Highlightly

Watch the Highlights of Any YouTube VideoLectures, Podcasts, Talks & More

Our AI finds the key moments in any YouTube video and plays its highlights for you, skipping the filler — so you get the important information faster, with the context intact.

Just want to read? Every video comes with a text summary too.

✦ 2 watches per day without signup

Sign up free to get more watches per day and support for longer videos.

500 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute.

We're surrounded by more long-form content than we have time to watch. Summaries lose context, scrubbing is guesswork, and 2× speed hurts comprehension.

None of these are the answer. Highlightly helps you get to the moments that matter.

Use it for
  • Lectures & courses
  • Podcasts & interviews
  • Conference talks
  • News & current affairs
  • Tutorials & how-tos
  • Webinars & panels
“What if you could still watch the video — just not the boring parts?”

That question started Highlightly.

What you get

The highlights experience

Video highlights

Like sports highlights for any video. You watch the actual moments — voice, tone, examples intact — just the important ones.

+ Text summary included

Every highlight comes with an optional AI-generated text recap, so you can scan and watch on your own terms.

One-click highlight mode

No chapters, no manual seeking. Click play and Highlightly auto-skips between the parts that matter.

Native YouTube controls

Playback speed, subtitles, captions, quality — every YouTube setting works on top of Highlightly.

HOW WE COMPARE

Highlightly vs. text summarizers

QuestionText summarizersHighlightly
Plays the actual video?
Hear the speaker's voice and tone?
Skip to the important parts automatically?
Browser extension on YouTube itself?varies
Built for any video, in any language?varies✓ (99)
Works without downloading the video?varies

Built for everyone who wants the crux.

Students

Revise lecture recordings without losing 60 minutes per video.

UPSC / PSC Aspirants

Pull through hours of current-affairs and topic explainer videos.

Educators

Get the crux of a long talk before recommending it to a class.

Working Professionals

Stay current on industry talks, podcasts, and interviews without losing evenings.

Podcast Listeners

Skip the small talk, hear the substance.

Researchers

Triage long-form interviews and panels by what's actually being argued.

No reading. Just watching.

Text summaries lose tone, emphasis, and examples. We preserve the video experience — you still watch, just 40–60% less of it.

AI that respects context.

Our model targets 35–55% of the video duration — not blindly cutting half. It preserves full arguments, examples, and conclusions intact.

Works where you already watch.

Available as a web app and as a browser extension that injects directly into YouTube. No new platform to learn.

BROWSER EXTENSION

Never paste a link again.

The extension puts a ✦ Highlights button inside YouTube's own player. Same account, same history — you just stop leaving the page.

It also handles videos the web player can't: when a channel blocks embedding, the extension still works, because it runs on YouTube itself.

12:48 / 45:00
✦ Highlights

We respect your content

We don't download videos

Highlightly never re-hosts or re-distributes a YouTube video. We work entirely off transcripts and timestamps.

Transcript-only AI

Our AI sees text, not video. Your viewing behavior is never sent to a model.

Frequently asked questions

Still have a question? Email us →

Yes — every video you open comes with a text summary and key takeaways in the Summary tab next to the player. But unlike a summarizer, you don't have to settle for reading: Highlightly can also play just the highlights of the actual video, skipping the filler in between, so you keep the speaker's voice, tone and examples.

Yes. Highlightly never stores your video content. We only process the transcript (captions/subtitles) to identify highlight timestamps, then cache the resulting timestamp pairs and AI summaries in our database so repeated requests are instant. No audio, no video, no personal content is retained. See our Privacy Policy for full details.

Never. Highlightly is fully compliant with YouTube's Terms of Service. We read only the video's transcript (captions/subtitles) to identify highlight segments. The video itself stays on YouTube's servers and plays via the official YouTube IFrame API. We do not download, copy, or redistribute video content.

99 languages. Highlightly reads a video's existing YouTube captions when they're available (auto-generated captions count — no manually added subtitles needed), and falls back to AI transcription for videos without them, covering English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Hindi, Arabic, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Italian, Dutch, Russian, Turkish, and dozens more.

In our testing across lecture and podcast content, the AI selects 35–55% of the original video duration and covers all key concepts. Accuracy varies by content type — lectures and structured talks produce the most precise results. You can always toggle to Full Video at any time if you want to catch something the AI skipped.

Subscription charges aren't refundable. Cancelling doesn't trigger a refund — your paid period runs to its end and you keep every feature of your plan until then, so there's no unused time to refund. If you were charged in error, email billing@highlightly.co and we'll put it right. Want to try before paying? The Free tier runs indefinitely, no card required — there's no trial clock to beat.

Yes. The web app is fully mobile-optimised with a native-feel bottom-sheet UI. The Chrome extension works on Android Chrome too. iOS Safari support is available via the web app — install it as a PWA (Add to Home Screen) for a standalone app experience.

Every visitor gets 2 free watches per day at no cost, no account needed, for videos up to 30 minutes. Just paste any YouTube URL and watch. Sign up free to get 5 watches per day (up to 15 per month), videos up to 150 minutes, and watch history.

Both give unlimited monthly watches. The key differences are daily throughput (12 hours of original video for Pro vs 24 hours for Max), max video length per session (4 hours vs 8 hours), and processing speed (Max gets ~3× priority in the queue). Max also gives first access to beta features and 12-hour email support SLA.

Ready to skip the noise?

2 free watches per day — no account needed. Paste your YouTube link and let the AI do the rest.

Start free Get the extension