Find the hidden patterns with YouTube’s new Analytics API

Trying to figure out how YouTube’s one billion monthly users are interacting with your videos? Try the new YouTube Analytics API to get custom reports of the YouTube statistics you care about in a direct JSON or CSV response, perfect for dashboards and ad hoc reports. 

The new API includes all the standard view and engagement metrics you would expect, including views, shares, and subscriber numbers. Compared to the previous Insight Data API, you also get:

• Watch metrics: Track estimated minutes watched across channel, content owner, or video, and dive into the video details with average view time and average view percentage.
• Earning performance metrics: Track estimated earnings (net revenue) from select advertising sources across your content.
• Ad performance metrics: Break down video performance with monetized playbacks, ad impressions, gross revenue, and cost per impression reports.
• Annotation metrics: Optimize overlays/annotations with click through and close rate metrics.

Client Libraries and Code Samples

You’ll find client libraries for the languages you use most, with nine different languages available today. You can also make HTTP RESTful requests directly, and with our API Explorer, you can try out sample reports before writing any code.  

Don’t write your code from scratch! Get started with code examples in Java, JavaScript, Python, and Ruby. If you want a step-by-step walkthrough of building a complete web application, have a look at our JavaScript exercise.  

App Examples

Check out some apps that are already using the API: 

Next Big Sound

VidIQ

• Next Big Sound provides analytics and insights for the music industry by tracking billions of social signals including YouTube. This enables record labels, artists, and band managers to make better decisions on everything from promotion strategies to tour locations.
• vidIQ is an audience development suite that works with global brands to organically grow their views and subscribers. Their features include cross-platform social analytics, advanced comment management, SEO tools, social syndication and influencer identification. 

Wizdeo

Vidyard

• Wizdeo’s WizTracker provides in-depth analysis of YouTube channels to help with cross promotion and video comparisons during their initial launch. Users get access to detailed analytics about views, subscriber engagement, traffic sources and demographics.
• Vidyard is a video marketing platform. With powerful analytics, built-in marketing tools, and integration with key marketing automation platforms, Vidyard helps marketers drive results with video content.  

Fullscreen

• Fullscreen is building a global network of YouTube channels with content creators and brands. Fullscreen provides a full suite of end-to-end YouTube tools and uses the new API for internal, business-intelligence tools.  

Learn More

In addition to the documentation, check out our Analytics API playlist to make getting started even easier.  

If your goal is to export all statistics for a large number of channels on a recurring basis for your data warehouse, look forward to using the upcoming scheduled reports feature of the API, expected to launch later this year.

To get more info on the YouTube APIs, subscribe to our YouTube for Developers’ channel and YouTubeDev on Google+. 

Cheers,

-- Ted Hamilton, Christoph Schwab-Ganser, and the YouTube Analytics API Team 

We’re going live from Google I/O

By Mike Winton, Director of Developer Relations

(Cross-posted from the Google Developers Blog)

At Google I/O 2013, we will share the future of our platforms with you. Developers from all over the world are the key innovators of powerful, breakthrough technologies, and that’s why we challenged ourselves to make the Google I/O experience available to every developer, everywhere.

Watch Google I/O live
From the comfort of your own home, office, secret lair, or anywhere you have a reliable Internet connection, you can stream Google I/O May 15-16 live. Brought to you by Google Developers Live (GDL), the Google I/O homepage will become the GDL at I/O live streaming hub starting on May 15th at 9:00 AM PT (16:00 UTC). From this page, you can:

• Stream 4 channels of technical content on your computer, tablet, or phone. You’ll feel like you’re right there in the keynote and session rooms, listening to product announcements straight from the source. Live streaming will run on developers.google.com/io from 9 AM PT (16:00 UTC) to 7 PM PT (2:00 UTC) on May 15 and 16.
• Watch exclusive interviews with the Googlers behind the latest product announcements. This year, GDL will be on site, broadcasting one-on-one product deep dives, executive interviews, and Sandbox walkthroughs from the GDL stage.
• Get the latest news in real-time. We’ll be posting official announcements during I/O. You’ll be able to see the feed on the Google I/O homepage, in the I/O mobile app (coming soon), and on +Google Developers.
• Never miss a session. All Google I/O technical sessions will be recorded and posted to GDL and the Google Developers YouTube channel. Subscribe to our YouTube channel for archived session updates.

Live blog the keynote
Grab our live blogging gadget to add the keynote live stream to your own site or blog. Customize the gadget with your site or blog name, live blog alongside real-time Google announcements, and share a dynamic Google I/O experience with your readers. Have questions? For more info, check out our live blogging gadget FAQ.

Get together locally
Experience Google I/O with your local developer community by hosting or attending an I/O Extended event. If you’re hosting, register here and learn how to hold a totally epic event with our handy Organizer Guide. Otherwise, with over 400 sites in 90+ countries, chances are good that there is an I/O Extended event near you. Find an event now!

And before I/O, tune in to Google Developers Live programming to connect with Google engineers, prep for this year’s event, and browse our archived content. For official conference updates, add +Google Developers to your Circles, follow #io13 for big announcements, join the Google I/O community, and keep an eye on the Google I/O site.

Mike Winton founded and leads Google's global Developer Relations organization. He also enjoys spending time with his family and DJing electronic music.

Streaming to YouTube Live? Put an API on it!

The YouTube Live Streaming API makes it easier to build tools and apps for channels that are enabled to stream live content on YouTube. With the YouTube Live platform, you have the ability to real-time transcode to a range of video qualities that support a broad set of devices and networks, dynamic bandwidth adjustment so viewers automatically see the highest quality stream their network supports, and DVR-like controls to allow viewers to pause, fast forward, and rewind during a live stream.

How to start developing with live streams

• The basics
• A broadcast represents a live event that you'll stream on YouTube. The API lets you schedule a broadcast, bind it to your live video stream, and update its status to testing, live, or complete.
• A stream represents the actual broadcast content.
• A cuepoint represents an ad break that can be inserted into a live broadcast. Cuepoints are only available to YouTube content partners.

• Documentation
• The Getting Started guide explains these concepts in more detail and explains how they interact with other YouTube Data API and YouTube Content ID API resources.
• The Life of a Broadcast guide walks you through the typical steps for creating and managing a live broadcast on YouTube.
• The YouTube Live Streaming Guide identifies the encoder settings, bitrates, and resolutions that the YouTube Live Streaming platform supports.
  
  
• Sample code and tools
• Client libraries for many different programming languages can help you implement the YouTube Live Streaming API as well as many other Google APIs.
• Don't write code from scratch! Our Java, PHP, and Python code samples will help you get started.
• The APIs Explorer lets you try out sample calls before writing any code.
  
  

In addition, in this video, we talk about the philosophy we followed in building the API and also see some great demos from our partners.

Awesome examples

Here are a few great examples from developers already using the API:

Capella’s Cambria Live

• Capella’s Cambria Live encodes live broadcasts in real time and streams them to YouTube Live. Cambria Live takes uncompressed broadcast video directly from a camera via SDI or HDMI and compresses it into the H.264 format with AAC audio, ensuring optimal video and audio quality.
  
  

Elgato Game Capture HD

Radioline

• Elgato Game Capture HD enables you to stream PlayStation or Xbox gameplay to share it with your friends and fans as it happens. Elgato’s video products enable high-quality video recording and conversion for consumers and professionals alike.

• Radioline designs and operates a cloud-based mobile internet radio. You can find or discover new radio stations according to their names, genres, areas or according to your favorite playlists.

This API is still experimental, so stay tuned here and subscribe to the YouTube for Developers channel to keep up on the latest.

Cheers,

-- Derek Tan, Satyajeet Salgar, and the YouTube Live Streaming API Team

The Helping Hand of an Expert

Have you ever been stuck working on a problem only to receive a solution from a friendly person you've never met? Some of the most helpful responses on Stack Overflow and open source code examples have been contributed by our YouTube API community members. The Google Developer Expert (GDE) program is designed to recognize the active and passionate YouTube API developers who make these outstanding contributions.

Each year, Google Developer Experts are selected for their existing accomplishments using Google technologies, their continued passion for these technologies, and their willingness to engage with and mentor other developers.

To learn more about what it’s like to be a GDE, check out this interview with two of our 2013 YouTube API GDEs, Matias Molinas from Argentina and Tim Wintle from the U.K. 

If you’d like to share your knowledge, connect with us on +YouTubeDev, contribute to Stack Overflow, and find like-minded developers at your local Google Developer Group (GDG). 

Cheers,

—Jarek Wilkiewicz and Jeremy Walker, YouTube API Team

YouTube for Developers on... YouTube!

For almost a year, we’ve been recording weekly shows for YouTube API developers as part of the Google Developers Live series, hosted on the Google Developers YouTube channel. Now, if you want to get just YouTube API-related videos, check out the new YouTube for Developers channel.

On our new channel, you’ll find an up to date playlist of all our YouTube Developers Live shows (which we’ve also embedded below), as well as other playlists with videos related to the API. We still recommend subscribing to Google Developers as well, especially if you plan to work with multiple Google APIs in your applications.

Not surprisingly, we’re using the YouTube Data API v3 to maintain the YouTube Developers Live playlist, and also to post channel bulletins whenever any video related to YouTube is added to the Google Developers channel. If you’re interested in doing this type of automatic curation in your own channels, you can take a look at the open source Ruby script that does the work for us.

Cheers,

—Jeff Posnick, YouTube API Team

Keeping Up with YouTube API Updates

As the YouTube APIs continue to evolve, release notes are a good place to keep track of improvements. However, with a busy life, you may not remember checking regularly for updates. Now, for the first time, you can subscribe to RSS feeds to be notified as soon as new features are available.

The release notes for all of the YouTube APIs and widgets have their own corresponding RSS feed.
Feeds are available for:

• YouTube Data API (v3)
• YouTube Analytics API
• YouTube Android Player API
• YouTube IFrame Player API
• YouTube JavaScript Player API
• YouTube Flash (AS3) Player API
• YouTube Upload Widget
• YouTube Data API (v2)

Going forward, we will be pushing updates via RSS for all of the YouTube APIs. Follow our YouTube for Developers Google+ page, and subscribe to the RSS feeds to get the latest API updates!

Cheers,
—Ibrahim Ulukaya, YouTube API Team

No WebView required, with native YouTube Player API for Android

Adding a high-quality video experience to your Android application just got a whole lot easier. Starting today, you can embed and play YouTube videos in your app using the new YouTube Android Player API.

The API, which was pre-announced at Google I/O 2012, offers these benefits:

• High-quality video playback supported on Android 2.2 (Froyo) or newer
• Easy integration with your Android application (no WebView required)
• Fullscreen and orientation change support
• Closed captions display
• Support for YouTube ads
• Programmatic access, similar to existing Player APIs, to most aspects of the YouTube video playback experience
• Integration with the Android YouTube app using a standard set of YouTube Intents

We are launching the API as experimental, though we do not expect major interface changes going forward.

The Only Limit Now is Your Imagination (and ToS)

These instructions explain how to include the YouTubeAndroidPlayerApi.jar client library in your Android application. The library is supported on Android devices running version 4.2.16 or newer of the Android YouTube app.

You can use the YouTubeApiServiceUtil class' isYouTubeApiServiceAvailable method to confirm that a device is compatible.

For a simple embed, use the YouTubeStandalonePlayer. To build a more sophisticated user interface, try the YouTubePlayerView or the YouTubePlayerFragment. Fragments can help create an engaging experience as shown in the Video Wall app example.


Play With These Apps

Here are a few interesting apps available for you to explore:

• See everything on Flipboard, all your news and life’s great moments in one place. Now you can watch YouTube videos from wherever you are in Flipboard without leaving the application, providing a more integrated and seamless experience.
• BuzzFeed delivers original reporting, scoops, and the hottest social content on the web. Android users can now view their favorite BuzzFeed content featuring YouTube videos in the BuzzFeed app and share with their friends.
• 9x9.tv enables users to discover and watch curated, topical videos that are organized into TV-like channels. Their blog describes their experience developing with the API.
• SoundTracking lets people use their mobile phone or tablet to share their music moments and favorite jams with friends and family.  Users can now discover and play YouTube music videos of the songs within their music timeline.
• Fitness Flow by Skimble helps you get in shape with high-quality exercise videos led by professional trainers. Skimble uses YouTube to stream workout content on your Android phone and tablets.

Check out a few screen shots below or download the apps from Google Play today!

Flipboard	BuzzFeed	Fitness Flow by Skimble

Learn More

If you would like to learn more about the YouTube Android Player API, the documentation is a great place to start. In addition, we have curated useful videos in this playlist. Please subscribe to the YouTube for Developers' channel to keep up on the latest.

Check Out The Sample Code

We’ve prepared several code examples to make it easy for you to get started with the new API. You will find them on code.google.com. The description of the examples is available in our documentation. If you need additional help with the API feel free to use our support resources.

Cheers,
-- Ross McIlroy, Anton Hansson, and Horia Ciurdar, YouTube Mobile Team