SubGrab Value Guide: Getting the Most Out of Every Credit
Exactly what costs a credit on SubGrab, what doesn't, and how to make credits go further — with real scenarios priced out.
SubGrab charges by the transcript, not by the month, and every new account gets 2 free credits to try it. Here is exactly what costs a credit, what does not, and how to make credits go further.
What's Free
- 2 credits when you sign up — enough for two transcripts of up to an hour each
- Your first AI summary — on your first transcript, no credit needed
- A transcript already extracted from captions — served from cache, no charge
- Every failed job — refunded automatically, always
- All export formats — TXT, SRT and VTT, as often as you like
- Full transcripts — no length limits, no truncation, no watermark
- Language selection — choose from every caption track the video has
- Timestamps and the embedded player — on every transcript
What Costs a Credit
1. Caption extraction (1 credit, however long the video) — when a video already has captions, SubGrab reads them in seconds
2. AI transcription (1 credit per started hour) — when a video has no captions; a 50-minute video is 1 credit, a 2-hour one is 2
3. AI summary (1 credit) — after your first free one
Why charge for captions at all? You are paying for an answer, not for our compute, and you should not need to know which path a link will take before you know its price. The trade-off is laid out honestly in what video transcription costs.
Smart Ways to Spend Fewer Credits
Long video? Captions are the bargain. A captioned three-hour lecture is 1 credit; transcribing the same audio with AI would be 3. SubGrab always tries captions first, automatically.
Generate summaries only when needed. Summaries earn their credit on long videos (20+ minutes). For a five-minute clip, reading the transcript is faster.
Buy the pack that matches the batch. Credits never expire, so one larger pack costs less per credit than several small top-ups.
Credit Pack Breakdown
| Pack | Price | Credits | Per Credit | Best For |
|------|-------|---------|-----------|----------|
| Micro | $3.99 | 3 | $1.33 | Quick top-up |
| Starter | $5.99 | 10 | $0.60 | Trying it out |
| Popular | $11.99 | 30 | $0.40 | Regular use |
| Pro | $22.99 | 80 | $0.29 | Power users |
| Power | $44.99 | 200 | $0.22 | Teams |
Real Scenarios
Student studying from YouTube lectures:
- A semester of 30 one-hour lectures with captions = 30 credits
- The Popular pack (30 credits, $11.99) covers it
- A summary of the densest few adds 1 credit each
Content creator repurposing their own videos:
- 15 videos a quarter, each transcribed (1 credit) and summarised (1 credit) = 30 credits
- The Popular pack ($11.99) covers the quarter
Researcher analysing interviews:
- 20 two-hour interviews without captions, AI-transcribed = 40 credits
- A summary of each = 20 credits
- The Pro pack (80 credits, $22.99) covers it with room to spare
The Bottom Line
One credit per transcript up to an hour, captions or AI; one per started hour beyond that when AI does the work; one per summary. No subscription, no recurring charge, no expiry — and if a job fails, the credit comes back without you asking.