YouTube Comments Scraper

Overview

This Apify actor scrapes structured comment data from YouTube videos. You provide one or more video URLs, and it returns JSON data including comment text, author details, timestamps, votes, and video metadata. The original raw comment object is preserved for each entry.

Key Features

• Scrapes comments, author info (name, ID, URL, avatar), and video metadata (ID, URL, title, comment count).
• Preserves the full, unmodified raw comment object for each entry.
• Allows limiting comments per video (maxComments) or fetching all comments (getAllComments).
• Supports sorting comments by top (highest votes) or newest.
• Outputs to both Apify datasets and downloadable container files.
• Recommended to use Apify Proxy (especially RESIDENTIAL) for reliable runs.

How to Use

Configure the actor run with an input JSON object. The only required parameter is startUrls.

Example Input

{
  "startUrls": [
    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wT4HcYAeV5U",
    "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6l0q4l2NLo"
  ],
  "maxComments": 100,
  "sortBy": "top"
}

Input Parameters:
* startUrls (required): Array of YouTube video URLs to scrape.
* maxComments (optional): Maximum number of comments to scrape per video. Ignored if getAllComments is true.
* getAllComments (optional): Set to true to scrape all available comments, overriding maxComments.
* sortBy (optional): Comment sort order. Use "top" or "newest".

Input/Output

Input: Provide video URLs via the startUrls array in the actor's input configuration.

Output: The actor generates the following for each video:
* A dataset entry in the Apify Console.
* A file output_<videoId>.json containing the complete video object.
* A file comments_<videoId>.jsonl with one JSON comment object per line (JSONL format).

Example Output Structure

{
  "videoUrl": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wT4HcYAeV5U",
  "videoId": "wT4HcYAeV5U",
  "title": "YouTube",
  "commentsCount": null,
  "comments": [
    {
      "cid": "Ugxl_IUyS2PaN9t-_wV4AaABAg",
      "type": "comment",
      "publishedTimeText": "7 hours ago",
      "publishedTimeTs": 1759729079.617027,
      "comment": "Madhubanti + Rashmika = ",
      "author": "@maddockfilmsindia",
      "authorId": null,
      "authorUrl": null,
      "authorThumbnail": null,
      "replyCount": 7,
      "voteCount": 5,
      "isHearted": false,
      "isEdited": false,
      "raw": { ... },
      "videoId": "H6l0q4l2NLo",
      "pageUrl": "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6l0q4l2NLo"
    }
  ]
}