🚀 YouTube Video Downloader ( Soundless )

🔎 Short description: This Apify Actor extracts detailed metadata from YouTube videos video-only downloadable links (no audio) at a requested resolution. It under the hood and applies a best-effort resolution matching strategy with automatic proxy rotation (residential proxies preferred) to improve reliability.

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▶️ Run on Apify Console

• 🚀 Step 1: Open the actor in Apify Console.
• 🧩 Step 2: Paste the example input into the Input field.
• ▶️ Step 3: Click Run.
• 📊 Step 4: Monitor run logs & view output dataset. Download results from the default dataset.

🎯 What This Actor Does

• ✅ Accepts one or multiple supported video URLs
• ✅ Processes each URL independently
• ✅ Returns direct media-only URLs
• ✅ Supports video-only outputs
• ✅ Allows quality/resolution selection
• ✅ Handles retries automatically to improve success rate

⭐ Key Features

• ✨ Clean and simple output
• ✨ No unnecessary metadata
• ✨ Handles multiple URLs at once
• ✨ Retry mechanism for better success rate
• ✨ Suitable for automation workflows
• ✨ Developer-friendly structure

🧭 Actor Overview

• 🚀 Purpose: Extract metadata and a direct video-only download URL (when available) for one or more YouTube video or playlist URLs.
• ⚙️ Primary audience: Developers, data engineers, and automation teams who need programmatic access to YouTube video files (video-only) and rich metadata for further processing, storage, or analytics.
• 🏷️ Actor name: youtube-video-downloader-soundless (as defined in actor.json)
• 🧰 Core behavior: For each input URL, the actor fetches video metadata , selects the best video-only format matching the requested resolution (or the highest available), and outputs a structured result for each URL.

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🧾 Parameter	🔤 Type	✅ Required	🧠 Description	🔎 Example
🟢 startUrls	array of objects	Yes	List of one or more YouTube video or playlist URLs. Each array item can be an object with a url field or a simple string value in some contexts. Provide full YouTube watch/playlist links.	[{ "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5RpJwCJDqc" }]
🟢 videoResolution	string (enum)	No (default: 1080p)	Desired video resolution. The actor will try to find the exact match; if none found it returns the highest available video-only format. Supported values: 8K, 4K, 2K, 1080p, 720p, 480p, 360p.	"1080p"

📥 Input Sample

You provide a list of URLs and your desired resolution.

{
  "startUrls": [
    { "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=example1" },
    { "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=example2" }
  ],
  "videoResolution": "1080p"
}

---

📄 Output Sample

A single result item looks like this:

[
 {
   "original_url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=example1",
   "requested_resolution": "1080p",
   "title": "Amazing Nature Documentation 4K",
   "channel": "NatureWorld",
   "duration": "12m 30s",
   "provided_resolution": "1080p",
   "thumbnail": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/example1/maxresdefault.jpg",

   "downloadable_video_link": "https://rr----------------sn-ox02.googlevideo.com/videoplayback?...",

   "view_count": "5.2M",
   "categories": ["Nature", "Travel"],
   "description": "Experience the beauty of nature in 4K...",
   "availability": "public",
   "live_status": "not_live",
   "channel_subscribers": "1.2M",
   "video_filesize": "200MB"
  },
  {
   "original_url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=example2",
   "requested_resolution": "1080p",
   "title": "Nature Documentation 2K",
   "channel": "Nature",
   "duration": "2hour 17m 30s",
   "provided_resolution": "1080p",
   "thumbnail": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/example2/maxresdefault.jpg",

   "downloadable_video_link": "https://rr----------------sn-ox03.googlevideo.com/videoplayback?...",
  
   "view_count": "5.2M",
   "categories": ["Nature", "Travel"],
   "description": "Beauty of nature in 8K...",
   "availability": "public",
   "live_status": "not_live",
   "channel_subscribers": "3.2M",
   "video_filesize": "500MB"
  } 
]...............

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📝 Output Fields Explanation

Here is a detailed breakdown of the fields you will receive in the output:

Field	Description
original_url	🔗 The URL of the YouTube video that was processed.
requested_resolution	🎯 The generic resolution you requested (e.g., "1080p").
title	🎬 The full title of the video.
channel	👤 The name of the channel or uploader.
duration	⏱️ The length of the video (e.g., "10m 5s").
provided_resolution	📏 The actual resolution of the video link obtained (e.g., "1080p").
thumbnail	🖼️ URL to the high-quality thumbnail image.
downloadable_video_link	📥 Direct link to download the video file (video stream only).
view_count	👁️ Total number of views formatted (e.g., "1.5M").
categories	🏷️ List of categories the video belongs to.
description	📝 The full text description of the video.
availability	🔓 Privacy status (e.g., "public").
live_status	🔴 Indicates if the video is currently live ("live" or "not_live").
channel_subscribers	👥 Number of subscribers to the channel (e.g., "100K").
video_filesize	💾 Approximate size of the video file (e.g., "150MB").

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✅ Best Practices

• 🟢 Use valid and supported URLs only
• 🟢 Avoid mixing unsupported links
• 🟢 Choose realistic quality values
• 🟢 Process large batches gradually
• 🟢 Always check status field in output

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⚠️ Possible Errors & Causes

Issue	Possible Reason
failed status	Invalid or unsupported URL
Missing directUrl	Media temporarily unavailable
Long processing time	Large media or network delay
Quality not matched	Requested resolution not available

🔧 Tip: Re-running the actor usually resolves temporary failures.

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🔄 Retry Behavior

If a request fails:

• The actor automatically retries
• Temporary issues are handled internally
• Final output reflects the latest attempt

📌 This improves reliability without user intervention.

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🔐 Privacy & Security

• 🔒 No internal logic is exposed
• 🔒 No scraping methods are disclosed
• 🔒 No confidential implementation details included

This README focuses only on usage and output behavior.

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📌 Summary

• ✅ Simple input
• ✅ Clean output
• ✅ Reliable processing
• ✅ Automation-ready
• ✅ Confidential by design

🎉 Perfect for media workflows that need direct, usable URLs without complexity.

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🎥 YouTube Video Downloader

Extract detailed metadata and high-quality video download links from YouTube videos and playlists.

This actor provides a reliable and efficient way to gather rich data from YouTube. Whether you need video details, channel statistics, or direct download links for various resolutions, this tool handles it all seamlessly.

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🌟 Features and Overview

• High-Quality Downloads: Supports resolutions from 360p up to 8K 📺.
• Rich Metadata Extraction: Get deep insights including views, likes, channel subscribers, and more 📊.
• Playlist Support: Process single videos or entire playlists with ease 📑.
• Robust Performance: Built to handle various availability statuses and live stream data 🛡️.
• Smart Resolution Matching: Automatically provides the closest available resolution if the requested one isn't available 🎯.

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📦 What Data This Actor Provides

This actor scrapes public data from YouTube video pages, providing you with:

• Video Details: Title, description, duration, and categories.
• Media Links: High-definition thumbnail URLs and direct video download links (video-only streams).
• Channel Info: Channel name and subscriber counts.
• Statistics: View counts and file sizes.
• Status Indicators: Availability (public/private) and live stream status.

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📤 What Outputs It Generates

The output is generated in JSON format. Each object in the results array represents a processed video with all its associated metadata. The data is structured to be easily consumable by other applications or analytics tools.

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🚀 Benefits and Advantages

• Efficiency: Quickly process lists of multiple URLs in a single run.
• Flexibility: select your preferred video quality to balance quality vs. bandwidth.
• Reliability: Uses advanced methods to ensure high success rates for public videos.
• Simplicity: Clean, structured JSON output ready for integration.

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