Watch and check YouTube videos

Paste a YouTube link into a chat and Bearly opens the video in a card. The card has the player, a verdict on whether the video is worth your time, its key moments, shorter cuts, and tabs with the summary, takeaways, and what the video mentions. From the card you can look up the papers, books, repositories, and tools the video names, and check the figures it states against the web.

The card and its tabs work in Bearly on the web, desktop, iOS, and Android, on every plan. If a video can’t play inside the card, select Open on YouTube to watch it there. Saving a video to play it and getting a missing transcript need the Bearly desktop app.

Open a video

Paste the link into a chat, on its own or with a question. The card appears as soon as Bearly starts reading, so you can play the video while the tabs fill in. The reply answers your question. If you send only the link, the reply says in a sentence whether the video is worth watching. When Bearly can read the captions, it saves the transcript to the chat’s files.

Links to videos, Shorts, and live streams work, from youtube.com or youtu.be. A link with a start time plays from that time. Playlists, channels, and clips aren’t supported.

To make sure Bearly opens the video, type /youtube, select YouTube under Tools, and paste the link.

Read the card

The header shows the title, channel, length, views, and upload month. Under it is the verdict, Watch, Skim, or Skip, with a sentence explaining it. When the video doesn’t fully deliver what its title promises, Title check says so and gives a plainer title.

Under the player:

• When the video is long enough, Watch offers 2 min, 5 min, or 10 min beside Full video. A shorter length plays the essential parts back to back in the same player, and the line beside it shows which part is playing.
• The playback speed menu and Open on YouTube sit at the end of the same row.
• The Key moments bar marks the parts worth watching. Select one to jump there. When YouTube has the data, a shaded curve shows which parts viewers replay most.

Select any time in the tabs to play from that moment. Only one video plays at a time in a chat, so starting another returns the first to its thumbnail. On a wide card, the expand button in the video’s top corner fills the card with the video; select it again to go back.

The tabs depend on the video. A tab with nothing to show is left out.

Tab	What it shows
Summary	The substance in a few sentences, who the video is best for and who can skip it, and the chapters.
Insights	Specific takeaways, each with the moment it’s said and, when the captions were read, the words from the video. Check claims sits at the top when it’s available.
Claims	The figures the video states and how many sites give the same figure or a different one. It appears when you select Check claims and stays with the chat.
Mentioned	The papers, books, code repositories, and tools the video names.
Community	What the comments agree on, push back on, correct, or add, and the moments people point to. Commenters aren’t named.
Transcript	The full transcript. Search it, copy it, or select a line’s time to play from there.
Steps	For how-to videos: the steps, commands you can copy, the tools used, and links.

Look up what a video mentions

Mentioned lists what the video names under Papers, Books, Repositories, and Tools, in the order they come up. Each row has the moment it’s named and, when the captions were read, the sentence it’s named in. Anything named only in a sponsor read or an ad is left out.

Select Find beside a row to look it up. Find shows the page it found and the site it’s on, with the year for a paper. Select the result to open the page. Find only accepts a page that names the item, so when none does, it says No match found. rather than guess.

Find results aren’t saved. After you reload the chat, Find appears again.

Check the figures a video states

Check claims lists the figures the video states, such as statistics, amounts, counts, and dates, and searches the web for each one. It needs the video’s transcript.

1. Open the Insights tab and select Check claims.

   The Claims tab opens and shows Finding the figures in the video…, then each figure as it’s checked. Select Cancel to stop. Cancelling a first check saves nothing.

2. Read the result.

   The top line says how many figures were checked, followed by a count for each label. Each row has the moment the figure is said, the claim, and its label.

3. Select a row’s label to see the sources.

   It shows the words from the video, then each site with the figure it gives, the words it uses, and a link to the page.

4. If the video states more than 12 figures, select Check N more to check the next ones.

Labels count sites in the search results. Bearly doesn’t decide whether a figure is true.

Label	What it means
Matched by N sites	Two or more sites give the same figure, and none gives a different one.
Found on 1 site	One site gives the same figure. Check it before you rely on it.
Split · N match, N differ	Some sites give the same figure and some give a different one. The check doesn’t pick between them.
N sites give a different figure	No result gives the video’s figure, and at least one site gives a different one.
Not found in N results	None of the results gives the figure. That doesn’t make it wrong. When the search found nothing, or only pages about this video, the label says so.
Couldn’t check	The check for that figure failed. Check N more doesn’t retry it.
Not checked yet	The figure is waiting for Check N more.

Each press checks up to 12 figures, and one check covers up to 40. The check is saved as a file in the chat’s files, so it’s still there after a reload and on your other devices. Copy at the top of the Claims tab copies the report with its sources. When the transcript came from automatic captions, the check says so, since automatic captions can mishear numbers. For a very long video, it says how far into the transcript it got.

Ask about the video

Follow up in the same chat. Bearly answers from what it already read, without opening the video again.

• Ask what was said about a topic, and Bearly looks it up in the transcript.
• Ask for just one part, or a shorter version, and Bearly adds a card for that cut. Select Play cut to play its parts back to back, or select a time in its list to start there.
• After you check claims, ask about the results, such as which figures sites disagreed with. Bearly reads the saved check. It doesn’t run a check itself; only you can, from the card.

Copy the card

Select Copy under Bearly’s reply. Along with the reply, it copies the card as text: the title and link, the verdict, the summary, chapters, insights with their quotes, the Mentioned list, community notes, and steps. Each time links to that moment on YouTube. The transcript and the claims check aren’t included; use Copy transcript in the Transcript tab or Copy in the Claims tab for those.

When the captions can’t be read

YouTube doesn’t always let Bearly read a video’s captions. Bearly then watches the video to make the card, and Insights and Mentioned say so. Times are approximate, insights have no quotes, and names may be misheard. For a video longer than 90 minutes, the card covers the first 90 minutes.

On the web and on phones, a card made by watching has no Transcript tab or Check claims until a transcript is saved from the desktop app. If the video has captions that Bearly couldn’t read, the desktop app can get them:

1. In the Bearly desktop app, open the card’s Transcript tab. It shows No transcript yet.
2. Select Get transcript. The tab says what it’s doing while the rest of the card keeps working. Select Cancel to stop.
3. The transcript appears in the tab and is saved to the chat’s files.

Once it’s saved, the transcript shows on the card on your other devices, Check claims becomes available, and follow-up questions can quote it. The summary and insights keep their approximate times. If the video has no captions at all, the tab says This video has no captions.

Get transcript isn’t offered in a chat you can only view, for a live stream, or for a video YouTube reports as having no captions. Otherwise, if a card made by watching has no Transcript tab in the desktop app, update the app.

When a video can’t play in the card

Some uploaders don’t allow their videos to play outside YouTube. The card then says This video can’t play in an embedded player. and offers Open on YouTube. Outside the desktop app, selecting a time on the card opens the video on YouTube at that moment.

In the desktop app, Bearly can save a copy of such a video to the chat and play it from there. Select Download to play here. The player shows the progress, and Cancel stops the download. Bearly never starts a download on its own.

Many videos can’t be saved this way. When a save fails, the card says The download couldn’t start. or The download didn’t finish. and still offers Open on YouTube.

The copy is saved to the chat’s files and plays on your other devices too. Bearly saves a lower quality when needed to stay under the 300 MB limit for a chat file. If even that is too large, the card shows This video is over the 300 MB limit for a chat file. To save videos as files on purpose, see Download a video.

Plans, allowance, and team policy

• Plans: YouTube cards are available on every plan. Opening a video uses your plan allowance, like any other reply.
• Allowance: Find and Check claims also use your plan allowance, and Check claims says Uses plan allowance. beside the button. When your allowance is used up, Check claims isn’t offered and Mentioned says Your plan allowance is used up, so Find is off for now. A new video whose captions Bearly can’t read can’t be summarized then, and the card says The summary couldn’t be made for this video. See Manage billing and review usage.
• Chats you can only view: In a chat you can view but not edit, the card plays and its tabs can be read, but Find, Check claims, Get transcript, and saving a video aren’t available.
• File uploads: The transcript, a saved video, and a claims check are files in the chat. When a managed organization’s policy turns off File uploads (under Privacy & Security), Bearly saves none of them, so the card has no Transcript tab, Get transcript, Check claims, or Download to play here. The rest of the card still works, and files saved earlier still open.
• Routines: Scheduled Routines don’t open YouTube videos.
• Team policy: There’s no chat setting for YouTube. Administrators of managed organizations control it from Organizations → organization name → Policies → policy name → Web & Research → YouTube, which needs Web on. Find and Check claims also need Chat web search. Without it, Find can still look up papers when Scholar is on.

Turning YouTube off stops new links from opening as cards. Cards already in chats still show, without Find, Check claims, Get transcript, or saving a video.

If something doesn’t work

What you see	What to do
That doesn’t look like a YouTube video link.	Paste the link to a single video, not a playlist, channel, or clip.
This video couldn’t be opened. It may be private, removed or restricted.	Open the link on YouTube to check that it still plays for you. Bearly can’t read private or restricted videos. If it plays on YouTube, ask Bearly to open the video again.
Reading was stopped before this was ready.	The reply was stopped, or the page reloaded, before the card was finished. Ask Bearly to open the video again.
The summary couldn’t be made for this video.	Ask Bearly to open the video again. If it fails again, check whether your plan allowance is used up in Manage billing and review usage.
This video can’t play in this app. or This video can’t be played here.	Select Open on YouTube to watch it there. In the desktop app, you can instead select Download to play here when it’s offered.
The download couldn’t start. or The download didn’t finish.	Select Try again. Many videos can’t be saved to a chat; if it keeps failing, select Open on YouTube.
Update the desktop app to download videos.	Update the Bearly desktop app.
The desktop app is saving other videos. Try again when one finishes.	Wait for a download in another card to finish, then select Try again.
Couldn’t search right now. under a Mentioned row	Select Try again.
Find doesn’t appear in Mentioned	Find needs plan allowance and a chat you can edit. On a managed account, books, repositories, and tools need Chat web search; papers need Chat web search or Scholar.
Couldn’t check the claims.	Select Try again.
Checking claims needs plan allowance, and yours is used up.	Figures checked before the allowance ran out are kept. When you have allowance again, reload the chat to continue.
Checking claims isn’t available on this account right now.	Your organization’s policy may not allow what the check needs. Ask an administrator.
This check couldn’t be saved to the chat, so it will be gone after a reload.	Select Copy in the Claims tab to keep the report.
Check claims doesn’t appear in Insights	The video needs a transcript, you need plan allowance, and the chat must be one you can edit. On a managed account, Chat web search and File uploads must be allowed. For a video Bearly watched, get the transcript in the desktop app first.