Channels

Learn about the channel resource and how to use it to get information about a YouTube channel.

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What is a channel resource?

The channel resource contains information about a YouTube channel, such as the number of subscribers, view count, video count, channel name, and description.

Supported methods

The API supports the list and update methods for this resource. The list method returns the channel resources matching the request criteria using the channel ID or username. It also allows retrieval of channel data of the user authorizing the API request. The update method updates a channel’s metadata. For this lesson, we’ll take a look at the list method only.

Let’s use the list method to retrieve data with the help of a few examples.

Example 1: Retrieve channel data using channel ID

In this example, we’ll retrieve the channel data of the Educative Sessions YouTube channel. It’ll retrieve the snippet and statistics parts for the channel resource.

Note: If you changed the CHANNEL_ID parameter in the previous lesson, then replace it with the Educative Sessions channel ID UCT_8FqzTIr2Q1BOtvX_DPPw in the code below. To do so, click on the “Edit” button in the following widget, enter the channel ID in the CHANNEL_ID field and click the “Save” button.

Let’s run the following code to get a response with the channel data of the Educative Sessions YouTube channel, along with the snippet and statistics parts.

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api_service_name = "youtube"
api_version = "v3"
DEVELOPER_KEY = "{{API_KEY}}"
youtube = googleapiclient.discovery.build(
    api_service_name, api_version, developerKey = DEVELOPER_KEY)
request = youtube.channels().list(
    part="snippet,statistics",
    id="{{CHANNEL_ID}}"
)
response = request.execute()

In the JSON response received, you’ll see the channel title, description, and other information in the snippet object. In the statistics object, we’ll find the channel statistics, such as view count, video count, and so on.

Example 2: Retrieve channel data of an authenticated user

In this example, we’ll retrieve the channel data of the user authorizing the API request.

Note: The channelId parameter will not be required for this example. Instead, we’ll use the mine parameter set to true. This tells the API call that we’re requesting data from a personal account.

Remember that we created an OAuth 2.0 client ID and saved the JSON object of the client_secret_CLIENTID.json file. We’ll use that in this example.

Note: We don’t need the API_KEY when we make authenticated requests.

After clicking the “Run” button, you’ll see a prompt in the terminal that says “Please visit this URL to authorize this application.” Copy this URL and paste it into a browser tab.

Note: Make sure that you are signed in using the Google account that was used to set up the project in the API Console.

You’ll be asked to permit the API request by giving some permissions. Then, copy the generated code and paste it into the terminal next to the prompt “Enter the authorization code.”

Finally, you’ll see the API response object in the terminal.

{{CLIENT_SECRET}}
Retrieving channel data of the user authorizing the API request

For the user authorizing the API request, we get a JSON response with the channel title, description, and other information in the snippet object. In the statistics object, we’ll find the channel statistics.