How-to

How do I save a recipe from a YouTube video?

Published October 10, 2026 Last checked October 10, 2026

Saving the video vs. saving the recipe

YouTube’s own save button puts a video in Watch Later or a playlist. On the app, tap Save under a video (for a Short, tap More, then Save to playlist) and pick a playlist (YouTube Help). That’s a good way to collect cooking videos, but it doesn’t give you a recipe. You still have to scrub through a 14-minute video to find out how much butter goes in.

Getting the recipe means getting a written list of ingredients and steps. There are three ways to do that, from quickest to most thorough.

1. Check the description first

Open the description under the video and look for a written recipe or a link to one. Many cooking channels put the full ingredient list there, or link to their website. If there’s a link to the creator’s own recipe page, save that page: it’s the creator’s tested version, and recipe sites usually import cleanly into recipe apps. See how to import a recipe from a website on iPhone.

2. Use the transcript for what’s only said out loud

For videos with captions, YouTube can show the full transcript. Open the description and choose Show transcript; tap any line to jump to that moment (YouTube Help). Search the transcript for numbers and units (“cup,” “grams,” “degrees”) to pull out the amounts and the oven temperature without rewatching. Auto-generated captions are speech recognition, so double-check anything that sounds alike, like fifteen and fifty.

3. Paste the YouTube link into Sous Chef

Sous Chef turns a public YouTube link into a written recipe on your iPhone.

1. In YouTube, tap Share, then Copy link. Regular videos, Shorts, and youtu.be short links all work.
2. In Sous Chef, tap + to add a recipe, choose From a link, and paste. Or share the link from the iPhone share sheet straight to Sous Chef.
3. The import runs in the background and the recipe lands in your library when it’s done.

Sous Chef reads the description together with what’s said in the video, what’s written on screen, and what the cook is visibly doing. Amounts it had to estimate are labeled as estimates. When the description and the video disagree, it notes the disagreement instead of guessing. If one video makes three dishes, you get three recipes. Each one credits the channel and links back to the original video.

The limits: the video must be public and ten minutes or shorter. A longer video, such as a 25-minute Sunday-roast episode, won’t import. For those, use the description and transcript method above, or paste the written recipe as text into Sous Chef.

What to check before you cook

Whichever way you got it, give the written recipe a quick look:

1. Every ingredient has an amount.
2. There’s an oven temperature and a pan size if anything gets baked.
3. The number of servings is stated, so you can scale it.
4. Meat, poultry, and eggs have a doneness check, not just a time. USDA’s safe minimum internal temperatures are the finish line: 165°F for poultry, 160°F for ground meat.

Long videos vs. Shorts: what changes

A 60-second Short and a 12-minute cooking episode hide the recipe in different places.

Shorts move fast. Amounts are often flashed on screen or not given at all, and the description is usually a one-liner. Expect to pause, or let an importer read the frames for you. If amounts truly aren’t there, see what to do when a video recipe has no measurements.

Longer videos are slower but more complete. The cook usually says every amount out loud, explains why, and shows the texture you’re aiming for. The challenge is length: the recipe is spread over many minutes of talking. That’s where the transcript and chapters help, and where an import saves the most time.

Series videos (“Part 1,” “Part 2”) split one recipe across several uploads. Collect all the parts, or check the description of the last one for a combined recipe. Each part can be imported, but you may end up merging the results yourself.

A quick tip for any of them: look at the pinned comment. Many channels pin the ingredient list there when the description runs out of room or when viewers keep asking for amounts.

Common questions

Can I save a recipe from a YouTube Short?

Yes. A Short is a YouTube video, so the same methods work: save it to a playlist for rewatching, or paste its link into Sous Chef to get the recipe written down.

Does Watch Later download the video?

No. Watch Later and playlists keep the video inside YouTube. Downloading for offline viewing is a YouTube Premium feature. Either way, it’s still a video, not a written recipe.

What if the video is longer than ten minutes?

Sous Chef will tell you to choose a shorter video. Use the description and the transcript, then paste what you collected into Sous Chef as text. It will tidy it into ingredients and steps.

Will the recipe still be there if the video is taken down?

The recipe you saved in Sous Chef stays in your library; only the “Watch original video” link stops working. A playlist entry, by contrast, just stops playing. More on that in what happens to saved recipes when a video is deleted.

Can I save the recipe without a YouTube account?

Yes. Watch Later and playlists need a signed-in account, but the description, the transcript, and a Sous Chef link import don’t. Sous Chef only needs the public link.