ClawLink
TL;DR
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| What does it do? | Your agent lists the channel's recent uploads, takes the newest one, reads its captions and summarizes them. |
| Who is it for? | People who follow many channels, researchers, and teams that track what reviewers say about a product. |
| What do I connect? | Nothing. It reads public data with ClawLink's own provider. |
| What does it cost? | About $0.00482 of ClawLink credit per run. New accounts get $0.50 free. |
| Does it work? | Yes. We ran it on 2026-10-03; the results are below. |
| Which agents? | OpenClaw, Hermes, Claude, Codex, ChatGPT and any MCP client connected to ClawLink. |
How do you try it?
- Set up ClawLink once. Add it to your agent from the install page. This job needs no connected app.
- Send this prompt to your agent. Click the card to copy it.
It works the same in OpenClaw, Hermes, Claude and Codex.
How does the agent do it?
The agent makes 2 calls through ClawLink. You do not pick the tools: the agent finds them by searching ClawLink, reads their input schema and runs them.
| Step | Tool | What it does | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | youtubedata_channel_videos | Lists a channel's recent uploads by handle, with views, length and publish date. | $0.002 |
| 2 | youtubedata_video_captions | Returns the video's captions as text, with timestamps. | $0.00282 |
What happened when we ran it?
We sent this job through ClawLink on 2026-10-03. These are the real calls and what came back, not an example.
| Call | Input and result | Time | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
youtubedata_channel_videos | @mkbhd, 30 recent videos returned | 6.6 s | $0.002 |
youtubedata_video_captions | "Xiaomi 18 Fold: How Does This Happen?" (10:47), 7 caption languages | 2.3 s | $0.00282 |
What the data showed:
- The newest upload was 15 hours old and already had 3.93M views.
- The video compares the Xiaomi 18 Fold with the iPhone Duo: same size and aspect ratio, unveiled two days apart.
- The Xiaomi is 30 g lighter than the 254 g iPhone Duo and has a 6,000 mAh silicon-carbon battery with 67 W charging.
- It has three rear cameras, including a 50 MP 3.5x zoom; the iPhone Duo has two and no zoom.
- The last minute is a merch segment (a desk pad), which a summary should drop.
How do you write the prompt?
- Use the handle. "@mkbhd" is enough. The agent does not need the channel id.
- Say how long. "5 points" or "one paragraph" keeps the summary short.
- Ask for timestamps. Captions come with times, so "with timestamps" lets you jump to the part you want.
What can go wrong?
- Sponsor segments end up in the summary. In our run the last minute of the video promoted a desk pad. Add "skip ads and sponsors" to the prompt.
- Words glued together. The timed caption lines sometimes join words across a line break ("afolding"). The same response also carries a clean full-text version; a good agent uses that one.
- No captions, no summary. A video with captions turned off returns nothing to read. Ask the agent to say so instead of guessing from the title.
How does this compare with other ways to do it?
| Option | How it works | Cost | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| ClawLink + your agent | One prompt, the agent picks the video and summarizes the captions | $0.00482 per run | Following channels from the agent you already use |
| Paste the link into a chatbot | Copy the URL by hand each time | Free to paid | One video now and then |
| YouTube Data API | Google Cloud project and key; captions need the owner's permission | Free quota | Your own channel |
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a YouTube account?
No. This job reads public YouTube data through ClawLink's own data provider, so there is nothing to connect. It runs on your ClawLink credit; every new account gets $0.50 of free credit on its first data call.
Does it work in other languages?
Yes, when the video has captions in that language. Our test video had 7 caption tracks; the tool takes a language code.
Can it summarize a video by URL instead?
Yes. Give the agent the link and it skips the channel step, so the run costs $0.00282.
Can it read the comments too?
Yes, with a third call. See the use case on what viewers ask for.
Does it work for Shorts?
Yes, captions work for Shorts URLs too.