the tab if the video changed through YouTube's in-page navigation.
Seeking uses the start time supplied by the caption track. Caption segments do not always begin at the exact first syllable, so small timing differences are expected.
Automatic loading does not run
- Check that Automatic is enabled in the extension settings.
- Automatic loading applies to the active desktop watch-page address. It does not scan other videos in the background.
- After changing the setting, navigate to another watch page or reload the current tab.
Before reporting a recurring problem
Note whether the issue affects one video or several captioned videos, whether the page is a standard watch URL, and whether Refresh or a tab reload changes the result. Do not include private transcript text in a report. Read the Privacy Policy for details about data handling.