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Dismiss alert {{ message }} mattwright324 / youtube-metadata Public * Notifications * Fork 43 * Star 220 * Code * Issues 7 * Pull requests 0 * Discussions * Actions * Projects 0 * Wiki * Security * Insights Additional navigation options * Code * Issues * Pull requests * Discussions * Actions * Projects * Wiki * Security * Insights YouTube Oddities Jump to bottom Matthew Wright edited this page Feb 7, 2024 * 54 revisions This is my place to document things I've found about YouTube and it's API. The examples for some of these may not last forever. Generally these are not 'issues' but just how YouTube and the API work. Due to these oddities in addition to the behavior of non-oddities I would recommend not to trust any field of the API to 100% be available or as you expect. Always handle the case as if something didn't come back even when you expect it to. Comments missing channel information https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWAod8ZmAuc&lc= Ugy9fRFjedh7r5c1lZJ4AaABAg The channel looks blank on the webpage and the API returns no information for it either: blank authorDisplayName, blank authorChannelUrl, and the default authorProfileImageUrl. { "kind": "youtube#comment", "etag": "Bs_q22LbPeL3w2zGepNLVIBvzD8", "id": "Ugy9fRFjedh7r5c1lZJ4AaABAg", "snippet": { "textDisplay": "Look it is work...thanks !", "textOriginal": "Look it is work...thanks !", "authorDisplayName": "", "authorProfileImageUrl": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/a/default-user=s48", "authorChannelUrl": "", "canRate": true, "viewerRating": "none", "likeCount": 0, "publishedAt": "2018-04-11T15:02:51Z", "updatedAt": "2018-04-11T15:02:51Z" } } comments.list API Explorer Channels with extremely long names The limit for channel titles as of today is 30 characters or maybe even 50. However, this limit can be broken by modifying client side validation in one of YouTube's features. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChLNLQ6r-aGrIFWo_1A9tKQ (383 characters) { "title": "JACKSEPICYOUTUBECHANNELFULLOFFUNTIMESANDFUNHIRICKXHASNOTHINGONMEIAMTHESUPERIORCHANNELIHAVEMORECHARACTERSTHANALLOFJACKSYOUTUBECHANNELSCOMBINEDHAHAHAHAIHAVEMORECHARACTERSTHANJACKSUCKSATLIFEJACKSUCKSATSTUFFJACKMASSEYWELSHJACKSUCKSATGEOGRAPHYJACKSUCKSATCLIPSSAMSMELLSOFAPRICOTSJACKSUCKSATPOPUPPIRATEETCETCIMAGINETHISONAPLAYBUTTONJESUSCHRISTBTWPLEASESUBSCRIBETHANKYOUVERYMUCHHIRICKXxXxXX", "description": "hey guys suscribe", "publishedAt": "2021-07-10T15:13:12.443555Z", "country": "GB" } channels.list API Explorer Other examples using this same trick * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDPhSOl_Zz26Gg9Kit_OkRw (451 characters) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_g-yxm_VHmFfUvgEE8ZwOA (451 characters) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbqb18xg2_9n92LRe-w6_4g (100 characters) Video without a title Unsure how this is done, a video can have no title at all. It is not a Zero-width space which you can currently use as a title, this is just blank. { "publishedAt": "2010-04-26T13:28:59Z", "channelId": "UC2VVIGlxmkQ5hMu-MouLiJw", "title": "", "description": " " } * https://youtu.be/OYY5Vh0sHy8 * https://youtu.be/RwfDMh_Bq7I Video with 249 allowed countries Typically video region restrictions will have some listed in either allowed or blocked. 249 is the current total country count and is equivalent to 'worldwide'. However, it is possible for 249 countries to appear in the allowed list. It's not clear why this happens as it is the same has having no restriction at all. It seems to occur most frequently with music videos, potentially they had actual blocks at one point and the only way it can be undone is to move everything to allowed? * https://youtu.be/vwkYxPpmEPE * https://youtu.be/ZTidn2dBYbY * https://youtu.be/Tg0VIPMjYgM { "duration": "PT3M33S", "dimension": "2d", "definition": "hd", "caption": "false", "licensedContent": true, "regionRestriction": { "allowed": [ "AD", "AE", "AF", "AG", "AI", "AL", "AM", "AO", "AQ", "AR", "AS", "AT", "AU", "AW", "AX", "AZ", "BA", "BB", "BD", "BE", "BF", "BG", "BH", "BI", "BJ", "BL", "BM", "BN", "BO", "BQ", "BR", "BS", "BT", "BV", "BW", "BY", "BZ", "CA", "CC", "CD", "CF", "CG", "CH", "CI", "CK", "CL", "CM", "CN", "CO", "CR", "CU", "CV", "CW", "CX", "CY", "CZ", "DE", "DJ", "DK", "DM", "DO", "DZ", "EC", "EE", "EG", "EH", "ER", "ES", "ET", "FI", "FJ", "FK", "FM", "FO", "FR", "GA", "GB", "GD", "GE", "GF", "GG", "GH", "GI", "GL", "GM", "GN", "GP", "GQ", "GR", "GS", "GT", "GU", "GW", "GY", "HK", "HM", "HN", "HR", "HT", "HU", "ID", "IE", "IL", "IM", "IN", "IO", "IQ", "IR", "IS", "IT", "JE", "JM", "JO", "JP", "KE", "KG", "KH", "KI", "KM", "KN", "KP", "KR", "KW", "KY", "KZ", "LA", "LB", "LC", "LI", "LK", "LR", "LS", "LT", "LU", "LV", "LY", "MA", "MC", "MD", "ME", "MF", "MG", "MH", "MK", "ML", "MM", "MN", "MO", "MP", "MQ", "MR", "MS", "MT", "MU", "MV", "MW", "MX", "MY", "MZ", "NA", "NC", "NE", "NF", "NG", "NI", "NL", "NO", "NP", "NR", "NU", "NZ", "OM", "PA", "PE", "PF", "PG", "PH", "PK", "PL", "PM", "PN", "PR", "PS", "PT", "PW", "PY", "QA", "RE", "RO", "RS", "RU", "RW", "SA", "SB", "SC", "SD", "SE", "SG", "SH", "SI", "SJ", "SK", "SL", "SM", "SN", "SO", "SR", "SS", "ST", "SV", "SX", "SY", "SZ", "TC", "TD", "TF", "TG", "TH", "TJ", "TK", "TL", "TM", "TN", "TO", "TR", "TT", "TV", "TW", "TZ", "UA", "UG", "UM", "US", "UY", "UZ", "VA", "VC", "VE", "VG", "VI", "VN", "VU", "WF", "WS", "YE", "YT", "ZA", "ZM", "ZW" ] }, "contentRating": {}, "projection": "rectangular" } Old channel, new channel * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC20vb-R_px4CguHzzBPhoyQ (Old: EminemVEVO) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfM3zsQsOnfWNUppiycmBuw (New: EminemMusic) Interacting with any video from the old channel in the YouTube interface will redirect you back to the new one. The old channel name and reference will never display except in the API. Also, to get every video in the API as displayed on the new channel you would need both channel ids. Each channel has its own set of videos in the API. More from YouTube On the sidebar YouTube under 'More from YouTube' there are several subsections of categorized media. These are 'channels' though they are not really channels but they do have channel ids and urls. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqVDpXKLmKeBU_yyt_QkItQ (Originals) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCStaiwu-FAgp_RC_tBiLh9A (Music) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClgRkhTL3_hImCAmdLfDE4g (Movies & Shows) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOpNcN46UbXVtpKMrmU4Abg (Gaming) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4R8DWoMoI7CAwX8_LjQHig (Live) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrpQ4p1Ql_hG8rKXIKM1MOQ (Fashion & Beauty) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtFRv9O2AHqOZjjynzrv-xg (Learning) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEgdi0XIXXZ-qJOFPf4JSKw (Sports) Movies & Shows In the API it is called "YouTube Movies" but is displayed as "Movies & Shows" everywhere else. { "publishedAt": "2015-06-10T20:32:27Z", "channelId": "UClgRkhTL3_hImCAmdLfDE4g", "title": "YouTube Movies", "description": "YouTube's movies destination featuring the latest new releases, blockbusters and more.", } Movies & Shows has a main channel but also has multiple sub channels that redirect back to the main channel. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClgRkhTL3_hImCAmdLfDE4g (Main: Movies & Shows) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHMViWNp4P23_FHAtxl4bVA (Sub: You Only Live Twice) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAjp-GvMwrxvNkTmSTJBx_w (Sub: Die Another Day) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqp8ynoa9Ek-sX4Ig4O2y5w (Sub: The Lord of the Rings (1978)) * ... and many more There is a unique channelId for what seems like every movie though redirects when visited in the browser. Each instance has different localized versions of that particular movie. Shows however work differently than movies. You can get a show's channelId by querying the videoId of an episode of the show. The channel for these look like channels and have the episodes listed in the videos section. However, these channels never come back in the API. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRvJJOwORJs358z8JAbx6KQ (Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9flJXukGXrCdBK6hnf358g (Chowder) Show to channel Shows have their own custom URL pattern with a value that looks like a channelId. * https://www.youtube.com/show/SCABsAlkY55kBhDpvVPd9E2A If you transform the SC... to UC... then it is readable like normal channelId. However, as mentioned before, show channels do not come back in the API. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCABsAlkY55kBhDpvVPd9E2A Topic channels Many channels for Gaming and Music are made as topic channels. The title of topic channels end with " - Topic" and the about links have "Auto generated by YouTube". Videos published by these topic channels (usually only music channels) have comments disabled and the description contains "Auto generated by YouTube." Older videos before they were forced to have comments disabled do have numbers in video.statistics.commentCount but are not accessible. Music topics: * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpGhWPSS2rAmjqBvwfWYxpQ (Mick Gordon - Topic) Gaming topics: * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXzGWycANrrfyBmzX6JMsvQ (Fortnite - Topic) * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQvWX73GQygcwXOTSf_VDVg (Minecraft - Topic) This video is unavailable on this device Also... * We're processing this video. Check back later. * This live stream recording is not available. The actual video is not playable because it is too long. You can still query in the API and view comments. It is not deleted or made private. The most likely reason for this video in particular is that it is over 3 months long or 100 days. * https://youtu.be/s6V8ZpLfD-c P109DT20H12M6S or 3 months 17 days 20h 12m 6s * https://youtu.be/V2Afni3S-ok P100DT15H6M19S or 3 months 8 days 15h 6m 19s * https://youtu.be/JlP-8JiKOS8 P66DT7H29M32S or 2 months 5 days 7h 29m 32s Various playlists There are a ton of different playlist ids formats for different purposes with varying degrees of functionality. This page documents it all: https://wiki.archiveteam.org/index.php/YouTube/Technical_details# Playlists Custom channel partially doesn't work / extra custom channel value Sometimes the /c/ url doesn't work but the / url does. Usually both urls work for a custom value and it is unclear why this happens. Unknown if it can be broken the other way around. * https://www.youtube.com/sbtv works * https://www.youtube.com/c/sbtv 404 However, this channel actually has a different custom value according the the YouTube API. When using that value both url patterns work. It isn't clear how the sbtv url was obtained or setup. * https://www.youtube.com/smokeybarz * https://www.youtube.com/c/smokeybarz Custom channels and special paths A quirk with the path recognition, case sensitivity, and custom channels. As long as it matches the lowercase watch it will work like a normal video url. However, when changing the case of watch to anything else it will resolve to a channel with that custom value. * https://www.youtube.com/watch no v param redirects to homepage * https://www.youtube.com/Watch channel * https://www.youtube.com/WATCH channel * https://www.youtube.com/wAtcH channel * https://www.youtube.com/c/watch channel New tab without without a videoId Another quirk related to the watch url, when navigating to these directly (copy, paste, enter) without a video id it will redirect to the homepage. However, if you middle click to open it as a new tab in your browser it will instead show a video without its id in the url. * https://www.youtube.com/watch * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v= The video displayed is unlisted and titled YouTube is not currently available on this device. and its actual url/id is the following: * https://youtu.be/9xp1XWmJ_Wo Its unclear why it does this but it seems to be related to old devices, playlists, and malformed urls. [68747470733a2f2f692e696d6775722e636f6d2f596e456f6f75642e] Channel URL redirect to video instead of channel Fairly recently spreading thing from YouTube comments where someone tells you to remove the h or c in watch on the current video you are watching. * https://www.youtube.com/watc?v=videoId * https://www.youtube.com/wath?v=videoId The link then redirects you to a video by 666. Speculation for how this works below: * Wayback archived video real? * Reddit comment explanation 1 * Reddit comment explanation 2 Strange channels Channels that seem to be broken/glitched in weird ways demonstrated by this video. * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXpfZAllrSY Channels: * https://www.youtube.com/c/wathc/channels * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsyvpDLOFCOgWQbU0RaxtUg * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsxspHPF7c9Wq2tIUKqnYEA * https://www.youtube.com/c/diging/featured Video that won't play A very early YouTube video, 2005, that will not play and always gives an error. * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zo3y1KIyAls Video that was corrupted by YouTube A very early YouTube video, 2006, that no longer looks like it should and shows washed out changing color nothing like the original (which was reuploaded and linked in the comments). * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNP-poEdf8M Video with the best video id A video that "won the lottery" in having one of the most funny video ids possible. There are plenty of URLs with words or leetspeak words in them though some are very much better than others. * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUMCUM--gaY This video above was found in this playlist of funny, nice, and interesting video ids. * https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list= PLbJTMy_JZKev4SzxM85Xv4Qn4A3SgW1Z9 Alternative client video Sometimes when using an alternative YouTube client, the following video will be returned instead of the actual video. * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQvGIIdgFDM The following content is not available on this app. Watch this content on the latest version of YouTube. Channels with 1/2 million videos Roel Van de Paar, at this current time has 2,035,484 videos uploaded. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPF-oYb2-xN5FbCXy0167Gg Knowledge Base, at this current time has 1,054,762 videos uploaded. * https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkNRxtDd_X8QuhPqDOKHNVQ Forever processing A video which is forever processing (> 12 years) * https://youtu.be/whZjkLXpID4 Greyscale preview A video where the preview is in greyscale, when hovering the mouse over the time bar. * https://youtu.be/75d4UgvPHQI [68747470733a2f2f692e696d6775722e636f6d2f51715a3163764c2e] Video with everything else hidden Almost all elements in the page are hidden except for the navbar and the video itself. This particular video was found through an entry on Google's Ads Transparency site. * https://youtu.be/h0pXBrprI-A [68747470733a2f2f692e696d6775722e636f6d2f6f5874465767632e] Still existing thumbnails The thumbnail of a video deleted more than 5 years ago is still accessible. * https://youtu.be/k062xKTX_DI * https://i.ytimg.com/vi/k062xKTX_DI/maxresdefault.jpg [68747470733a2f2f692e7974696d672e636f6d2f76692f6b30363278] Watchable video, inaccessible channel There are some strange cases where videos are still viewable while the channel is terminated or otherwise inaccessible for some reason. 1. Channel Google Videos inaccessible for reason This channel is not available. + Google Input Tools: Google Drive Setup 2. Channel CYBERXSYSTEMSALGORV1 inaccessible for reason This account has been terminated due to multiple or severe violations of YouTube's policy against spam, deceptive practices, and misleading content or other Terms of Service violations. + # # # # # # # + ## #| # #|#|#|##*|#|#|## #|#|#|# + kyRA + |#|#p|#|###|#|###|#|###|#|#|--||#|##|#||# + Note: These were watchable at one point but no longer appear to be. Super-wide aspect ratio Breaks the YouTube UI because the video width is so large. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z815XfakQCE 3840x128 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QliQ0livbeQ 3840x678 Toggle tagle of contents Pages 5 [ ] * Home * Deleted and Private Videos * Resources * YouTube API Notes * YouTube Oddities + Comments missing channel information + Channels with extremely long names + Video without a title + Video with 249 allowed countries + Old channel, new channel + More from YouTube + Movies & Shows + Show to channel + Topic channels + This video is unavailable on this device + Various playlists + Custom channel partially doesn't work / extra custom channel value + Custom channels and special paths + New tab without without a videoId + Channel URL redirect to video instead of channel + Strange channels + Video that won't play + Video that was corrupted by YouTube + Video with the best video id + Alternative client video + Channels with 1/2 million videos + Forever processing + Greyscale preview + Video with everything else hidden + Still existing thumbnails + Watchable video, inaccessible channel + Super-wide aspect ratio Clone this wiki locally [https://github.com/m] Footer (c) 2024 GitHub, Inc. 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