AI-powered YouTube video summarizer that runs on your desktop. Paste a link, get an instant summary with timestamps. No cloud, no sign-up.
The entire app is just ~4 MB, 30x smaller than Electron.
Built with Tauri 2 + Next.js + Claude AI.
I watch a lot of YouTube (conference talks, system design, interviews, podcasts, etc.) and most of it is way longer than it needs to be. I wanted a tool that could pull out the key points so I could decide what's actually worth my time.
YouTube's built-in "Ask Gemini" feature technically does this, but the output formatting was painful to read. Walls of text with no structure, no timestamps, no way to scan it quickly. I knew I could do better.
So I built yt-video-summariser, a full-stack Next.js web app that did exactly what I wanted. Clean summaries, clickable timestamps, multiple languages. It worked great... locally though.
The moment I deployed it, YouTube started blocking every request. Turns out YouTube aggressively rejects traffic from cloud/datacenter IPs (AWS, GCP, Vercel, all of them) with "Sign in to confirm you're not a bot" walls. Free proxy services? Blocked too. The only real fix was a residential proxy at ~$6/month, and I wasn't about to pay a recurring cost just to keep a side project alive.
Then it clicked: if the problem is that YouTube blocks server IPs but not home IPs, why not just run the whole thing on the user's machine?
That's how Rundownly was born. A desktop app that fetches transcripts directly from your IP. No server, no proxy, no cloud. YouTube doesn't block you because you're just a person watching YouTube. The architectural constraint that killed the web app became a non-issue the moment I moved to desktop.
Building it with Tauri and Rust was also a learning goal. The transcript fetching, Innertube API integration, and YouTube's GDPR consent handling are all written in Rust, and building a real product with it has been worth every compile-time fight.
- Runs locally — YouTube is accessed from your IP. No server, no IP blocks.
- Secure — API key stored in your OS keychain (macOS Keychain, Windows Credential Manager, Linux Secret Service). Never leaves your machine.
- Timestamps — Summaries link back to exact moments in the video.
- 11 languages — English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, Assamese.
- 3 summary lengths — Short, Medium, or Long.
- Dark mode — Follows your system theme.
- Caching — Re-opening the same video returns the cached summary instantly (24h TTL).
- Export — Download summaries as Markdown or copy to clipboard.
git clone https://github.com/rajat-mehra05/rundownly.git
cd rundownly
npm install
npm run tauri:devThe app opens automatically. On first launch, you'll be prompted to enter your Anthropic API key.
npm run tauri:buildOutputs platform-specific installers (.dmg, .msi, .AppImage) in src-tauri/target/release/bundle/.
- You paste a YouTube URL and pick a summary length + language.
- The Rust backend fetches the video transcript via YouTube's Innertube API.
- The transcript is sent to Claude with a tailored prompt.
- Claude's response streams back in real-time and renders as Markdown with clickable timestamp links.
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Desktop framework | Tauri 2 |
| Frontend | Next.js 16, React 19, Tailwind CSS 4 |
| Backend | Rust, reqwest, tokio |
| AI | Claude API (Sonnet 4.6 default) |
| Markdown | react-markdown |
| Storage | tauri-plugin-store (settings), OS keychain (API key) |
Pre-built binaries are available on the Releases page for macOS (ARM64 & Intel), Windows, and Linux.
- Download the
.dmgfile for your architecture (Apple Silicon or Intel) - Open the
.dmgand drag Rundownly to Applications - If you see "Rundownly is damaged and can't be opened", run in Terminal:
This removes the quarantine flag added by your browser. It's normal for open-source apps that aren't code-signed.
xattr -cr /Applications/Rundownly.app
- Download and run the
.msiinstaller - If SmartScreen warns about an unrecognized app: click "More info" → "Run anyway"
- Download the
.AppImagefile - Make it executable:
chmod +x Rundownly-*.AppImage - Run it:
./Rundownly-*.AppImage
Rundownly uses the Anthropic API directly — you pay only for what you use. A typical video summary costs less than $0.01. Get your API key at console.anthropic.com.
Contributions are welcome! Whether it's a bug fix, new feature, or documentation improvement — PRs are appreciated.
- Test locally with
npm run tauri:devand verify the feature works end-to-end - Run the linter:
npm run lint - Build successfully:
npm run tauri:build - Ensure CI checks pass
- Keep PRs focused — one thing per PR, don't mix unrelated concerns
- Describe what changed and why in your PR description
git clone https://github.com/rajat-mehra05/rundownly.git
cd rundownly
npm install
npm run tauri:devIf you find a bug or have a feature request, open an issue first so we can discuss the approach.
Open source. See LICENSE for details.