YouTube - SocialAPI.AI

Available Managed connector - SocialAPI handles the Google Cloud project and YouTube Data API access for you. No customer-side Google Cloud setup required. See Platform credentials.

At a glance

Field	Value
Platform slug	`youtube`
Auth type	OAuth 2.0 (Google)
API	YouTube Data API v3
Best for	Comment moderation and metadata on owned YouTube channels.

Capabilities

Feature	Supported	Notes
List posts	Yes	Returns uploaded videos
Comments	Yes	Scoped to a specific video
Reply to comment	Yes
Comment replies (thread)	Yes
Moderate comment (hide/delete)	Yes	Hide sets moderation status; delete removes permanently
Like comment	No	Not supported by YouTube API
Private reply	No	Not applicable
DMs	No	Not supported by platform
Reviews	No	Not applicable
Mentions	No	Not supported via YouTube API
Create post	Yes	Upload and publish videos
Update post	Yes	Update title, description, tags, privacy, and other metadata
Delete post	Yes
Edit own comment	Yes	PATCH /v1/platforms/youtube/comments/

Connecting

curl -X POST https://api.social-api.ai/v1/accounts/connect \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "platform": "youtube",
    "redirect_uri": "https://app.example.com/oauth/callback",
    "state": "session_abc123"
  }'

Response:

{
  "auth_url": "https://accounts.google.com/o/oauth2/v2/auth?client_id=...&state=...",
  "state": "4a8f2c1e9b3d7f06a5c2e8b4d1f3a7e2"
}

Redirect your user to auth_url. After they authorize, SocialAPI exchanges the code with YouTube and redirects the user to your redirect_uri with the connection result. See OAuth flows for the redirect parameters.

Reading samples

List posts

curl "https://api.social-api.ai/v1/posts?account_ids=acc_01HZ9X3Q4R5M6N7P8V2K0W1J" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY"

List comments on a post

curl "https://api.social-api.ai/v1/inbox/comments/{videoId}" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY"

Sample response:

{
  "data": [
    {
      "id": "sapi_cmt_eW91dHViZTpVZ3h...",
      "platform": "youtube",
      "type": "comment",
      "author": {
        "id": "UCxyz123",
        "name": "Jane Smith",
        "avatar_url": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/..."
      },
      "content": {
        "text": "Great video!"
      },
      "metadata": {
        "post_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
        "like_count": 5,
        "has_replies": true
      },
      "created_at": "2026-03-15T10:30:00Z",
      "account_id": "acc_01HZ9X3Q4R5M6N7P8V2K0W1J",
      "platform_id": "Ugxyz..."
    }
  ],
  "count": 1
}

Publishing

Create a video post by providing a video URL and optional metadata via platform_data. See the API reference for the full request schema.

curl -X POST https://api.social-api.ai/v1/posts \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "text": "Check out our latest video!",
    "media_ids": ["f47ac10b-58cc-4372-a567-0e02b2c3d479"],
    "visibility": "public",
    "targets": [
      {
        "account_id": "acc_01HZ9X3Q4R5M6N7P8V2K0W1J",
        "platform_data": {
          "category_id": "22",
          "tags": ["tutorial", "demo"],
          "made_for_kids": false,
          "embeddable": true,
          "notify_subscribers": true
        }
      }
    ]
  }'

PlatformData fields

YouTube platform data can be supplied in two forms, which are merged before delivery (per-target values override top-level values on conflict):

Top-level: platform_data.youtube.<key> applies to all YouTube targets in the request.
Per-target: targets[].platform_data.<key> (flat keys, no nesting) overrides the top-level value for that target only. The example above uses this form.

Fields supported in either form:

Field	Type	Default	Description
`title`	string	none	Video title. If omitted, the title is inferred from the filename or URL.
`category_id`	string	`"22"` (People & Blogs)	YouTube video category ID. See YouTube category list.
`tags`	string[]	none	Video tags for discoverability.
`default_language`	string	none	BCP-47 language code (e.g. `"en"`, `"fr"`).
`made_for_kids`	bool	`false`	Whether the video is made for children (COPPA).
`embeddable`	bool	`true`	Whether the video can be embedded on other sites.
`license`	string	`"youtube"`	`"youtube"` for standard YouTube license, `"creativeCommon"` for CC BY.
`public_stats_viewable`	bool	`true`	Whether view counts and likes are publicly visible.
`publish_at`	string	none	RFC 3339 timestamp for scheduled publish (e.g. `"2026-04-10T15:00:00Z"`). Only applies when `visibility` is `"private"`.
`recording_date`	string	none	Date the video was recorded, in `YYYY-MM-DD` format.
`contains_synthetic_media`	bool	`false`	Whether the video contains AI-generated or synthetic content.
`notify_subscribers`	bool	`true`	Whether to send a notification to channel subscribers.
`playlist_id`	string	none	YouTube playlist ID. The video is added to this playlist after publishing.

Channel summary

Retrieve aggregate stats for a connected YouTube channel.

curl "https://api.social-api.ai/v1/platforms/youtube/accounts/{id}/summary" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY"

Response:

{
  "title": "Acme Corp",
  "handle": "@acmecorp",
  "thumbnail_url": "https://yt3.ggpht.com/...",
  "subscriber_count": 12400,
  "view_count": 980000,
  "video_count": 47
}

Force sync

Force an immediate re-sync of uploaded videos for an account.

curl -X POST "https://api.social-api.ai/v1/platforms/youtube/accounts/{id}/sync" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY"

Returns {"success": true} on success.

Edit own comment

To edit a comment you own, use the YouTube-specific PATCH endpoint. All three body fields are required.

curl -X PATCH "https://api.social-api.ai/v1/platforms/youtube/comments/{commentId}" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SOCAPI_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "account_id": "acc_01HZ9X3Q4R5M6N7P8V2K0W1J",
    "post_id": "dQw4w9WgXcQ",
    "text": "Updated comment text"
  }'

Limitations and gotchas

No DMs or mentions. YouTube does not expose a messaging or mention API. These endpoints return 501.
No webhook handler. YouTube does not push real-time events. Posts and comments are fetched on demand.
Comment moderation. Hide sets the comment moderation status to rejected (removes it from public view). Delete removes it permanently. The dedicated moderation endpoint (POST /v1/platforms/youtube/comments/{commentId}/moderate) can also set held_for_review explicitly. Like is not supported.
Token refresh. Google OAuth tokens expire. SocialAPI handles refresh automatically. If you receive 401 with code: "platform.youtube.auth", reconnect the account.

Permissions

SocialAPI’s managed Google Cloud OAuth app already requests YouTube Data API v3 scopes for reading and managing comments on your owned channels. You don’t need to set up a Google Cloud project. See Platform credentials.

​At a glance

​Capabilities

​Connecting

​Reading samples

​List posts

​List comments on a post

​Publishing

​PlatformData fields

​Channel summary

​Force sync

​Edit own comment

​Limitations and gotchas

​Permissions

​Related