askvideo

AskVideo CLI

Chat with any YouTube video from your terminal using AI

Agent Skill

Enable AI coding assistants (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, etc.) to use AskVideo:

npx skills add IndianAppGuy/askvideo-cli

Once installed, your AI agent can automatically summarize and answer questions about YouTube videos.

Features

• Fast: Chat with YouTube videos in seconds without leaving your terminal
• AI-Powered: Leverage advanced AI to understand and answer questions about video content
• Interactive Mode: Have flowing conversations with video content
• Scriptable: One-shot question mode perfect for automation and piping
• Developer-Friendly: Built for developers who live in the terminal
• Easy Auth: Simple email OTP verification - no passwords needed

Installation

npm install -g askvideo
# or
yarn global add askvideo

Quick Start

• Login or create an account (email OTP verification):

  askvideo login
  

  Enter your email, receive a 6-digit code, and you're in!

• Start chatting with any YouTube video:

  askvideo chat "https://youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"
  

That's it! No API keys to manage manually.

Commands

askvideo login

Authenticate with email OTP or API key.

# Interactive login with email OTP (recommended)
askvideo login

# Direct login with API key (if you have one)
askvideo login --key av-api-your-key-here

The login command handles both new signups and existing users:

• New users: Account is created automatically after OTP verification
• Existing users: Just verify and you're logged in

askvideo chat <url>

Start an interactive chat session with a YouTube video.

# Chat with a YouTube video
askvideo chat "https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID"

# Chat with an already indexed video by ID
askvideo chat --id abc123

askvideo ask <question>

Ask a single question and get an answer (great for scripts).

# Ask a question about a video
askvideo ask "What are the main topics covered?" --url "https://youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID"

# Use video ID instead of URL
askvideo ask "Summarize this video" --id abc123

# Use simple mode (non-streaming, better for piping)
askvideo ask "List the key points" --url "..." --simple

askvideo videos

List all your indexed videos.

askvideo videos
# or
askvideo list

askvideo credits

Check your remaining credits.

askvideo credits

Usage Examples

Interactive Chat Session

$ askvideo chat "https://youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"

  💬 AskVideo Chat
  ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
  
  📹 Video: Never Gonna Give You Up
     ID: dQw4w9WgXcQ
  
  ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
  
  Type your questions below. Use "exit" or Ctrl+C to quit.

  You: What is this song about?
  
  🤖 This song is about unwavering commitment and devotion in a 
     relationship. The lyrics express a promise to never abandon 
     or hurt the person they love...

  You: Who wrote this song?
  
  🤖 "Never Gonna Give You Up" was written by the production trio 
     Stock Aitken Waterman - Mike Stock, Matt Aitken, and Pete 
     Waterman...

Scripting / Automation

# Get a quick summary
askvideo ask "Give me a 3-bullet summary" --url "..." --simple

# Pipe to other commands
askvideo ask "List all timestamps" --url "..." --simple | grep "00:"

# Use in shell scripts
VIDEO_SUMMARY=$(askvideo ask "Summarize" --url "..." --simple)
echo "Summary: $VIDEO_SUMMARY"

Configuration

Configuration is stored in ~/.config/configstore/askvideo-cli.json.

Environment Variables

• ASKVIDEO_API_URL - Override the API URL (useful for development)

Credits & Limits

• Free Plan: 1 video + 10 messages per month
• Pro Plan: Unlimited videos and messages

Check your remaining credits anytime:

askvideo credits

Upgrade at askvideo.ai/pricing

Troubleshooting

"Authentication required"

Run askvideo login to authenticate with your email.

"No video credits remaining"

You've used all your video credits for the month. Upgrade to Pro or wait for the next month.

"No message credits remaining"

You've used all your message credits. Upgrade to Pro for unlimited messages.

"Failed to fetch transcript"

Some YouTube videos don't have transcripts available. Try a different video.

Video taking too long to process?

Longer videos take more time to transcribe and index. The CLI will wait up to 10 minutes.

Didn't receive OTP email?

Check your spam folder. The email is sent from [e-mail].

Development

# Clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/IndianAppGuy/askvideo-cli

# Install dependencies
yarn install

# Build
yarn build

# Run locally
node dist/index.js

License

MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Links

• Website
• npm Package
• Support