# YouTube Comments Scraper (`scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper`) Actor

Extract comments and replies from any YouTube video. Scrape by video URL or channel. Get comment text, likes, replies, author info, and more. Fast bulk extraction — export to JSON, CSV, or Excel.

- **URL**: https://apify.com/scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper.md
- **Developed by:** [ScrapeForge](https://apify.com/scrapeforge) (community)
- **Categories:** Social media, Videos
- **Stats:** 7 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks
- **User rating**: No ratings yet

## Pricing

from $0.30 / 1,000 comments

This Actor is paid per event. You are not charged for the Apify platform usage, but only a fixed price for specific events.

Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-event

## What's an Apify Actor?

Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows.
In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours,
and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store.
In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server.
Actors are written with capital "A".

## How to integrate an Actor?

If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects.
You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready.
The best way to integrate Actors is as follows.

- **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use).
- **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`.
- **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`.
- **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`.
- **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md).

For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below.

For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt).

# README

## YouTube Comments Scraper

Extract comments and replies from any YouTube video. Fast, reliable, and no browser needed — pure HTTP-based extraction at scale.

### Features

- **Fast extraction** — Direct API calls, no browser emulation needed
- **Multiple input modes** — Paste video URLs, channel URLs, or @handles
- **Reply support** — Optionally fetch replies to each comment
- **Sort options** — Get top comments or newest first
- **Low resource usage** — Minimal memory and bandwidth (JSON only, no page rendering)
- **Automatic pagination** — Fetches all comments, even on videos with thousands
- **Deduplication** — No duplicate comments in your dataset

### What data do you get?

Each comment includes:

| Field | Description |
|-------|-------------|
| `text` | Full comment text |
| `likeCount` | Number of likes on the comment |
| `replyCount` | Number of replies |
| `publishedTime` | When the comment was posted (e.g., "2 hours ago") |
| `isPinned` | Whether the comment is pinned by the creator |
| `isHearted` | Whether the creator hearted the comment |
| `videoId` | Source video ID |
| `videoUrl` | Source video URL |
| `author.name` | Commenter's display name |
| `author.channelId` | Commenter's channel ID |
| `author.channelUrl` | Commenter's channel URL |
| `author.avatarUrl` | Commenter's profile picture URL |
| `replies` | Array of reply comments (when enabled) |

#### Sample output

```json
{
    "commentId": "UgyBxGk...",
    "text": "This video is amazing! Great explanation.",
    "likeCount": 142,
    "replyCount": 5,
    "publishedTime": "2 days ago",
    "isPinned": false,
    "isHearted": true,
    "videoId": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
    "videoUrl": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ",
    "author": {
        "name": "John Doe",
        "channelId": "UCxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx",
        "channelUrl": "https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx",
        "avatarUrl": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/..."
    },
    "replies": []
}
```

### Input

| Field | Description | Default |
|-------|-------------|---------|
| `videoURLs` | List of YouTube video URLs | `[]` |
| `channelURLs` | List of YouTube channel URLs or @handles | `[]` |
| `commentsPerVideo` | Max comments per video. Set to `0` for all comments | `0` |
| `maxRepliesPerComment` | Max replies to fetch per comment. Set to `0` to skip | `0` |
| `sortBy` | Sort order: `top` or `newest` | `top` |
| `proxy` | Proxy configuration (recommended) | Apify Proxy |

#### Example input

```json
{
    "videoURLs": [
        "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"
    ],
    "commentsPerVideo": 500,
    "maxRepliesPerComment": 5,
    "sortBy": "top"
}
```

#### Scraping comments from a channel

```json
{
    "channelURLs": [
        "https://www.youtube.com/@MrBeast"
    ],
    "commentsPerVideo": 100,
    "sortBy": "newest"
}
```

### Use cases

- **Sentiment analysis** — Analyze audience reactions to products, campaigns, or creators
- **Brand monitoring** — Track what people say about your brand across YouTube
- **Competitor research** — Study engagement patterns on competitor content
- **Influencer vetting** — Evaluate comment quality and authenticity before partnerships
- **Trend detection** — Spot emerging topics and opinions in comment sections
- **Academic research** — Collect data for social media studies and NLP projects
- **Content strategy** — Understand what resonates with audiences by analyzing top comments

### How it works

This scraper fetches comments in bulk without launching a browser or rendering any pages. It uses fast, efficient JSON requests under the hood. This means:

- **No scroll delays** — Comments are fetched via pagination, not scrolling
- **Minimal bandwidth** — Only JSON data is transferred, no HTML/CSS/JS/images
- **Low memory** — Runs in 256MB, no browser overhead

### Export formats

Export your data in JSON, CSV, Excel, XML, or HTML. Integrate via the Apify API, webhooks, or connect directly to Google Sheets, Slack, Zapier, Make, and more.

### Limitations

- Only public video comments are accessible
- Comments disabled by the creator cannot be scraped
- Age-restricted videos may not be accessible without authentication
- YouTube may rate-limit requests from the same IP — use proxy for best results

### Disclaimer

This is an **unofficial** actor and is **not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by YouTube or Google**. It is developed and maintained independently. YouTube is a trademark of Google LLC.

This actor accesses only publicly available data. Users are responsible for ensuring their use complies with YouTube's Terms of Service and all applicable laws. By using this actor, you agree that you are solely responsible for how you use the extracted data.

# Actor input Schema

## `videoURLs` (type: `array`):

List of YouTube video URLs to scrape comments from (e.g., https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO\_ID)

## `channelURLs` (type: `array`):

List of YouTube channel URLs or @handles. All recent videos from these channels will have their comments scraped.

## `commentsPerVideo` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of comments to scrape per video. Set to 0 for all comments.

## `maxRepliesPerComment` (type: `integer`):

Maximum number of replies to fetch per comment. Set to 0 to skip replies.

## `sortBy` (type: `string`):

Sort order for comments.

## `proxy` (type: `object`):

Proxy settings. Recommended for avoiding rate limits.

## Actor input object example

```json
{
  "videoURLs": [],
  "channelURLs": [],
  "commentsPerVideo": 0,
  "maxRepliesPerComment": 0,
  "sortBy": "top",
  "proxy": {
    "useApifyProxy": true
  }
}
```

# Actor output Schema

## `comments` (type: `string`):

Dataset containing all extracted comments with user data, timestamps, and replies

# API

You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup.

## JavaScript example

```javascript
import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

// Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
// Replace the '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token
const client = new ApifyClient({
    token: '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>',
});

// Prepare Actor input
const input = {};

// Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
const run = await client.actor("scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper").call(input);

// Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any)
console.log('Results from dataset');
console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`);
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
items.forEach((item) => {
    console.dir(item);
});

// 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs

```

## Python example

```python
from apify_client import ApifyClient

# Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token
# Replace '<YOUR_API_TOKEN>' with your token.
client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_API_TOKEN>")

# Prepare the Actor input
run_input = {}

# Run the Actor and wait for it to finish
run = client.actor("scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)

# Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any)
print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}")
for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items():
    print(item)

# 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start

```

## CLI example

```bash
echo '{}' |
apify call scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper --silent --output-dataset

```

## MCP server setup

```json
{
    "mcpServers": {
        "apify": {
            "type": "http",
            "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,scrapeforge/youtube-comments-scraper"
        }
    }
}

```

The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer <APIFY_API_TOKEN>` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations).

## OpenAPI specification

Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/BAZ7l5sWbghtjrzsh/builds/Ik2vaitiNWgcfkpM3/openapi.json