{"id":"kevinwatt-yt-dlp-mcp","name":"yt-dlp-mcp","af_score":64.5,"security_score":48.5,"reliability_score":36.2,"what_it_does":"Provides an MCP server (Node/TypeScript) that wraps yt-dlp to let AI agents search for videos, extract metadata, download subtitles/transcripts, and download video/audio (including trimming), via MCP tools such as ytdlp_search_videos and ytdlp_download_video/audio.","best_when":"You need an agent toolchain that can pull structured information and/or media artifacts from public video URLs on-demand through MCP.","avoid_when":"You have strict egress controls, cannot run npx/Node tooling, or require guaranteed stability of third-party video site behavior (yt-dlp scraping).","last_evaluated":"2026-03-30T13:36:33.771290+00:00","has_mcp":true,"has_api":false,"auth_methods":["Cookie-based access for private/age-restricted content via yt-dlp cookies (YTDLP_COOKIES_FROM_BROWSER or YTDLP_COOKIES_FILE)"],"has_free_tier":false,"known_gotchas":["Downloads are performed via yt-dlp, which can fail for site-specific changes; agents should handle failures and possibly retry with alternative URLs/parameters.","Cookie-based access requires an additional JS runtime (deno) per README note; without it, authenticated downloads may fail.","Because the tool executes commands for downloads, an agent should validate URLs and constrain parameters (resolution/time ranges) to reduce unexpected large downloads.","When using transcripts/subtitles, language availability can vary; agents may need to query available languages first."],"error_quality":0.0}