YouTube Competitor Analyzer - Compare 5 Channels

The YouTube Competitor Analyzer compares up to 5 YouTube channels side-by-side in a single run — subscriber counts, top-performing videos, posting cadence, and average views — with no YouTube Data API key, no quota, and no login. Paste 1–5 channel URLs and get one consolidated comparison record plus per-channel records, ready to drop into Google Sheets, Notion, Airtable, or a BI dashboard. It is the fastest no-code way to benchmark competitors, run influencer due diligence, and shape your YouTube content strategy.

What does the YouTube Competitor Analyzer do?

The YouTube Competitor Analyzer is an Apify actor for YouTube competitor analysis that scrapes channel metadata and recent videos to produce side-by-side competitive metrics — without the official YouTube Data API. You provide 1–5 channel URLs, and it pulls each channel's stats and a configurable window of recent uploads in parallel, then surfaces the highlights you need to compare.

• Compare up to 5 YouTube channels in one run for category benchmarking
• Pull subscriber count, total views, and video count for every competitor
• Identify each channel's top 3 most-viewed, latest 3, and oldest 3 videos in the fetched window
• Analyze posting cadence using the oldest-to-latest upload spread
• Get a single comparison record plus per-channel records for easy filtering
• Accept any URL format — @handle, /channel/UC..., /c/, /user/, or a video URL
• Export comparison data to CSV, Excel, JSON, or Google Sheets via Apify exports

What data can I extract?

The first dataset item is a consolidated comparison object containing a channels array; each subsequent item is a single-channel record. Each channel object contains:

Field	Description
channel_name	Channel display name
subscriber_count	Subscriber count
view_count	Total channel view count
video_count	Total number of videos on the channel
videos_fetched	How many videos were pulled this run
top_viewed	Top 3 most-viewed videos in the fetched window
latest_videos	Most recent 3 uploads
oldest_videos	Oldest 3 in the window (for posting-cadence math)
all_videos	All videos considered in the window

How to compare YouTube channels (step-by-step)

1. Open the YouTube Competitor Analyzer on Apify and click Try for free.
2. Paste between 1 and 5 competitor channel URLs into Competitor channel URLs.
3. Set Max videos per channel (default 30, range 5–500) — the recent window to analyze.
4. Leave Proxy configuration on Apify Proxy so the per-video highlights populate reliably.
5. Click Start — the comparison and per-channel records stream into the dataset.
6. Export to CSV, Excel, JSON, or Google Sheets and build side-by-side charts.

Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
channelUrls	array of 1–5 strings	required	YouTube channel URLs to compare in parallel. Accepts /@handle, /channel/UC..., /c/, /user/, or any video URL.
maxVideos	integer	30	How many recent videos to consider per channel (5–500).
proxyConfiguration	object	{ "useApifyProxy": true }	Routes yt-dlp through Apify Proxy; required to populate top/latest/oldest video metadata.

{
    "channelUrls": [
        "https://www.youtube.com/@MrBeast",
        "https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRober",
        "https://www.youtube.com/@VeritasiumYT"
    ],
    "maxVideos": 30,
    "proxyConfiguration": { "useApifyProxy": true }
}

Output example

{
    "channels": [
        {
            "channel_name": "MrBeast",
            "subscriber_count": 250000000,
            "view_count": 50000000000,
            "video_count": 800,
            "videos_fetched": 30,
            "top_viewed": [],
            "latest_videos": [],
            "oldest_videos": [],
            "all_videos": []
        },
        {
            "channel_name": "Mark Rober",
            "subscriber_count": 60000000,
            "view_count": 9000000000,
            "video_count": 90,
            "videos_fetched": 30,
            "top_viewed": [],
            "latest_videos": [],
            "oldest_videos": [],
            "all_videos": []
        }
    ]
}

Use cases

• Competitor benchmarking — compare your channel against up to 4 rivals in your niche
• Influencer due diligence — qualify creators before sponsoring or partnering
• Content gap analysis — see which video formats and topics your competitors crush
• Niche research — identify which channels are growing fastest in a category
• Pitch decks & reports — generate clean comparison tables and highlight samples in minutes

Pricing

This actor runs on Apify's usage-based pricing — you pay only for compute time and proxy. Because channel pulls run concurrently with flat-playlist extraction (no Playwright, no API tokens), an analysis of 5 channels at 30 videos each completes in roughly 30–60 seconds. See the Pricing tab for current rates.

Why this analyzer instead of the YouTube Data API?

The official YouTube Data API caps you at 10,000 quota units per day and requires a key and Google Cloud setup — awkward for quick competitive benchmarking. This actor uses yt-dlp with extract_flat='in_playlist' and runs all channel pulls concurrently via asyncio.gather, so you get multi-channel comparisons with no API tokens and no rate limits.

FAQ

Is it legal to scrape YouTube for competitor analysis?

This actor extracts only publicly available channel and video metadata. You are responsible for complying with YouTube's Terms of Service and applicable laws such as GDPR and CCPA.

Do I need a YouTube API key or account?

No. The actor needs no API key, no OAuth, and no Google login.

Can I compare more than 5 channels?

The actor caps at 5 to keep runtimes predictable. Run multiple jobs and combine the datasets if you need more.

How much does it cost?

It runs on Apify's usage-based pricing. A 5-channel, 30-video analysis finishes in about 30–60 seconds, so costs stay low.

Can I export the comparison to CSV, Excel, JSON, or Google Sheets?

Yes. Every Apify dataset exports to CSV, Excel, JSON, or Google Sheets, or you can pull it via the Apify API.

Is the data live?

Yes — every run hits YouTube fresh. There is no staleness window.

Does it use proxies, and will I get blocked?

Yes, it routes through Apify Proxy, which is required to populate the per-video top/latest/oldest highlights without being rate-limited.

Does it handle very large channels?

Set maxVideos to the window you actually need (e.g. the last 100). Runtime scales linearly with that value.

Related actors

• YouTube Channel Scraper — single-channel deep dive with full video history
• YouTube Video Info Scraper — full per-video metadata
• YouTube Downloader — downloadable MP4 / MP3 URLs
• TikTok Scraper — scrape TikTok by hashtag, profile, and search
• Reddit Scraper — scrape Reddit posts, comments, and communities

Support

Need an extra metric or a custom comparison? Open an issue on the actor's Issues tab. Custom scraping and analytics solutions are available on request.