Claude
How to let Claude watch a video
Claude cannot open a video file on its own. Adding Playhead as a custom connector gives it three tools — watch_video, inspect_frame and get_transcript — and from then on you paste a link into the chat and ask what happens at second 37.
Free tier: 60 credits a month, no card. One credit is about a minute of video.
What this changes
This is the only way to do it on a phone. Every other approach in this space is a script that needs ffmpeg, yt-dlp and a Python environment on the machine you are sitting at, which rules out Claude on the web and Claude on iOS entirely. A remote connector runs nowhere near your device: you sign in with your Playhead account, and the same connection follows you from the laptop to the phone.
Setting it up
- 01
Open the connector dialog
In Claude, go to Settings → Connectors → Add custom connector. The button on this page opens it with the URL already filled in.
- 02
Paste the server URL
https://mcp.tryplayhead.com/mcp — no API key. Claude signs you in through your Playhead account, which is why this link is safe to share.
- 03
Approve the connection
You will see exactly which scopes are being granted: analysing videos, reading your plan, and staying connected. Approving is one click and it lands you back in the chat.
- 04
Paste a link and ask
Any TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, X, Vimeo or Reddit URL. Claude calls watch_video, gets contact sheets back, and answers from the frames rather than from the description.
Things worth asking it
Each of these produces an answer with a second attached, because the timestamp is burned into the frame the model is looking at — it cannot lose track of when something happened.
- https://www.tiktok.com/@user/video/… — what is the hook here, and exactly when does it end?
- Watch this ad and tell me every cut, with timestamps.
- Read the text on screen between 0:12 and 0:18.
- Is there a moment in this video where nothing is happening for more than two seconds?
How closely it looks is a choice
Six levels, picked by the agent from the question. Surveying an hour and reading a single frame of animation are different jobs, and charging the same for both would make one of them pointless.
| Level | Rate | Answers |
|---|---|---|
| overview | 0.5–2 fps | What is this video, start to end |
| standard | 5 fps | What happens when — cuts, overlays, entrances |
| detail | 5 fps | Objects and text blocks, tiles four times larger |
| fine | 10 fps | Type, logos, subtle transitions |
| motion | 30 fps | Animation, easing, dropped frames |
| single | one frame | Reading text at full resolution |
Questions
- Does this work on the Claude mobile app?
- Yes. The connector is attached to your account rather than to a machine, so it works in Claude on the web, on desktop and on iOS and Android without any further setup.
- Do I need an API key?
- No. The connector uses OAuth — you sign in with your Playhead account when you add it. API keys exist for people running their own agents, and are not needed here.
- Can Claude watch a private or unlisted video?
- Only if it is reachable without a login. For anything behind an account, upload the file instead: in Claude Code and other local clients you can pass a path, and the file is uploaded once and reused for every later call.
Or somewhere else
One account, every client. The connection is attached to you rather than to a machine, so adding a second one costs nothing.
Claude CodeOne command in the terminal, then /mcp to sign in.
claude mcp add --transport http playhead https://mcp.tryplayhead.com/mcpNo deeplink exists for the terminal, so this is the install.
- ChatGPTNeeds Developer mode under Settings → Connectors → Advanced first.
- CursorAdds the server to Cursor's MCP settings.
- VS CodeOpens VS Code and adds the server to your MCP configuration.
CodexAdd the server to Codex's config file.
[mcp_servers.playhead] url = "https://mcp.tryplayhead.com/mcp" auth = "oauth"Append to ~/.codex/config.toml — the CLI, IDE extension and desktop app share it.
- LM StudioAdds the server to LM Studio's MCP list.