Best YouTube scrapers in 2026: 8 options compared

November 8, 2026

"YouTube scraper" covers very different tools: a free command-line program, an official API with a daily quota, a service that delivers millions of records to a bucket, and an API you call from an app. Here are eight options, what each is good at, and where each one falls short.

Quick comparison

1. YouTube Data API v3

Free and official. You get 10,000 units a day for most methods and a separate 100 searches a day. Invalid requests still cost quota, and captions for videos you cannot edit are off limits. source Pick it when your volume is modest and you want Google's own numbers.

2. yt-dlp

The most capable free tool. It prints JSON metadata, lists playlists and channels, saves subtitles and collects comments. It is under the Unlicense. Recent versions need a JavaScript runtime such as Deno for full YouTube support, and you maintain it yourself. source Pick it for research on your own machine.

3. youtube-transcript-api

A small MIT-licensed Python library that fetches captions without an API key. Its README says YouTube blocks most cloud provider IPs, so it works best from a laptop rather than a server. source

4. Bright Data

Scrapers for videos, channels, comments and search. Pay as you go is $1.50 per 1,000 records; the Scale plan is $499 a month for 384,000 records. New accounts get 5,000 free records a month that do not roll over. Output is JSON, NDJSON or CSV, delivered to S3, GCS, Snowflake and more. source Pick it for large scheduled exports.

5. SerpApi

A search engine results API with a YouTube engine that returns video, channel and Shorts results for a query. The free plan has 250 searches a month; Starter is $25 for 1,000. Failed and cached searches are not counted. source pricing Pick it if you already use it for Google results.

6. EnsembleData

A multi-platform API that includes YouTube. Plans start at $100 a month for 1,500 units a day, and units reset daily at 00:00 UTC. source Pick it for steady, predictable daily volume.

7. Supadata

Focused on transcripts. One transcript costs 1 credit, the free plan has 100 credits a month, and credits do not roll over. source Pick it if transcripts are all you need.

8. ScrapeIO

A per-call API with YouTube endpoints for channels, uploads, Shorts, playlists, comments, search, community posts and transcripts. Credits never expire, failed calls are free, and the same field names work on TikTok, Instagram and 30 other platforms. It is a weaker fit than Bright Data for exporting hundreds of millions of rows to a warehouse.

Checklist before you pick

• Which objects do you need: channels, videos, comments, transcripts, search?
• How many calls a day, and is the volume steady or bursty?
• Do you pay for empty or failed results?
• Do credits or quota expire?
• Does it run from a server, or does it get blocked there?
• Read YouTube's Terms of Service, which restrict automated access without permission. terms

Doing it with ScrapeIO

Try the YouTube video API and the channel videos API with the 100 free signup credits. Every response uses the same envelope, and lists page with data.cursor. See all endpoints on the YouTube page.

Sources

Checked on 8 November 2026 from each vendor's own pages. Prices and limits change; follow the links before you decide.

• https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3/getting-started
• https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp
• https://github.com/jdepoix/youtube-transcript-api
• https://brightdata.com/products/web-scraper/youtube
• https://serpapi.com/youtube-search-api
• https://serpapi.com/pricing
• https://ensembledata.com/pricing
• https://supadata.ai/pricing
• https://www.youtube.com/t/terms