Glossary
YouTube chapters
Updated · By the WithTranscript team · How we checked
YouTube chapters: YouTube chapters split a video into titled sections on the progress bar, either from timestamps the creator lists in the description or generated automatically by YouTube.
Per YouTube Help, creator chapters come from a list of timestamps in the description: the first must be 00:00, there must be at least three, and each chapter must be at least 10 seconds long. YouTube can also add automatic chapters, and creators can turn that off.
Chapters are the cheapest way to navigate a long video, and they carry over well into text: a transcript with chapter headings can be skimmed like a document, and an AI assistant given the headings can answer "what does the section on X say" more precisely.
Many videos have no chapters at all, so transcript tools that care about structure generate their own sections from the text.
How WithTranscript handles it
WithTranscript splits every transcript into titled chapters with a one-line summary each, shown next to the text and included at the top of the Markdown copy. Click a chapter to jump the video there.