Youtube Metadata Scraper

Youtube Metadata Scraper

The Youtube Metadata Scraper is a fast, scalable YouTube metadata extractor that collects structured video details, engagement metrics, transcripts, and comments from public videos — no API keys required. It helps you analyze content performance, power SEO research, and build datasets at scale. Designed for marketers, developers, data analysts, and researchers, this YouTube video metadata scraper supports direct URLs and keyword searches to produce clean, analytics‑ready outputs.

What data / output can you get?

Below are examples of the structured fields this YouTube video details extractor returns. Results can be exported from Apify in JSON, CSV, or Excel.

Data field	Description	Example value
id	YouTube video ID	dQw4w9WgXcQ
url	Video URL	https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
title	Video title	Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up (Official Video)
description	Video description (shortDescription)	The official video for “Never Gonna Give You Up” by Rick Astley.
lengthInSeconds	Video length in seconds	213
uploadDatetime	Upload/publish date	2009-10-24T23:57:33-07:00
publish_date_since	Relative publish date (if available)	16 years ago
category	Video category	Music
tags	Video tags/keywords	["rick astley","never gonna give you up"]
thumbnail	Primary thumbnail URL	https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dQw4w9WgXcQ/hqdefault.jpg
thumbnails_urls	All discovered thumbnail URLs	["https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dQw.../hqdefault.jpg", "..."]
channelID	Channel ID	UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw
channelURL	Channel URL	https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw
channelUsername	Channel username/handle (derived)	rickastley
channelDisplayName	Channel display name	Rick Astley

Bonus fields include channelSubscribers, viewCount, likeCount, commentCount, is_live_now, author_avatar_url, is_verified, description_links, is_comments_off, is_members_only, is_paid_content, transcripts, and comments.

Key features

• ⚡ Smart proxy fallback & resilience
  Automatically escalates connection mode as needed (none → datacenter → residential) with retries, keeping scraping stable when facing blocks (e.g., 403/429/503).

• 🔎 Hybrid input: URLs and keyword search
  Ingest direct video URLs/IDs or discover videos via keywords with sort options (relevance, upload_date, view_count, rating) and per‑keyword limits.

• 🗣️ Transcripts in text or timestamps
  Toggle transcripts and choose format (text or timestamps). Optionally include auto‑generated English captions and non‑English languages when available.

• 💬 Comment collection with limits
  Fetch top‑level comments up to your specified maximum (0–5,000), returned in structured objects with IDs, authors, like counts, and reply counts.

• 📊 Complete engagement & channel context
  Capture viewCount, likeCount, commentCount, is_live_now, and channel fields (IDs, names, subscribers, avatars, verification), plus description links.

• 🧵 Concurrent, batch‑ready processing
  Processes multiple videos concurrently with robust logging and per‑video streaming to the dataset for faster feedback loops.

• 🧰 Developer‑friendly & API‑ready
  Built on Apify’s Python SDK and aiohttp. Works great for “Scrape YouTube metadata without API” workflows and downstream pipelines that need YouTube video metadata JSON.

• 💾 Flexible exports on Apify
  Download and integrate results in JSON, CSV, or Excel from the Apify dataset for BI tools, SEO audits, or enrichment pipelines.

How to use Youtube Metadata Scraper - step by step

1. 🔐 Sign in to Apify
   Create a free Apify account or log in.

2. 🔍 Open the actor
   Find “YouTube Metadata Scraper” in the Apify Store and click Try.

3. 📥 Provide input

   • Paste YouTube video URLs or IDs into urls.
   • Or add keywords into keywords to discover videos via search.

4. ⚙️ Configure options

   • sort_order: relevance, upload_date, view_count, or rating.
   • max_results_per_keyword: 1–100 (default 20).
   • max_comments: 0–5000 (default 20).
   • include_transcripts, transcript_format ("text" or "timestamps"), include_english_auto, include_non_english.
   • proxyConfiguration: leave default to start without a proxy; the actor manages fallback automatically.

5. ▶️ Start the run
   Click Start. The actor resolves video lists (from URLs and/or keywords), fetches pages, and streams each result into the dataset as it completes.

6. 👀 Monitor progress
   View logs for per‑video summaries (views, comments, transcripts) and see dataset rows appear in real time.

7. 💾 Export your data
   Go to the run’s Dataset tab and export results in JSON, CSV, or Excel.

Pro tip: Automate recurring runs via Apify schedules or connect the dataset to your pipelines for continuous SEO monitoring and analytics.

Use cases

Use case	Description
SEO tag and keyword mining	Extract tags, titles, and descriptions to inform content optimization and keyword strategy.
Competitor performance tracking	Compare view/like/comment counts and channel stats for benchmarking over time.
Content research & planning	Use keyword search with sorting and limits to discover top‑performing videos in your niche.
Audience insights from comments	Analyze structured comment data (likes, replies, timestamps) for sentiment and themes.
Academic & market research	Build reproducible datasets of public YouTube metadata and transcripts for analysis and modeling.
Data pipelines & enrichment	Feed YouTube video metadata JSON into BI tools, warehouses, or machine learning workflows.
Monitoring live/visibility status	Track is_live_now, is_members_only, is_paid_content, and comments availability flags.

Why choose Youtube Metadata Scraper?

This production‑ready YouTube metadata parser is built for precision, reliability, and developer‑grade automation.

• ✅ Accurate, structured outputs: Robust parsing of player and initial data for consistent fields across runs.
• 🌍 Multilingual transcript support: Include non‑English and auto‑generated English captions when available.
• 📈 Scalable at speed: Concurrency, retries, and proxy fallback designed for batch jobs and ongoing monitoring.
• 🧩 Developer access: Python-based actor on Apify with dataset outputs ideal for APIs and pipelines.
• 🔒 Ethical by design: Scrapes publicly available information and avoids private/authenticated data.
• 💵 Cost‑effective: Flat monthly plan is available; the listing includes 120 trial minutes to evaluate.
• 🔗 Export & integrate: Download as JSON/CSV/Excel and plug into analytics, SEO, or data engineering stacks.

Compared to manual tools and unstable browser extensions, this YouTube video metadata scraper delivers repeatable, automation‑ready results without user‑supplied API keys.

Is it legal / ethical to use Youtube Metadata Scraper?

Yes — when used responsibly. This actor extracts publicly available YouTube data and avoids private or authenticated content. Users should:

• Scrape only public pages and metadata.
• Respect YouTube’s Terms of Service and applicable laws (e.g., GDPR/CCPA where relevant).
• Avoid collecting or using personal data beyond public information.
• Consult your legal team for edge cases or jurisdiction‑specific requirements.

Input parameters & output format

Example JSON input

{
  "urls": [
    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"
  ],
  "keywords": [
    "best 80s music"
  ],
  "sort_order": "relevance",
  "max_results_per_keyword": 20,
  "max_comments": 20,
  "include_transcripts": true,
  "transcript_format": "text",
  "include_english_auto": false,
  "include_non_english": false,
  "proxyConfiguration": {
    "useApifyProxy": false
  }
}

Input parameter reference

• urls (array of string)
  Description: Provide YouTube video URLs or IDs. You can mix URLs and plain keywords; each entry is one target.
  Default: not set
  Required: no

• keywords (array of string)
  Description: Search YouTube by keyword(s). Results can be sorted and paged.
  Default: not set
  Required: no

• sort_order (string; one of: "relevance","upload_date","view_count","rating")
  Description: Sort keyword search results: relevance, upload date, view count, or rating.
  Default: "relevance"
  Required: no

• max_results_per_keyword (integer; 1–100)
  Description: Maximum number of videos to fetch per keyword (with paging).
  Default: 20
  Required: no

• max_comments (integer; 0–5000)
  Description: Maximum number of top-level comments to retrieve per video.
  Default: 20
  Required: no

• include_transcripts (boolean)
  Description: Toggle to download closed captions and transcripts when available.
  Default: true
  Required: no

• transcript_format (string; one of: "text","timestamps")
  Description: Choose whether transcripts are returned as plain text or with timestamps.
  Default: "text"
  Required: no

• include_english_auto (boolean)
  Description: Enable to include YouTube's auto-generated English captions.
  Default: false
  Required: no

• include_non_english (boolean)
  Description: Enable to include transcripts in non-English languages.
  Default: false
  Required: no

• proxyConfiguration (object)
  Description: Configure Apify proxies. Leave as default to start without a proxy and allow automatic fallback management.
  Default: {"useApifyProxy": false}
  Required: no

Example JSON output

{
  "id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "url": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ",
  "title": "Rick Astley - Never Gonna Give You Up (Official Video)",
  "description": "The official video for “Never Gonna Give You Up” by Rick Astley.",
  "lengthInSeconds": 213,
  "uploadDatetime": "2009-10-24T23:57:33-07:00",
  "publish_date_since": "16 years ago",
  "category": "Music",
  "tags": ["rick astley", "never gonna give you up", "80s music"],
  "thumbnail": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dQw4w9WgXcQ/hqdefault.jpg",
  "thumbnails_urls": [
    "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dQw4w9WgXcQ/hqdefault.jpg",
    "https://i.ytimg.com/vi_webp/dQw4w9WgXcQ/maxresdefault.webp"
  ],
  "channelID": "UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw",
  "channelURL": "https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuAXFkgsw1L7xaCfnd5JJOw",
  "channelUsername": "rickastley",
  "channelDisplayName": "Rick Astley",
  "channelSubscribers": "4.44M",
  "author_avatar_url": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/....=s176-c-k-c0x00ffffff-no-rj",
  "is_verified": true,
  "viewCount": 1726805028,
  "likeCount": 18702878,
  "commentCount": 2400000,
  "is_live_now": false,
  "description_links": [
    "https://linktr.ee/rickastleynever",
    "https://RickAstley.lnk.to/YTSubID"
  ],
  "is_comments_off": false,
  "is_members_only": false,
  "is_paid_content": false,
  "transcripts": [
    {
      "language": "EN",
      "content": "We're no strangers to love ... Never gonna give you up ..."
    }
  ],
  "comments": [
    {
      "id": "Ugzge340dBgB75hWBm54AaABAg",
      "text": "can confirm: he never gave us up",
      "author": "@YouTube",
      "authorChannelId": "UCBR8-60-B28hp2BmDPdntcQ",
      "likeCount": 153000,
      "publishedTime": "8 months ago",
      "replyCount": 960
    }
  ]
}

Notes:

• channelSubscribers may be "Unknown" if the page doesn’t expose a subscriber count in the parsed section.
• transcripts and comments are returned only when available and within your configured limits and options.

FAQ

Do I need API keys to use this YouTube metadata scraper?

No. The actor scrapes publicly available pages and uses internal page data; it does not require user‑supplied API keys to extract YouTube video metadata JSON.

Can it scrape YouTube tags and thumbnails?

Yes. Fields include tags and both a primary thumbnail (thumbnail) and all discovered thumbnail URLs (thumbnails_urls), making it a reliable YouTube tags scraper and YouTube thumbnail URL extractor.

Can I scrape by keywords instead of URLs?

Yes. Add keywords to keywords, set sort_order and max_results_per_keyword (1–100, default 20), and the actor will discover and process matching videos.

How many comments can it fetch per video?

You control this with max_comments (0–5000; default 20). The actor returns top‑level comments in structured objects with IDs, authors, like counts, and reply counts.

Does it support transcripts in different formats or languages?

Yes. Set include_transcripts and choose transcript_format ("text" or "timestamps"). You can also include_english_auto and include_non_english when available.

Is there a free trial or pricing?

The listing provides a flat monthly plan and includes 120 trial minutes to evaluate the scraper. Usage beyond trial follows the plan terms on Apify.

Is it legal to scrape YouTube?

Yes, when done responsibly. This tool collects only publicly available data and avoids private/authenticated content. Always review YouTube’s Terms of Service and applicable regulations for your use case.

Can developers integrate this with Python or APIs?

Yes. It’s built on the Apify Python SDK and streams structured results to an Apify dataset that you can access via the Apify API in JSON/CSV/Excel for pipelines and automations.

Closing thoughts

The Youtube Metadata Scraper is built to extract clean, structured YouTube video data at scale — from titles, tags, and thumbnails to transcripts and comments. It empowers marketers, developers, analysts, and researchers with accurate, automation‑ready outputs for SEO, analytics, and insight generation. Use the Apify dataset API or Python SDK to plug this YouTube metadata extractor into your pipelines and start extracting smarter today.