How to scrape YouTube Channel Lives with Rust

A channel's past and current live streams. This tutorial gets it with a short Rust program and the YouTube Channel Lives API. Each successful call costs 1 credit; errors and not-found answers are free.

1. Get an API key

Sign in to get a key and 100 free credits, no card. Then put the key in an environment variable so it stays out of your code:

export SCRAPEIO_API_KEY="your_key_here"

2. Set up Rust

cargo new scrape && cd scrape && cargo add reqwest --features blocking,json && cargo add serde_json

3. Write the code

Save this as src/main.rs.

use serde_json::Value;

fn main() -> Result<(), Box<dyn std::error::Error>> {
    let key = std::env::var("SCRAPEIO_API_KEY")?;
    let client = reqwest::blocking::Client::new();
    let mut params: Vec<(&str, String)> = vec![("handle", "nike".to_string())];
    let mut items: Vec<Value> = Vec::new();
    loop {
        let body: Value = client.get("https://scrapeio.com/v1/youtube/channel/lives").query(&params).header("x-api-key", &key).send()?.error_for_status()?.json()?;
        let data = &body["data"];
        if let Some(rows) = data["items"].as_array() {
            items.extend(rows.iter().cloned());
        }
        let cursor = data["cursor"].as_str().unwrap_or("").to_string();
        if !data["has_more"].as_bool().unwrap_or(false) || cursor.is_empty() || items.len() >= 100 {
            break;
        }
        params.retain(|(k, _)| *k != "cursor");
        params.push(("cursor", cursor));
    }
    println!("{} items", items.len());
    println!("{}", serde_json::to_string_pretty(&items.iter().take(3).collect::<Vec<_>>())?);
    Ok(())
}

The loop follows data.cursor until data.has_more is false, and stops at 100 items. Each page is one call, so it costs 1 credit.

4. Run it

cargo run

The response has the same envelope on every endpoint: success, cached, credits_used, credits_remaining and data. Shared fields such as handle, followers, plays, likes and created_at have the same names on every platform.

Parameters

Name	Type	Description
`handle`	string	Channel handle, e.g. @MrBeast.
`channelId`	string	Channel id (UC...). Send this or handle.
`cursor`	string	Cursor from the previous page's data.cursor.

Errors and what you pay

Status	Meaning	Charged
`200`	Success	Yes, unless cached
`400`	A parameter is missing or wrong	No
`401`	The key is missing or invalid	No
`402`	Not enough credits	No
`403`	The account or post is private	No
`404`	Not found on the platform	No
`429`	More than 300 requests a minute	No
`502`	Every source is down; retry shortly	No

Same endpoint in other languages

Python · Node.js · JavaScript · TypeScript · Go · Java · C# · PHP · Ruby · Kotlin · Swift · R

Prefer no code?

Connect the MCP server to Claude Code, Cursor or Codex and ask in plain English. The agent uses the youtube_channel_lives tool for you.

100 free credits, no card. Credits never expire.

Get API key