YouTube to PDF

A WordPress custom plugin that converts YouTube videos into PDF documents by extracting frames using FFmpeg 7.1.1, fetching videos with yt-dlp (2025.10.22), and generating PDFs via TCPDF. Ideal for educators, researchers, and content creators who want to archive YouTube video frames directly inside WordPress.

📌 youtube-to-pdf — WordPress Custom Plugin

youtube-to-pdf is a lightweight yet powerful WordPress plugin designed to automatically convert YouTube video frames into a downloadable PDF document. It integrates three major tools — FFmpeg, yt-dlp, and TCPDF — to extract high-quality frames and assemble them into a clean PDF.

This plugin is ideal for educators, content creators, researchers, or bloggers who want to archive visual content from YouTube videos directly inside WordPress.

🚀 Features

🎥 Download YouTube Videos Uses yt-dlp (version 2025.10.22) to fetch the YouTube video in the best available format.

🖼️ Extract Frames Using FFmpeg Uses FFmpeg 7.1.1 to capture frames at intervals (configurable), generating high-quality JPEG or PNG snapshots.

📄 Generate PDF Using TCPDF Automatically compiles extracted frames into a PDF using TCPDF, with:

Automatic page sizing

Optional title, watermark, or timestamps

Custom margins and layout

🔄 Fully Automated Workflow Input a YouTube URL → plugin fetches video → extracts frames → generates PDF → stores it in WordPress uploads folder.

📥 Admin Interface Clean WordPress admin page where users can:

Enter YouTube URL

Set frame interval (e.g., 1 frame per second)

Set output PDF filename

Download the final PDF

📂 File Management Generated PDF files are stored under /wp-content/uploads/youtube-to-pdf/.

🧩 Dependencies

This plugin requires the following binaries/libraries available on your server:

FFmpeg 7.1.1

yt-dlp (master build — version 2025.10.22)

TCPDF library for PHP

Make sure these are installed and accessible from your PHP environment (shell_exec or similar must be enabled).

🏗️ How It Works (Technical Flow)

User inputs a YouTube URL in the plugin's admin page.

Plugin executes:

yt-dlp -o video.mp4

FFmpeg extracts frames:

ffmpeg -i video.mp4 -vf fps=1 frame-%03d.jpg

TCPDF initializes a PDF document and inserts each extracted frame as a full-page image.

PDF is saved in the uploads directory.

User can download the PDF or delete generated files.

🔧 Use Cases

Creating visual transcripts of video lectures.

Extracting key scenes from tutorials, webinars, or interviews.

Offline visual notes for research or study.

Archiving video content in PDF form.