Youtube Shorts Scraper lite

🔍 Youtube Shorts Scraper lite – Overview

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite is an Apify Actor designed to extract structured metadata from one or more YouTube Shorts video URLs or share links. It is useful when you need organized information about specific Shorts without manually opening each video and copying details.

The Actor focuses on YouTube Shorts metadata extraction rather than downloading the actual video. For each supplied Shorts URL, it returns information such as the video title, video ID, canonical URL, thumbnail, views, likes, comments, upload date, channel details, description, tags, hashtags, duration, available resolutions, subtitles, category, description links, and calculated engagement rate.

This makes Youtube Shorts Scraper lite suitable for creators, marketers, researchers, analysts, agencies, and developers who need structured YouTube Shorts data for individual videos or small batches of known Shorts URLs.

🔹 Key Features

• Extract metadata from one or multiple YouTube Shorts URLs
• Accept YouTube Shorts URLs and share links
• Collect views, likes, and comment counts
• Calculate a simple engagement rate from likes, comments, and views
• Extract channel and creator information
• Capture title, description, tags, hashtags, and category information
• Detect available video resolutions
• Identify subtitle and automatic-caption languages when available
• Extract URLs found inside the video description
• Return structured records for each processed Short
• Save the collected results for convenient access after the Actor run

The easiest workflow is simple: provide the Shorts URLs in Start URLs, run the Actor, and review the resulting structured records.

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⚡ Youtube Shorts Scraper lite – Key Features

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite is built around a straightforward URL-to-metadata workflow. You give it the Shorts you want to analyze, and the Actor processes those URLs and creates one structured result per successfully processed video.

🎬 Direct YouTube Shorts URL Extraction

The Actor accepts one or more YouTube Shorts URLs through the startUrls input. A URL can be a standard Shorts URL, including links containing additional query parameters.

For example, these types of links can be provided:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9JsL7wexSgI
https://youtube.com/shorts/T1EwKGIFVxE?si=HaZEK0Z8Ky3UjHyy

📈 YouTube Shorts Engagement Metrics

Each result can contain the video's numeric view, like, and comment counts. The Actor also provides formatted versions of these values, making large numbers easier to scan.

For example:

1250 → 1.25K
2500000 → 2.50M

An engagement_rate field is also returned using likes, comments, and views.

👤 Channel and Creator Information

The output can include the channel name, channel URL, channel identifier, and subscriber count associated with the Short. This helps connect an individual Shorts video with its publishing channel.

📝 Content Metadata

The Actor extracts important descriptive information including:

• Video title
• Description
• Video tags
• Hashtags
• Category
• Description links
• Thumbnail URL
• Upload date

🎞️ Video Information

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite can also return duration, available resolutions, and a simple resolution-quality label based on the extracted video information.

💬 Subtitle Information

Where subtitle or automatic-caption information is available, the Actor returns the detected subtitle language identifiers in the available_subtitles field.

🔹 Why Use This Actor

• Quickly collect metadata from known YouTube Shorts
• Avoid manually copying statistics from individual videos
• Build structured datasets from selected Shorts
• Analyze creator, content, and engagement information
• Prepare YouTube Shorts metadata for research or reporting
• Process multiple supplied Shorts URLs in one Actor run

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📊 Youtube Shorts Scraper lite – What Data You Can Extract

The output is designed to provide a broad metadata view for each YouTube Short. The exact values depend on what information is available for the supplied video.

Field	Description
title	Title of the YouTube Short
video_id	YouTube video identifier
url	Video webpage URL returned for the Short
thumbnail_url	Thumbnail URL
view_count	Numeric view count
like_count	Numeric like count
comment_count	Numeric comment count
view_count_formatted	Human-readable view count
like_count_formatted	Human-readable like count
comment_count_formatted	Human-readable comment count
upload_date	Upload date formatted as YYYY-MM-DD when available
channel_name	Channel or uploader name
channel_url	Channel URL
channel_id	Channel identifier or available channel handle-style value
channel_subscribers	Numeric channel subscriber/follower count when available
channel_subscribers_formatted	Human-readable subscriber count
description	Full available video description
video_tags	Video tags represented as hashtags
hashtags	Hashtag values detected from available tags
duration	Video duration in MM:SS format
availableResolutions	Detected video resolutions such as 1080p or 720p
video_resolution_quality	HD, SD, or Unknown based on available resolution data
engagement_rate	Calculated engagement percentage
shares_count	Returned as null in the current output
music	Returned as null in the current output
available_subtitles	Available subtitle/automatic-caption language identifiers
category	Video category information
descriptionLinks	URLs detected within the description
privacy_settings	Availability value associated with the video
pinned_comments	Returned as an empty array in the current output
top_comments	Returned as an empty array in the current output

📌 Engagement Rate

The engagement_rate field provides a simple percentage based on:

((likes + comments) / views) × 100

For example, if a Short has 1,000 views, 50 likes, and 10 comments:

((50 + 10) / 1000) × 100 = 6.00%

This is a straightforward interaction-to-view calculation and should be treated as a basic comparison metric rather than a complete measurement of audience performance.

🔹 Important Output Notes

• View, like, comment, subscriber, and other numeric values may be unavailable depending on the source video.
• Formatted count fields are intended for easier human reading.
• pinned_comments and top_comments are currently empty arrays rather than scraped comment records.
• shares_count and music are currently returned as null.
• Subtitle availability depends on what information is exposed for the selected video.
• Resolution results represent the resolutions detected in the available video information.

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🚀 Youtube Shorts Scraper lite – How to Use It

Using Youtube Shorts Scraper lite requires only one input field: Start URLs.

1. Prepare Your YouTube Shorts URLs

Collect the Shorts you want to inspect. You can provide one URL or multiple URLs in the same run.

Example:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9JsL7wexSgI
https://youtube.com/shorts/T1EwKGIFVxE

2. Add URLs to Start URLs

In the Actor input, add the Shorts links to the Start URLs list.

The input is defined as a list, allowing multiple video URLs to be supplied for batch metadata collection.

3. Run the Actor

Start the Actor after providing your URLs. The Actor processes the submitted Shorts and creates structured result records for successfully processed videos.

4. Review the Results

After the run, review the resulting dataset records and the saved output. Each successful Short is represented by an individual metadata object.

🔹 Input

• Start URLs – Required
• Type: Array
• Purpose: Provide one or more YouTube Shorts video URLs or share links
• Multiple URLs: Supported
• Direct string URLs: Supported by the Actor's input handling

🧾 Sample Input

{
  "startUrls": [
    {
      "url": "https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9JsL7wexSgI"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://youtube.com/shorts/T1EwKGIFVxE?si=HaZEK0Z8Ky3UjHyy"
    }
  ]
}

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🔎 How to Scrape YouTube Shorts Metadata from Specific URLs

The best approach for URL-specific YouTube Shorts metadata is to provide the exact Shorts links you want to analyze.

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite is especially useful when your source list already exists. For example, you may have Shorts URLs collected from a campaign, content audit, creator research project, or internal list of videos.

Once the URLs are submitted, the Actor returns structured video and channel metadata rather than requiring you to manually inspect every Short.

This URL-focused approach is different from a discovery workflow where an Actor searches a channel for Shorts automatically. The supplied configuration specifically expects Start URLs, so the videos you want to process should be identified before the run.

🔗 Can I Scrape Multiple YouTube Shorts at Once?

Yes. The startUrls input accepts multiple entries, so you can submit several Shorts in a single Actor run.

This is useful for:

• Comparing selected Shorts
• Building a content research dataset
• Reviewing videos from several channels
• Collecting metadata from a campaign list
• Creating a structured inventory of known Shorts

The Actor creates an individual output item for each successfully processed URL.

📥 Does It Download the YouTube Short Video?

No. The documented functionality is focused on extracting metadata and structured information from the supplied Shorts URLs.

The output includes fields such as title, thumbnail URL, statistics, description, duration, resolutions, subtitles, and channel information rather than a downloaded video file.

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🎯 Youtube Shorts Scraper lite – Use Cases

The Actor can support a range of practical YouTube Shorts research and metadata workflows.

📣 Content and Marketing Research

Marketers can collect metadata from selected Shorts to compare video titles, descriptions, hashtags, tags, publishing dates, engagement metrics, and creator information.

👀 Competitor Content Analysis

Teams can submit specific competitor Shorts and create a structured dataset containing views, likes, comments, upload dates, descriptions, channel details, and available resolutions.

📊 Engagement Analysis

The combination of views, likes, comments, and engagement_rate provides a simple way to compare audience interaction across selected Shorts.

🧑‍🎨 Creator Research

Researchers can collect channel names, channel URLs, subscriber counts, and individual video metadata from known creators.

🔍 Content Auditing

Agencies and creators can build an inventory of selected Shorts to review titles, descriptions, hashtags, links, tags, video length, and other metadata.

🗂️ Dataset Preparation

Developers can use the structured records as a starting point for dashboards, internal research datasets, spreadsheets, reporting workflows, or further data processing.

🔹 Use Cases

• YouTube Shorts competitor research
• Creator and influencer analysis
• Content auditing
• Video engagement comparison
• Social media research
• Shorts metadata collection
• Marketing reporting
• Content inventory creation
• Research dataset preparation
• Video metadata analysis

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📦 Output – Sample YouTube Shorts Data

A successful result can look similar to the following structure:

{
  "title": "Example YouTube Short",
  "video_id": "9JsL7wexSgI",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/shorts/9JsL7wexSgI",
  "thumbnail_url": "https://example.com/thumbnail.jpg",
  "view_count": 125000,
  "like_count": 6200,
  "comment_count": 145,
  "view_count_formatted": "125.00K",
  "like_count_formatted": "6.20K",
  "comment_count_formatted": "145",
  "upload_date": "2026-10-01",
  "channel_name": "Example Channel",
  "channel_url": "https://www.youtube.com/@examplechannel",
  "channel_id": "@examplechannel",
  "channel_subscribers": 850000,
  "channel_subscribers_formatted": "850.00K",
  "description": "Example video description",
  "video_tags": ["#shorts", "#example"],
  "hashtags": ["#shorts", "#example"],
  "duration": "00:32",
  "availableResolutions": ["1080p", "720p"],
  "video_resolution_quality": "HD",
  "engagement_rate": "5.08%",
  "shares_count": null,
  "music": null,
  "available_subtitles": ["en"],
  "category": ["Entertainment"],
  "descriptionLinks": ["https://example.com"],
  "privacy_settings": "Public",
  "pinned_comments": [],
  "top_comments": []
}

The example values above illustrate the output structure. Actual values depend on the specific Shorts processed and the information available for each video.

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💰 Pricing

No fixed Actor price or per-use amount is specified in the supplied Actor configuration, so this README does not state a specific price.

Any actual run cost is determined by the current Actor billing configuration and the Apify platform account settings applicable at the time of use.

🔹 Pricing Note

• No invented pricing is provided.
• Review the Actor's current Apify Store pricing information before running large jobs.
• Costs can depend on the current platform configuration and usage.

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💡 Tips and Best Practices

For cleaner results, provide valid YouTube Shorts URLs and avoid mixing unrelated webpage URLs into the same input list.

When working with many videos, review the returned records for missing values because YouTube metadata availability can vary between videos.

Use the numeric fields when you need calculations, and the formatted fields when you need human-readable reports.

For engagement comparisons, compare videos using the same calculation method. The Actor's engagement_rate is based only on likes, comments, and views, so it does not represent every possible interaction or audience signal.

🔹 Tips

• Use direct Shorts links whenever possible.
• Keep URL lists organized for easier analysis.
• Check view_count, like_count, and comment_count for numeric analysis.
• Use formatted fields for presentation and reporting.
• Treat unavailable metadata as missing rather than assuming a zero value.
• Remember that empty comment arrays do not mean that the video has no comments; they indicate that comment records are not provided by the current output structure.
• Use availableResolutions and video_resolution_quality when reviewing technical video availability.

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions

🔗 What is Youtube Shorts Scraper lite?

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite is an Apify Actor for extracting structured metadata from specified YouTube Shorts URLs. It returns video, channel, engagement, description, technical, subtitle, and related metadata.

📥 What input does Youtube Shorts Scraper lite require?

The Actor requires the startUrls field. It is an array containing one or more YouTube Shorts video URLs or share links.

🎬 Can I scrape multiple YouTube Shorts in one run?

Yes. Multiple Shorts can be added to startUrls, allowing the Actor to process a batch of supplied video URLs.

📊 What data does Youtube Shorts Scraper lite extract?

The output can include title, video ID, URL, thumbnail, views, likes, comments, formatted metrics, upload date, channel details, subscribers, description, tags, hashtags, duration, resolutions, quality, engagement rate, subtitles, category, description links, and availability information.

💬 Does it extract full YouTube Shorts comments?

No. The current output does not provide full comment records. The pinned_comments and top_comments fields are returned as empty arrays.

❤️ How is the engagement rate calculated?

The engagement rate uses likes and comments compared with views:

((likes + comments) / views) × 100

The result is formatted as a percentage with two decimal places.

🎞️ Does the Actor return video resolutions?

Yes. The availableResolutions field can contain detected resolution values, while video_resolution_quality provides a simple HD, SD, or Unknown label.

📝 Does it extract YouTube Shorts descriptions and links?

Yes. The description field contains the available description, and descriptionLinks contains URLs detected in that description.

🗓️ Can I get the Shorts upload date?

Yes. When available, the upload date is formatted as YYYY-MM-DD.

🔤 Does the Actor collect subtitles?

It can return available subtitle and automatic-caption language identifiers in available_subtitles when those values are exposed for the video.

👤 Does it collect channel information?

Yes. The Actor can return the channel name, channel URL, channel identifier, and subscriber count when available.

📦 Where are the results stored?

The Actor produces structured dataset records for processed videos and also saves the collected output for the run. This makes the resulting metadata convenient to review after execution.

🔍 Can I use this Actor to discover every Short on a YouTube channel?

The supplied configuration is URL-based and does not provide a channel-search input. For channel-level Shorts discovery, use an Actor specifically designed for finding Shorts from channel search results.

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🤝 Support

Youtube Shorts Scraper lite is designed for users who already have YouTube Shorts URLs and need structured metadata in a convenient format.

For questions, feedback, or help related to the Actor, you can contact the developer directly.

• contact me by email : alphascraper69@gmail.com