Youku Scraper — Chinese Video Search, Details & Creators 🎬

🎉 The first and only Youku (优酷) scraper on Apify — search, details, and creator data from China's biggest long-form video platform

Built for China-market media researchers, IP-licensing analysts, and content-localization teams who need clean, structured Youku data without a login

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📋 Overview

Need structured data from Youku (优酷)? This actor turns one of China's three largest long-form video platforms — home to dramas, variety shows, documentaries, and anime — into clean, queryable datasets. Search by keyword, pull deep video metadata, and extract creator profiles, all without an account or API key.

Why professionals choose us:

• ✅ First and only Youku scraper on Apify: Greenfield coverage of a platform no other tool reaches — own your China long-form video data pipeline.
• ⚡ Self-contained discovery chain: Search returns a showId → feed it to Video Detail → get the creator's uploaderUid → pull the Creator Profile. No pre-existing IDs needed to start.
• 🎯 Long-form-native fields: Episode totals, show-vs-video distinction, drama/variety/documentary/anime categories, release dates, and VIP/paid flags — data short-video scrapers never expose.
• 💰 Pay-per-result: Only charged for successful rows. Error rows are never billed.
• 💎 Clean flattened output: We collapse Youku's deeply nested response tree into flat, ready-to-use rows — export to JSON, CSV, or Excel in one click.
• ✨ No login required: Just pick an operation and run — no Youku account, no API key, no setup.

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✨ Features

• 🔍 Keyword Video Search: Find shows and videos across every Youku category by search term (~15 results per page, paginated).
• 🎬 Deep Video Detail: Title, category, video type, show name, episode counts, duration, publish time, like/comment totals, and VIP flags for any show.
• 👤 Creator Profile Extraction: Nickname, follower count, total likes, verification status, and bio for any uploader.
• 🔗 End-to-end discovery chain: Go from a keyword to full creator analytics in three chained runs — no manual ID hunting.
• 🌏 Chinese-language native: Optimized for Chinese keywords (try 庆余年, 电视剧, 纪录片, 综艺, 动漫).
• 📦 Structured exports: JSON, CSV, Excel, and XML straight from the Apify dataset.
• 🧾 HTML run report: Every run writes a summary report with row counts, success rate, and timings.
• ⚙️ Schedulable: Automate recurring searches to monitor trends across drama, documentary, and variety categories.

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🎞️ Quick Start

Pick one operation per run, fill in the matching field, and launch. Start with Video Search to discover shows, then drill into Video Detail and Creator Profile using IDs from the search results.

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/sian.agency~youku-video-scraper/runs?token=YOUR_TOKEN" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"operation": "videoSearch", "keyword": "庆余年", "maxPages": 2}'

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🚀 Getting Started (3 Simple Steps)

Step 1: Search

Run Video Search with a Chinese keyword. Each row gives you a showId, title, category, and cover.

Step 2: Drill in

Copy a showId into Video Detail to get full metadata — including the creator's uploaderUid.

Step 3: Profile the creator

Paste that uploaderUid into Creator Profile to pull nickname, followers, total likes, and bio.

That's it! In under a minute, you'll have:

• A list of Youku shows matching your keyword
• Full metadata for any show you choose
• Creator analytics for the uploader behind it

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📥 Input Configuration

Field	Type	Required	Description
operation	string	Yes	One of videoSearch, videoDetail, userProfile
keyword	string	For videoSearch	Search query — Chinese gives best results
videoId	string	For videoDetail	The Youku showId (alphanumeric hash)
uid	string	For userProfile	The creator UID (encoded form)
maxPages	integer	No	Max pages for Video Search (default 5, range 1–50)

Video Search:

{ "operation": "videoSearch", "keyword": "纪录片", "maxPages": 3 }

Video Detail:

{ "operation": "videoDetail", "videoId": "fbbfcb303fcc4e2c8e18" }

Creator Profile:

{ "operation": "userProfile", "uid": "UNDc4MDk2MzMyMA==" }

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📤 Output

Results are saved to the Apify dataset as flat rows. Filter by _operation to split the three modes.

Field	Type	Description
showId	string	Youku show ID (search + detail)
videoTitle	string	Video/episode title
categoryName / videoCategory	string	Content category (drama, documentary, etc.)
showName	string	Parent show/series name
episodeTotal	integer	Total episodes in the series
durationSeconds	number	Video duration in seconds
videoPublishTime	string	Publish timestamp
totalUp / totalComment	integer	Like / comment totals
isPaidVip	boolean	Whether the video is VIP/paid
uploaderUid	string	Creator UID (chains into Creator Profile)
nickName	string	Creator nickname
followCount	string	Creator follower count
videoUrl / profileUrl	string	Canonical Youku URL

Example (Video Detail row):

{
  "_operation": "videoDetail",
  "status": "success",
  "videoId": "XNjM5ODE0Njk5Ng==",
  "videoTitle": "二皇子拦截使团真相 李云睿利用君山会斗法范闲",
  "videoCategory": "纪录片",
  "showName": "《庆余年》第二季剧情深度解读 非正片",
  "episodeTotal": 15,
  "durationSeconds": 158.67,
  "totalUp": 2,
  "uploaderUid": "UNDc4MDk2MzMyMA==",
  "videoUrl": "https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNjM5ODE0Njk5Ng==.html"
}

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💼 Use Cases & Examples

1. Chinese Long-Form Video Discovery

Media researchers mapping what's available on Youku.

Input: A genre keyword like 电视剧 or 纪录片. Output: Shows with categories, release dates, episode counts, and covers. Use: Build a catalog of Chinese dramas and documentaries for content scouting.

2. Title & Episode Intelligence

IP-licensing analysts tracking Chinese series.

Input: A showId from search. Output: Show name, category, episode totals, duration, VIP flags. Use: Monitor which titles are completed, paid, or trending for licensing decisions.

3. Creator & Channel Analytics

Influencer and partnership teams sizing up Youku uploaders.

Input: A creator uid. Output: Nickname, follower count, total likes, verification, bio. Use: Identify and rank influential Youku creators for outreach.

4. Content-Localization Research

Localization teams evaluating Chinese content for export.

Input: Keyword searches across drama, variety, and anime. Output: Structured metadata per title. Use: Shortlist Chinese long-form content for subtitling and distribution.

5. Academic & Trend Monitoring

Media scholars and analysts studying Chinese streaming.

Input: Scheduled keyword searches. Output: Time-stamped datasets of Youku metadata. Use: Track category trends on one of China's big-three video platforms without manual collection.

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🔗 Integration Examples

JavaScript/Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';
const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('sian.agency/youku-video-scraper').call({
  operation: 'videoSearch',
  keyword: '庆余年',
  maxPages: 2
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items[0]);

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient
client = ApifyClient('YOUR_TOKEN')

run = client.actor('sian.agency/youku-video-scraper').call(
    run_input={'operation': 'videoDetail', 'videoId': 'fbbfcb303fcc4e2c8e18'}
)

for item in client.dataset(run['defaultDatasetId']).iterate_items():
    print(item)

cURL

curl -X POST 'https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/sian.agency~youku-video-scraper/runs?token=YOUR_TOKEN' \
-H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
-d '{"operation": "userProfile", "uid": "UNDc4MDk2MzMyMA=="}'

Automation Workflows (N8N / Zapier / Make)

1. Trigger: Schedule or webhook
2. HTTP Request: Call the actor API
3. Process: Handle JSON results
4. Action: Save, notify, or transform

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📊 Performance & Pricing

FREE Tier (Try It Now)

• Sample rows per run — full feature access, same quality
• No credit card required
• Perfect for testing the search → detail → profile chain

PAID Tier (Production Ready)

• Unlimited rows per run
• Pay-per-result: only charged for successful rows
• Error rows are never billed

🔗 View current pricing

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❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Do I need a Youku account or API key? A: No. Just pick an operation and run.

Q: How do I get a video or creator ID? A: Run Video Search first — each row has a showId. Run Video Detail on that ID — the row includes the creator's uploaderUid, which feeds Creator Profile.

Q: Why does Creator Profile sometimes return no creator? A: Roughly 83% of videos carry an uploader UID. Some officially-licensed content (e.g. certain anime and studio titles) has no individual uploader, so no profile exists to resolve.

Q: What language should I search in? A: Chinese keywords return the best results (try 庆余年, 电视剧, 纪录片, 综艺, 动漫).

Q: What output formats are available? A: JSON, CSV, Excel, and XML — export directly from the Apify dataset.

Q: Is this legal? A: Yes — we only extract publicly available data. See the legal section below.

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🐛 Troubleshooting

No rows returned from Video Search

• Use a Chinese keyword; English terms often return fewer or no results.

Video Detail returns an error row

• Confirm you used the showId (the alphanumeric hash from a search row), not the numeric programId.

Creator Profile returns no data

• The video may have no uploader UID (licensed content). Try a different video's uploaderUid.

Data source temporarily unavailable

• This is a transient signal; the actor retries automatically. Re-run if it persists.

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⚠️ Trademark Disclaimer

This is an independent scraping tool. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Youku (优酷), Alibaba Group, or any of their subsidiaries. The Youku® and 优酷® names appear under nominative fair use solely to describe what the tool does. All trademarks belong to their respective owners.

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⚖️ Is it legal to scrape data?

Our actors are ethical and do not extract any private user data, such as email addresses, gender, or location. They only extract what the user has chosen to share publicly. We therefore believe that our actors, when used for ethical purposes by Apify users, are safe.

However, you should be aware that your results could contain personal data. Personal data is protected by the GDPR in the European Union and by other regulations around the world. You should not scrape personal data unless you have a legitimate reason to do so. If you're unsure whether your reason is legitimate, consult your lawyers.

You can also read Apify's blog post on the legality of web scraping.

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🤝 Support

Join our active support community

• For issues or questions, open an issue in the actor's Issues tab
• Check SIÁN Agency Store for more automation tools
• 📧 apify@sian-agency.online

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