Free YouTube comment exporter

Paste a video link and export up to 500 recent comment rows as a spreadsheet, or up to 1,000 with your own YouTube Data API key. Replies are included, and nothing is stored on our side once the file reaches your browser.

What you get in the file

Nine columns, one row per comment, always in this order. Replies are rows too, flagged and linked back to the comment they answer.

The JSON download carries the same nine fields as an array of objects, indented, so it can be read without unpicking any quoting.

File details, since nobody else states them

• UTF-8 with a byte-order mark, so emoji and Japanese, Korean or Arabic comments open in Excel as themselves rather than as question marks.
• CRLF line endings, and every field quoted, with embedded quotes doubled.
• A field starting =, +, - or @ is prefixed with an apostrophe, so a comment that reads like a formula is not run as one when you open the file.
• Filenames are youtube-comments-<video id>.csv and .json.
• The file is assembled in your browser. The comments are not written to a file or a database on our side, and if you supply your own API key it is used for that one request and never stored or logged.

How to export comments from a YouTube video

1. Copy the video URL from your browser's address bar. Watch pages, youtu.be short links, /shorts/, /live/ and /embed/ URLs all work, as does a bare 11-character video id.
2. Paste it into the box above and pick how many comments you want.
3. Press Export comments, then download the CSV or JSON.

A worked example

Sample data, not a real video — the shape is what matters. Three rows of a file where the second comment is a reply to the first:

comment_id,parent_id,author,author_channel_url,text,like_count,published_at,updated_at,is_reply
"UgxAbC1","","Mara K","https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0001","Which tripod is that at 4:12?","18","2026-08-11T09:14:52Z","2026-08-11T09:14:52Z","false"
"UgxAbC1.9","UgxAbC1","Field Notes","https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0002","Linked in the description now","4","2026-08-11T10:02:10Z","2026-08-11T10:40:31Z","true"
"UgxDeF2","","Tomas R","https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0003","'=HYPERLINK(""x"") nice video","0","2026-08-12T18:33:07Z","2026-08-12T18:33:07Z","false"

Two things to notice. The reply carries the parent's id, so a pivot table can group a thread back together without any guessing. And the third comment began with an =, so an apostrophe was added in front of it — that is the formula guard, and it is why the export cannot turn a hostile comment into a live spreadsheet formula.

What people use the export for

The two requests that come up most often are research and evidence. Creators pull a few hundred comments into a spreadsheet to find the questions that keep repeating, then turn those into a video. Anyone running a giveaway needs the comment list as a record of who entered before a winner is drawn.

The other common use is feeding comments to an AI assistant. The JSON download exists for that: it drops straight into a prompt or a script without the quoting problems a CSV introduces.

The limits, in numbers

Two details behind the ceiling, because they change what you actually get. Comments are read newest first, in batches of 100 threads, so hitting the ceiling means you have the most recent 500 rather than a random 500. And the ceiling counts rows, not top-level comments: with replies switched on, a busy thread can spend a dozen rows, so you end up with fewer distinct comments than the number suggests. Turn replies off if the top-level comments are what you are counting.

The free tier draws on a shared daily pool that resets at midnight Pacific, which is when YouTube resets API quota. If it runs out, the tool says so and offers the API key box rather than failing quietly. Private and unlisted videos are not readable at all, and a video with comments turned off returns that as the reason.

How it compares to the other exporters

Figures below were read from each tool's own page on 24 August 2026 and will drift, so check them before relying on one.

Where the others are better: ExportComments covers more than twenty platforms, so if you need Instagram and TikTok in the same workflow it is the more sensible tool, and its export records whether a comment was pinned or hearted, which this one does not. Comment Picker gives you eleven fields including the profile picture URL and the channel id. The open-source downloader has no ceiling at all, because it does not go through the API — the cost is a terminal, Python, and a method Google does not sanction.

What this one does differently is the free ceiling and the file itself: 500 rows without an account, CSV and JSON both free rather than XLSX-only, and a documented column list you can build a script against. Longer version in the ExportComments comparison.

Browser extensions are a category rather than a product, and worth one caution: an extension that reads comments by driving the page you are logged into needs permission to read the page. That is a different trust decision from pasting a public link into a form, and it is worth making deliberately either way.

Is this allowed?

Yes. The exporter reads public comments through the official YouTube Data API v3, which is the route Google provides for exactly this. It does not scrape the watch page and it does not drive a logged-in account, which are the two things that get tools into trouble. Private and unlisted videos are not readable, by design.

If you want the longer version of where the policy lines fall, that is covered in what YouTube comment automation actually covers and in the write-up on what gets channels banned.

Common questions

Can I download YouTube comments to Excel?

Yes. The exporter produces a UTF-8 CSV with a byte-order mark, which Excel opens directly with emoji and non-Latin characters intact. Choose the JSON download instead if you are feeding the comments into a script.

Do I need a YouTube API key to export comments?

No. Up to 500 comments per video run on ReplyTide's quota with no signup. Adding your own YouTube Data API key raises the ceiling to 1,000 and draws on your own Google Cloud quota instead.

Why does the exporter return no comments?

The two usual causes are comments being turned off for that video, and the video being private or unlisted. The YouTube Data API only reads comments on public videos.

Does exporting comments break YouTube's terms?

No. The exporter reads public comments through the official YouTube Data API v3, which is the access route Google provides for this. It does not scrape the page or automate a logged-in account.

Can I export comments from a whole channel at once?

Not with this tool, which works one video at a time. Channel-wide export needs an authorised connection to the channel.

Does the export include replies?

Yes, unless you untick the box. A reply is a row like any other, with is_reply set to true and parent_id holding the id of the comment it answers. Replies count towards the row ceiling, so a thread-heavy video yields fewer distinct top-level comments.

Can I export the comments on a YouTube Short?

Yes. Paste the /shorts/ link and it is handled the same way as a watch page, because a Short is an ordinary video as far as the API is concerned. Live and embed URLs work too, as does a bare video id.

What order are the exported comments in?

Newest first. That is also what the ceiling means in practice: a truncated export is the most recent 500 comments, not an arbitrary sample of the thread.

What columns does the CSV have?

Nine, in this order: comment_id, parent_id, author, author_channel_url, text, like_count, published_at, updated_at, is_reply. The JSON download carries the same nine fields.