Search FAQs

Filmot indexes publicly accessible information about YouTube videos; it does not provide access to private video or audio files or maintain private, account-only indexes.

Coverage depends on the video's status and what Filmot previously collected:

• Private videos: Filmot cannot access or collect metadata for private videos. Metadata collected while a video was publicly accessible may remain in its historical index.
• Unlisted videos: Filmot has incomplete coverage. Unlisted Video Search shows known records, but channel prioritization cannot guarantee discovery of every unlisted video. To be discovered the unlisted video needs to have been public at a previous time or the id should have been linked or listed somewhere (playlist, other site or forum, etc). There is no general way to discover unlisted videos.
• Deleted videos: previously collected metadata may remain, although detected deletions are periodically removed from subtitle search. Filmot cannot retrieve details it never collected and are no longer on YouTube.
• Members-only and age-restricted videos: basic metadata may appear in Metadata search, but subtitles for such videos cannot be collected for search.

Historical records may differ from a video's current status on YouTube and do not establish permission to redistribute content. Hide and skip unavailable videos in Settings changes which results are displayed.

Filmot cannot restore, download or provide the video or audio files of a deleted video or terminated channel. It may retain metadata and subtitles collected while videos were accessible, but those records are not copies of the footage.

You can search for a reupload by title in metadata search or by a distinctive quote in subtitle search. The IA links on video listings also let you check the Internet Archive for independently archived material. When an archived copy is available, Try Playing from Archive.org may offer playback; a working copy is not guaranteed.

Filmot cannot collect missing details from an inaccessible video. Archived or historical information may be outdated if present.

Yes, if Filmot already holds a record for that video. Filmot does not retrieve missing historical metadata from YouTube on demand. A stored title, channel or upload date can remain after a video is removed from YouTube or becomes private, but it may be outdated or incomplete.

To check a video ID:

• Open /video/ followed by the ID.
• Paste one or more IDs into the title box in Metadata search, separated by spaces or commas.
• Use the getvideos endpoint of the public API with an API key.

An ID alone cannot reconstruct information Filmot never collected.

Filmot Title Restorer is an optional browser userscript that displays historical titles and thumbnails for supported video IDs inside YouTube playlists. It uses metadata previously collected by Filmot.

Open Title Restorer under More and follow the Script Page link. Installation requires a userscript manager such as Tampermonkey; review the extension's permissions before installing it.

The script works only for records Filmot already knows. It does not recover video or audio, reconstruct playlists or create missing metadata. To request review of sensitive or outdated stored information, use the contact form.

Filmot may display two controls associated with the Internet Archive:

• IA link: opens the video's Internet Archive or Wayback Machine record from a video listing or page.
• Try Playing from Archive.org: on a video's subtitles page, attempts playback of an independently archived copy if one is available. If no playable archived copy is available, the page may fall back to a YouTube iframe, where the player controls are provided by YouTube.

Only some videos have archive records, and a Wayback Machine page does not necessarily contain playable media. The link and the playback button check for different kinds of availability, so their results may differ.

Filmot does not host the archived video. An archived copy does not itself grant permission to reuse or redistribute the content.

Filmot may retain metadata collected while a video was publicly accessible even if the video is later deleted or made private. Availability changes can take time to appear in Filmot, so historical records do not necessarily reflect the video's current YouTube status.

Videos detected as deleted are periodically removed from subtitle search, but some previously collected details may remain on video or metadata pages. Removing a result from subtitle search is not the same as deleting the underlying stored record.

You can change the display of videos that appear unavailable:

• Subtitle search: in Settings, set Hide and skip unavailable videos to Yes, No or Unavailable Only.
• Metadata search and channel pages: use Filter videos to choose Available or Unavailable. The Metadata videos filter setting controls the initial selection.

Availability detection is not definitive, and some filters affect only the currently displayed page. These settings change what you see; they do not delete records or recover videos.

To request review or removal of stored information, use the contact form. A request can address Filmot's public pages and future API responses or exports, but Filmot cannot recall files already downloaded by third parties.

No. Filmot's coverage of unlisted videos is incomplete. Videos that were never publicly shared may not be known to Filmot, and prioritizing a channel does not guarantee discovery of all its unlisted uploads.

An unlisted video is not necessarily intended for unrestricted distribution. Filmot's recorded availability may also differ from the video's current status on YouTube.

Use Unlisted Video Search to browse known records. To request review or removal of a record, use the contact form.

Filmot cannot retrieve member-only video footage or subtitles. Basic details may appear in Metadata search, but subtitles for restricted videos are not available for new collection.

If a video later becomes publicly accessible, its captions may still be missing from Filmot until the record is updated. To check, search for the video by ID, title or channel and inspect the AutoSubs and ManualSubs columns. A later update is not guaranteed, and there is no individual-video reindexing request feature.

Age-restricted videos have similar limitations on subtitle collection.

Filmot cannot collect or index the subtitles, captions or transcripts of age-restricted YouTube videos. Their spoken content is therefore unavailable in subtitle search, although basic metadata may appear in Metadata search.

To inspect a record, paste the video ID into the metadata title box and check AutoSubs and ManualSubs. An empty column means no subtitle tracks of that type are indexed.

Age restriction is determined by YouTube. It is one of several reasons captions can be missing, alongside members-only access, discovery delays, low view counts and captions that YouTube has not made available.

The video page displays a YouTube iframe beside the subtitle tracks Filmot has collected, with the player controls inside the iframe. Open it from a search result, a subtitle-language link, the Info link in Transverso, or /video/ followed by the video ID.

Depending on available data, you can:

• Follow the highlighted caption line during playback or click a line to play from that timestamp.
• Compare two subtitle languages side by side.
• Download the selected subtitles as an SRT file.
• Browse Similar videos, when suggestions are available.
• View historical community-subtitle credits using Show Contributors, when available.
• Report an inaccurate or unsuitable caption track with Report.
• Use Try Playing from Archive.org if an independently archived copy is available.

Yes. A video's side-by-side subtitles page displays two caption tracks next to each other with the video. Choose a language for each column from the tracks Filmot has collected for that video.

The current subtitle line is highlighted during playback, and clicking a line starts the video at that timestamp. In Metadata search, click a subtitle-language flag to open this view.

Only available tracks can be selected; Filmot does not generate a missing translation. On Settings, Language Indicator controls whether subtitle languages are displayed as flags, short codes or full names.

A sign-in or anti-bot prompt displayed by the player in a YouTube iframe comes from YouTube, not Filmot's own verification system. YouTube determines whether a video requires sign-in or additional verification.

Try signing in to YouTube in the same browser, or open the video directly on YouTube and complete its normal verification process. On mobile, opening the video in a regular browser may help if playback in the iframe fails.

Filmot cannot override YouTube's playback or verification requirements.

Yes. On the Settings page, set "Delay Video Start" to 3, 5, 10, 15 or 20 seconds and click Save Settings. Videos then start that many seconds before the matched moment, so you hear more of the context. The default is 0 seconds.

Yes. On subtitle search results, metadata search, unlisted video search, channel pages and My Notes, videos can be viewed through a YouTube iframe in a floating window.

• Drag the window to move it, and use the resize handle to change its size.
• The position and size are remembered for each page in your browser.
• On small screens, phones and in portrait orientation, the window containing the player appears across the top of the page.

Hover autoplay applies only to subtitle search results: holding the pointer over a thumbnail can start the video. On other pages, click a thumbnail to open the floating window. To disable hover autoplay, set Autoplay videos on mouse-over to No in Settings, or use the Autoplay switch on the subtitle search results page.

Yes. In metadata search, unlisted video search and channel listings, a video's title opens its Filmot video page, including the side-by-side subtitle view when tracks are available. The title link works the same way for available and unavailable videos.

A separate arrow link opens the video on YouTube. The IA link opens its Internet Archive or Wayback Machine record; an archived copy is available only for some videos.

Sometimes. When Filmot has stored publicly available credits for a video's community subtitle track, its subtitles page may show a Show Contributors button and the number of credited contributors.

Credits are historical and may not reflect a contributor's current profile. If your name or contributor information appears and you would like it reviewed or removed, use the contact form.

Use the channel lookup box on the home page, subtitle search or Metadata search. Enter the channel's name, @handle or full UC channel ID, select the matching suggestion and open the resulting green channel tag's tooltip. It contains links to the channel's Filmot page and YouTube channel.

To add several channels at once, paste a comma-delimited list of handles or IDs. You can mix them, for example @DIYPerks,UCWFKCr40YwOZQx8FHU_ZqqQ. You can also open a known channel directly at /channel/ followed by its UC channel ID.

If a channel recently changed its YouTube name, Filmot may still have the old name. Non-standard Unicode characters in a name can also make lookup difficult. Try its @handle or full UC ID; the ID is the most reliable option because it does not depend on the display name.

The home-page and subtitle-search lookup only includes channels with searchable captions. Metadata and Unlisted Video Search include known channels without indexed subtitles, so try those pages if the channel is missing from subtitle lookup.

A channel page shows the information Filmot has stored for one YouTube channel, derived from publicly available video and channel data. Open /channel/ followed by its UC channel ID, use the link in a green channel tag, or find it through Channel Search.

The page includes:

• A channel card with its stored subscriber and video counts, plus a historical subscriber chart when enough observations exist.
• A search box with Auto for automatic captions, Manual for manual subtitles and a title-search button, all restricted to that channel.
• A word cloud of characteristic terms. Click a word to find related channels or search the channel's captions for it.
• A video list with 100 records per page and a Next Page button. Rows include available subtitle-language links, a half-star Partial data indicator when applicable, and links to YouTube and the Internet Archive.
• Metadata/Sort, which opens the channel's videos in metadata search ordered by upload date, views or duration, and Filter videos for available or unavailable records.

The information is incomplete and approximate: the list reflects only the videos Filmot has discovered, and the counts, chart and word cloud are indicative snapshots rather than current YouTube statistics or a complete profile of the creator.

Channel pages show 100 videos at a time. A Next Page button appears whenever the current page is full because Filmot cannot determine in advance whether another page contains records.

If the channel's indexed videos end exactly at a page boundary, the next page is empty. This means there are no more records in that listing, rather than a missing batch of videos.

Channel pages also have a maximum paging limit. Beyond it, the Next Page button is no longer shown.

The basic Channel Search page does not provide country, join-date or subscriber filters, or a subscriber-count sort. Results show the stored subscriber count and the channel's country when one is supplied, but join date is not shown in that results list.

Country information is self-reported by the channel owner, and many channels leave it blank. To filter video results by a channel's country, use the Country field in Metadata search.

Video sorting is separate from channel lookup. Subtitle search can sort videos by Channel Rank, but that score is not the same as subscriber count. The API's advanced channel-search endpoint has its own documented filters; those do not imply equivalent controls on the basic website page.