diff --git a/open_notebook/config.py b/open_notebook/config.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2adf1a7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/open_notebook/config.py
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+import os
+
+import yaml
+from loguru import logger
+
+# todo: enable config file overwrite with env vars
+current_dir = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
+project_root = os.path.dirname(current_dir)
+config_path = os.path.join(project_root, "open_notebook_config.yaml")
+
+try:
+    with open(config_path, "r") as file:
+        CONFIG = yaml.safe_load(file)
+except Exception:
+    logger.critical("Config file not found, using empty defaults")
+    logger.debug(f"Looked in {config_path}")
+    CONFIG = {}
diff --git a/open_notebook_config.yaml b/open_notebook_config.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..280c2a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/open_notebook_config.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+
+youtube_transcripts:
+  preferred_languages:
+    - en
+    - pt
+    - es
+    - de
+    - nl
+    - en-GB
+    - fr
+    - de
+    - hi
+    - ja
\ No newline at end of file