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YouTube Video ID Finder

Extract the video ID from any YouTube link — watch, Shorts, embed, youtu.be or mobile. Everything runs in your browser.

Try an example :

100% freeNo account requiredNo usage limit

How it works

  1. 01

    Paste any YouTube link

    Watch pages, Shorts, embeds, youtu.be short links, mobile links, and links with timestamps or playlist parameters all work.

  2. 02

    Get the ID instantly

    The 11-character video ID appears immediately, along with the canonical URL, short link, embed URL and thumbnail URL — each with a copy button.

  3. 03

    Use it wherever you need it

    Video IDs are what APIs, embeds and analytics tools expect. Copy the one you need and move on.

What people use it for

Feed an API or a script

The YouTube Data API works on video IDs, not URLs. This gets you the ID in one paste.

Clean up a messy link

Strip out tracking parameters, playlist context and timestamps to get the plain canonical URL.

Build an embed

Get the ready-to-use embed URL without hunting through YouTube’s share menu.

Frequently asked questions

What is a YouTube video ID?+

It is the 11-character string that identifies a video, made of letters, digits, hyphens and underscores. In https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ, the ID is dQw4w9WgXcQ. It never changes, even if the title does.

Which link formats are supported?+

Watch pages, Shorts, embeds, youtu.be short links, mobile links (m.youtube.com), the /v/ and /e/ legacy formats, live links, and any of these carrying timestamps, playlist or tracking parameters.

Does this work for channel IDs too?+

This tool handles video IDs. Channel IDs start with UC and are 24 characters long — resolving a @handle to a channel ID requires a call to YouTube, which is a different tool.

Is anything sent to your servers?+

No. The extraction is pure pattern matching and happens entirely in your browser. Nothing is uploaded, logged or stored.

Why does my link not work?+

Either it is not a YouTube link, or the ID inside it is malformed. A valid video ID is exactly 11 characters using A–Z, a–z, 0–9, hyphen and underscore.

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