Best YouTube Summarizer Apps for iPhone (2026)

There is no single best YouTube summarizer for iPhone: the right one depends on your sources and on what you want besides the summary. As of November 2026, SumAI, Summarify, Eightify, YouSumm, Glasp and Recall are native iPhone apps, Google’s Gemini app and Gemini Notebook (formerly NotebookLM) also handle YouTube videos, and YouTube’s own Ask YouTube feature answers questions on some videos in some regions.

SumAI is our app. We have tried to describe every tool here fairly, from its own documentation as of November 2026; tell us if we got something wrong. Contact details are on the support page.

How did we compare the apps?

We read each vendor’s website, help pages and US App Store listing on 12 November 2026 and checked five things: platforms, inputs, outputs, price and stated limits. Nothing was speed-tested or scored, and the order below is not a ranking. “Not listed” means a vendor’s pages do not mention a feature, not that the feature is missing. Prices are US prices and they change, so check the current listing before you subscribe.

One limit is shared: SumAI, Summarify, Glasp and Gemini Notebook all say they work from a video’s captions or transcript, so a video with no captions usually cannot be summarized.

How do iPhone YouTube summarizers compare at a glance?

App	Sources beyond YouTube	Study tools	Platform notes
SumAI	Web articles, PDFs	Quiz, flashcards, mind map, Ask AI chat	iPhone, iPad; no Android, web app or extension
Gemini Notebook	PDFs, websites, audio, copied text	Flashcards, quizzes, Audio Overviews; mind maps on web only	iPhone, Android, web; Google Account
Summarify	None listed	Chat about a video	iPhone, iPad; companion Chrome extension
Eightify	None listed	None listed	iPhone, Android, Chrome and Safari extensions
YouSumm	None listed	Highlights	iPhone, iPad
Recall	Podcasts, articles, PDFs	Quizzes with spaced repetition, chat (paid plans)	iPhone, Android, web, extensions; account required
Glasp	Web articles, PDFs	Highlights and notes	iPhone, Android, web, extensions
Gemini app	Files and photos (general assistant)	Chat answers	iPhone, Android, web; Google sign-in
Ask YouTube	None	Questions and answers	Inside YouTube; select videos and regions

Best if you want study tools as well as a summary

SumAI

SumAI summarizes YouTube videos, Shorts and live streams, plus web articles and PDFs, in five styles from TL;DR to Chapters. Each summary comes with tappable key moments, an Ask AI chat, a mind map, a quiz, flashcards and the full transcript, in 60+ output languages. No account is required. SumAI is free to download, with optional Premium at $2.99 a week or $29.99 a year (US App Store price, November 2026).

• Good fit if you study from videos, also summarize PDFs and articles, or want summaries in another language.
• Look elsewhere if you need Android, a web app or a browser extension, or want to question many sources together in one notebook.

Gemini Notebook

Gemini Notebook is Google’s notebook app. On iPhone you add public, captioned YouTube videos, PDFs, websites, audio or copied text to a notebook, get answers cited to your sources, and generate flashcards, quizzes, Audio Overviews and Video Overviews. Google says mind maps, notes, reports and data tables are not yet available in the iPhone app. Gemini Notebook is free with a Google Account, and Google AI Plus ($4.99 a month in the US, November 2026) raises its limits.

• Good fit if you want cited answers across several sources, or an audio overview to listen to.
• Look elsewhere if you want a mind map on your phone, a one-link summary without setting up a notebook, or no Google sign-in.

Best if you only need YouTube summaries

Summarify

Summarify is an iPhone and iPad app that summarizes YouTube videos from their transcripts. Its listing describes more than 15 summary styles, chat about a video, chapter summaries, linked timestamps, export as PDF, Markdown or plain text, and iCloud sync. Some summaries are free on install and each week (the listing does not say how many). Unlimited is $4.99 a month or $29.99 a year (US App Store price, November 2026).

• Good fit if YouTube is your only source and you want many summary styles, a monthly plan or iCloud sync.
• Look elsewhere if you also summarize PDFs or articles, or want quizzes, flashcards or a mind map, which the listing does not mention.

Eightify

Eightify adds a summary panel to YouTube through a browser extension and also has iPhone and Android apps. Its App Store listing describes TL;DR summaries and key points, timestamp navigation, top comments and 40+ languages. The iPhone app’s last App Store update is dated 3 April 2025, and the Chrome extension was updated in November 2026. Eightify’s site has no public pricing page; Eightify Pro is $9.99 a month or $59.99 a year (US App Store price, November 2026).

• Good fit if you also watch on a computer and want the same tool in your browser.
• Look elsewhere if you want sources beyond YouTube, or chat, quizzes and mind maps, which its pages do not list.

YouSumm

YouSumm is an iPhone and iPad app that pulls a video’s transcript and writes a bullet-point summary with key points and keywords. Its listing mentions highlights, export as text, SRT or VTT, 10+ languages and offline notes. YouSumm is free to download, with in-app purchases from $5.99 to $59.99 (US App Store price, November 2026). The listing does not state a free allowance, and we found no vendor website to cross-check it.

• Good fit if you mainly want the transcript, including subtitle files.
• Look elsewhere if you want chat, timestamps in the summary or study tools, which the listing does not mention.

Best if you are building a library of what you save

Recall

Recall is a knowledge base that saves and summarizes YouTube videos, podcasts, articles and PDFs, tags them automatically and links related items. The free plan includes 10 AI summaries a month. Recall’s pricing page lists chat, quizzes with spaced repetition and Listen Mode under paid plans, from $10 a month billed yearly (vendor’s site, November 2026). An account is required.

• Good fit if you want one library across phone, web and browser, with spaced-repetition review.
• Look elsewhere if you would rather not create an account.

Glasp

Glasp is a web highlighter with browser extensions and iPhone and Android apps. The iPhone app’s listing describes AI summaries of YouTube videos and web pages with transcripts and timestamps, highlighting for articles and PDFs, a read-later library and a feed that follows YouTube channels. The free plan is metered, and Pro is $15 a month or $150 a year (vendor’s site, November 2026).

• Good fit if you highlight articles and PDFs as well as videos and want it all in one searchable library.
• Look elsewhere if you want quizzes, flashcards or a mind map, which Glasp’s pages do not list.

Best if you already use Google or YouTube

Gemini app

Google’s help page says you can ask the Gemini app to find YouTube videos and to explain or summarize one. You must be signed in with Keep Activity on, and the feature is not available in Live chats. The result is a chat answer; the help page describes no export, mind map or flashcards for YouTube videos. Gemini is free with a Google Account.

• Good fit if you already use Gemini and want a quick answer about a video.
• Look elsewhere if you want chapters, a transcript or export (the help page describes none), or you keep that activity setting off.

Ask YouTube

Ask YouTube is built into YouTube’s watch page: you ask about the video you are watching and get an AI-generated answer. YouTube’s Help Center says it is for signed-in users aged 13 or older, appears only on select videos, and is limited to a published list of regions and languages. When we read it, the list included the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, India and Japan, but no EU member state and not Australia.

• Good fit if the feature appears on your video and you want an answer without installing anything.
• Look elsewhere if you are outside the listed regions, or you want a summary you can save, export or study from.

Which well-known YouTube summarizers are not iPhone apps?

• NoteGPT is a web app with Chrome and Edge extensions that lists summaries, transcripts, mind maps, chat, flashcards and quizzes. Its site links to no iPhone app, and App Store apps using the NoteGPT name list other sellers, so we could not confirm an official one.
• Summarize.tech, a web-only summarizer, was unavailable when we checked on 12 November 2026.
• Monica is a general AI assistant with an iPhone app. Its pricing page lists YouTube video summaries as an extension feature, and we could not confirm them in the iPhone app, so we treat it as desktop-first.

Which YouTube summarizer should you install?

• You study from videos, or also summarize PDFs and articles: SumAI (download).
• You want to question many sources together: Gemini Notebook.
• YouTube only, with many summary styles and export: Summarify.
• You split your time between phone and desktop browser: Eightify, Glasp or Recall.
• You want a quick answer in an app you already have: Ask YouTube if it appears on the video, or the Gemini app.

Whichever you pick, an AI summary can get a detail wrong, so check what matters against the video: How accurate are AI summaries? explains how. Our comparison hub has head-to-head pages.