YouTube Channel Scraper - Free Channel & Video Data Extractor (No API)

Scrape any YouTube channel's full video history, subscriber count, and metadata in one run. No YouTube Data API key, no daily quotas, no rate limits — just pass channel URLs and get clean structured data.

What this YouTube Channel Scraper does

This Apify actor extracts complete metadata for any public YouTube channel:

• Channel-level data (name, description, subscriber count, total view count)
• A list of the channel's videos (configurable limit — default 50, up to 5,000)
• Pre-computed top 3 most viewed, latest 3, and oldest 3 videos
• Per-video data: title, view count, upload date, duration, thumbnail, URL, description

Works with @handle, /channel/UC..., /c/, and /user/ URL formats. You can also paste a video URL — the actor will resolve and scrape its parent channel automatically.

Output schema

Each dataset record contains:

{
    "channel_id": "UCX6OQ3DkcsbYNE6H8uQQuVA",
    "channel_name": "MrBeast",
    "channel_url": "https://www.youtube.com/@MrBeast",
    "description": "SUBSCRIBE FOR A COOKIE!",
    "subscriber_count": 250000000,
    "view_count": 50000000000,
    "video_count": 800,
    "thumbnail": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/...",
    "videos_fetched": 50,
    "top_viewed":      [ /* top 3 by view count */ ],
    "latest_videos":   [ /* latest 3 by upload date */ ],
    "oldest_videos":   [ /* oldest 3 in the fetched window */ ],
    "all_videos":      [ /* all videos fetched, with title, views, date, etc */ ]
}

Each video entry has:

{
    "id": "abc123",
    "title": "I Gave $1,000,000 To Random People",
    "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abc123",
    "view_count": 200000000,
    "upload_date": "2024-03-15",
    "duration": 845,
    "duration_string": "14:05",
    "thumbnail": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/abc123/maxresdefault.jpg",
    "description": "First 200 chars of description..."
}

Why use this YouTube Channel Scraper?

• No YouTube API key — bypass the 10K units/day limit
• No login — fully anonymous extraction
• Bulk channel scraping — pass an array of URLs, scrape in parallel
• Smart URL resolution — handles handles, channel IDs, custom URLs, and even individual video URLs
• Pre-sorted highlights — top viewed, latest, and oldest videos ready to use
• Predictable costs — fast, low memory, no Playwright

Use cases

• Competitor analysis — track competitor video output and engagement
• Influencer marketing — qualify creators by subscriber count and view averages
• Content research — find what's working in your niche
• SEO & keyword research — surface high-performing video titles and tags
• Trend detection — identify channels growing fast in your category
• Affiliate marketing — discover channels that promote products in your space
• Brand monitoring — track mentions of your brand on creator channels

Input

{
    "channelUrls": [
        "https://www.youtube.com/@MrBeast",
        "https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX6OQ3DkcsbYNE6H8uQQuVA",
        "https://www.youtube.com/c/PewDiePie"
    ],
    "maxVideos": 100
}

Field	Type	Default	Description
channelUrls	array of strings	required	Channel URLs to scrape
maxVideos	integer	50	Max videos per channel (1–5000)

How it works

The actor uses yt-dlp with extract_flat='in_playlist' for fast bulk metadata pulls. It first fetches the channel listing page, then walks the resulting playlist of videos. Detail-level data is harvested without per-video network calls — keeping memory and runtime low even for channels with thousands of uploads.

Cost

Smart use of extract_flat keeps a 50-video channel scrape under 5 seconds. A 1,000-video scrape completes in ~30 seconds. Memory stays under 256 MB.

Related actors

• YouTube Video Info Scraper — deep metadata for individual videos
• YouTube Competitor Analyzer — compare up to 5 channels side-by-side
• YouTube Downloader — get downloadable MP4 / MP3 URLs

FAQ

Q: Does this need a Google account or API key? No. Both are unnecessary.

Q: How many videos can I extract per channel? Up to 5,000. For larger channels, run multiple jobs with different sort orders.

Q: Does this work on YouTube Music or YouTube Kids? Standard YouTube channel URLs are supported. YouTube Music profile pages are not currently in scope.

Q: Are private or members-only videos included? No. Only publicly-visible videos appear in the output.