Google Drive Adds Video Transcripts for Easy Navigation: How It Works

Hyderabad: Google has launched recently a video transcript feature on Google Drive that allows users to make the most out of the videos. This innovation also builds on the feature that was rolled out last year — auto captions. Google Drive users can now view and search through transcripts in videos stored in Drive.

The primary advantage is that from the transcript, a user may start playback of the video at a specific time by clicking on a sentence in the transcript. The mention above makes it clear “jump directly to the video, and it will start at the exact point.” It can be recalled that last year Google introduced auto-generated captions and this is an improvement on that feature.

What’s New to Google Drive Video Transcript Feature?

Google said in one of the blogs on Workspace that the new feature of transcripts in videos is an extension to the previously available feature of auto generated captions for videos uploaded on Drive. The latter feature had a restricted launch in July 2024 where users can generate captions on the videos they upload without having to ask for it (though there are limits imposed by the Workspace administrators needing to only grant the option).

When the Mountain View-based company first unveiled the feature for auto-generated captions, it stated that speech recognition technology was used for captioning provided that the spoken language of the video was English. Google also stated that the technology would eventually support more languages, although it is not operational yet. 

Users can now view a separate transcript panel that appears on the right side when the video is played on Google drive. The video transcript feature includes timestamps and each sentence appears as a separate entry. Utilizing the search bar in the transcript panel enables users to locate specific words or phrases effortlessly within the video.

By clicking any sentence from the transcripts, the video will play from the time that specific sentence was recorded. This feature saves the users from the trouble of scrolling through the videos scagnel to find specific mentions.

Google Drive Video Transcript Feature: How To Use

To use this feature, a user must first play the video in Google Drive. Additionally, ensure that the captions or the CC button present at the bottom right side of the Drive player is switched on. See if it is active or greyed out. After this, follow the procedure that is listed below. 

Step 1: Click on Settings

Step 2: Select the Transcript Option. 

After doing this, the user will be able to view the transcript dialogue on the right side which lets them navigate, search and browse the entire video with ease.