CommentThread

Learn how to retrieve comment threads and add a top-level comment.

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Users can post comments on videos, and other users can reply to comments, creating threads. The information regarding these comments and threads is stored in the commentThread resource.

Note: The top-level comment and replies are actually comment resources nested inside the commentThread resource.

Supported methods

The API supports the following methods for the commentThread resource:

  • list: Returns a list of comment threads associated with a video.
  • insert: Creates a new top-level comment.

Let’s look at each method in detail with the help of a few examples.

The list method

The list method can retrieve all comment threads associated with a video or about a specified channel. It uses the videoId and channelId parameters to identify the video and channel, respectively.

Let’s look at an example of using the videoId parameter to get comment threads associated with it. In the code below, add a video ID to the VIDEO_ID field.

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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.commentThreads().list(
  part="snippet,replies",
  videoId="{{VIDEO_ID}}"
)
response = request.execute()

Note: We can retrieve the comment threads for a channel by using the channelId parameter in place of videoId.

In the JSON response received, we can see a list of objects named items. Each object in this list is a commentThread resource, which we can verify by looking at the value of the kind key, which is youtube#commentThread. You’ll also find the nested objects for the snippet and replies parts for each commentThread resource.

The insert method

The insert method adds a new top-level comment to a video or channel. This example will create a top-level comment on a video. The request body should have the snippet part, where you can set the metadata of a comment, such as the comment’s text and the video ID of the video we want to comment on.

Note: On line 20 in the code below, you need to add a video ID on which you want to add a comment. You can also change the default content of the comment on line 23 with something of your choice.

Also, to add a top-level comment, we must be logged in with a user account to authorize the API request.

Let’s run the code below and follow the steps to complete the authorization process, and consequently add a comment.

{{CLIENT_SECRET}}
Add a new top-level comment

The API response object will have a nested snippet object, which contains the videoId of the video we want to comment on. We can also see information about the comment itself, including the comment’s text, name of the comment author, published date, and so on. We can verify the addition of the comment by looking at the ”Comments” section of the YouTube video.