# Ultimate Youtube Scraper

> Get YouTube video info, statistics, descriptions, thumbnails, and optionally transcripts. Uses YouTube Data API (free) for basic info and Apify (optional) for transcripts.

- Skill: `modbender/ultimate-youtube-scraper` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 2 files)
- Install (CLI): `npx skillmds add modbender/ultimate-youtube-scraper`
- Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/modbender/ultimate-youtube-scraper/raw
- Safety review: pending
- Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex
- Category: Integrations & APIs
- Author: modbender (https://skillmd.com/u/modbender)
- Updated: 2026-09-09
- Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/modbender/ultimate-youtube-scraper

---


# 🎬 Ultimate YouTube Scraper

Get comprehensive YouTube video data including metadata, statistics, descriptions, thumbnails, and optionally transcripts.

## Why This Skill?

YouTube videos require multiple APIs to get complete data. This skill intelligently uses:
- **YouTube Data API (FREE)** → Video metadata, stats, description
- **Apify API (OPTIONAL)** → Only when transcripts requested

## Advantages

### 💰 Cost Effective
- **Default**: YouTube API only (free quota)
- **Transcript**: Only 1 Apify request when explicitly requested
- No wasted API calls

### ⚡ Fast Performance
- YouTube API: ~200ms response
- Apify: Only loads when needed

### 📊 Complete Data
| Data | Source |
|------|--------|
| Title | ✅ YouTube API |
| Description | ✅ YouTube API |
| Channel Name | ✅ YouTube API |
| View Count | ✅ YouTube API |
| Like Count | ✅ YouTube API |
| Comment Count | ✅ YouTube API |
| Upload Date | ✅ YouTube API |
| Thumbnail URL | ✅ YouTube API |
| Tags | ✅ YouTube API |
| **Transcript** | ✅ Apify (on demand) |

### 🔄 Intelligent Flow

```
┌─────────────────┐
│  Input: URL/ID   │
└────────┬────────┘
         │
         ▼
┌─────────────────┐
│ YouTube API    │ ◄── FREE, always runs
│ (viewCount,    │
│  description,   │
│  title, etc.)  │
└────────┬────────┘
         │
    ┌────┴────┐
    │         │
    ▼         ▼
┌───────┐ ┌──────────────┐
│ --    │ │ --transcript │
│info   │ │ is requested │
│only   │ └──────┬───────┘
└───┬───┘        │
    │            ▼
    │    ┌─────────────────┐
    │    │ Apify API      │ ◄── Only runs if
    │    │ (transcript)   │     explicitly asked
    │    └────────┬────────┘
    │             │
    └─────┬───────┘
          │
          ▼
┌─────────────────┐
│   Full Output   │
└─────────────────┘
```

## Credentials Setup

### Option 1: Environment Variables

```bash
export YOUTUBE_API_KEY="AIzaSy..."
export APIFY_TOKEN="apify_api_..."
```

### Option 2: Credentials File (Recommended)

Add to `~/.openclaw/credentials/api-credentials.json`:

```json
{
  "google": {
    "api_key": "AIzaSy..."
  },
  "apify": {
    "api_key": "apify_api_..."
  }
}
```

### Getting YouTube API Key

1. Go to [Google Cloud Console](https://console.cloud.google.com/)
2. Create a project
3. Enable YouTube Data API v3
4. Create credentials (API Key)
5. Free quota: 10,000 units/day

### Getting Apify Token

1. Go to [Apify](https://apify.com/)
2. Sign up / Login
3. Copy API token from Settings

## Usage

### Default (Info Only - FREE)

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py "VIDEO_ID"
python3 get_transcript.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID"
```

**Output:**
```
============================================================
📺 Video Title
============================================================
📅 2026-02-16
👤 Channel Name
👁️ 92,875 views
👍 5,525 likes
💬 737 comments

📝 AÇIKLAMA:
----------------------------------------
Video description here...
```

### With Transcript (Uses Apify)

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py "VIDEO_ID" --transcript
python3 get_transcript.py "VIDEO_ID" -t
python3 get_transcript.py "VIDEO_ID" --transcript --lang tr
```

### Info Only (Skip Transcript Check)

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py "VIDEO_ID" --info-only
```

## Examples

### Basic Video Info

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py dQw4w9WgXcQ
```

### Video + Turkish Transcript

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py Oi3Z1wlZXhg --transcript --lang tr
```

### Video + Auto-detect Transcript

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py VIDEO_ID --transcript
```

### Save to File

```bash
python3 get_transcript.py VIDEO_ID > output.txt
python3 get_transcript.py VIDEO_ID --transcript > full_output.txt
```

## How It Works

### 1. Video ID Extraction
Automatically handles all YouTube URL formats:
- `https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID`
- `https://youtu.be/VIDEO_ID`
- `https://www.youtube.com/shorts/VIDEO_ID`
- `VIDEO_ID` (direct)

### 2. YouTube API Call (Free)
```python
GET https://www.googleapis.com/youtube/v3/videos
  ?part=snippet,statistics
  &id=VIDEO_ID
  &key=YOUR_API_KEY
```

Returns:
- Title, description, channel
- View count, like count, comment count
- Upload date, thumbnail, tags

### 3. Apify API Call (On Demand)
Only runs if `--transcript` flag provided:

```python
POST https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/karamelo~youtube-transcripts/run-sync-get-dataset-items
```

Returns:
- Video captions/transcript

## API Quotas

### YouTube Data API (Free)
- 10,000 units/day (default)
- Video list: 1 unit per request
- Enough for ~10,000 video queries/day

### Apify
- Free tier available
- ~$0.004 per run (very cheap)
- Only charged when transcript requested

## Troubleshooting

| Issue | Solution |
|-------|----------|
| "API key not found" | Set YOUTUBE_API_KEY env var or add to credentials |
| "Video not found" | Check video ID is correct |
| "No transcript found" | Video may not have captions. Try `--lang auto` |
| "Apify error" | Check APIFY_TOKEN is set correctly |

## Why Not Use Just One API?

- **Only YouTube API**: Can't get transcripts (no captions endpoint)
- **Only Apify**: Wastes credits for basic info, can't get view counts
- **This skill**: Best of both worlds!

## Files

- `get_transcript.py` - Main script

## Credits

- YouTube Data API v3
- [karamelo/youtube-transcripts](https://apify.com/karamelo/youtube-transcripts) Actor