The NotebookLM alternative for video & audio
Love asking questions of your sources, but your sources are recordings — not documents? That's exactly what Silestis is for.
NotebookLM is a great research notebook for documents. But if the content you want to question lives in lectures, webinars, YouTube, and podcasts, you need a tool built around media — not files.
Silestis is that alternative: paste a link or use the browser extension, get a timestamped transcript, and ask any video or podcast a question — with answers that cite the exact [mm:ss] moment. Add speaker labels, semantic search across everything you've transcribed, and EU hosting.
| Silestis | NotebookLM | |
|---|---|---|
| Ask questions, get grounded answers | ||
| Built for video & audio sources | ||
| Transcribe any web video (YouTube, 1800+ sites) | ||
| Browser extension to grab any video | ||
| Timestamped [mm:ss] answers | ||
| Speaker diarization | ||
| Export SRT / VTT / TXT / PDF / DOCX | Limited | |
| Data hosting | EU (Cloudflare) | Google Cloud |
When to use which
- Pick Silestis when your knowledge lives in recordings you want to search, quote, and study from.
- Stay with NotebookLM when you're synthesizing across documents and PDFs you've already gathered.
Prefer a side-by-side? See the full Silestis vs NotebookLM comparison, or how it works for lectures and podcasts.
Comparison based on publicly available information; competitor features may change over time.
NotebookLM alternative — FAQ
What's the best NotebookLM alternative for YouTube and lectures?
Silestis is built for exactly that: paste a YouTube link or upload a lecture, get a timestamped transcript, and ask questions with answers that cite the exact moment. NotebookLM is document-first and doesn't transcribe arbitrary web video.
Is it private / EU-hosted?
Yes. Silestis processes audio in the EU on Cloudflare, deletes source files after transcription, and never trains AI models on your content.
Can I still use it for documents?
Silestis focuses on audio and video. Many people pair it with a document tool — Silestis turns recordings into clean, exportable transcripts you can take anywhere.
Every video you watch could be searchable.
Install the extension, hit transcribe, and never lose what was said in a lecture, meeting, or podcast again.
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