PlaylistItems

  • A playlistItem resource represents a resource, such as a video, within a playlist and contains details about how that resource is used within that specific playlist.

  • YouTube uses playlistItem resources to manage a channel's uploaded videos, with each item representing an individual uploaded video.

  • The API provides methods for managing playlistItems, including listing, inserting, updating, and deleting items in a playlist.

  • playlistItem resources contain properties like snippet for basic details, contentDetails for video-specific information, and status for privacy settings.

  • The snippet property contains information on the item's title, description, position, thumbnails, the channels associated to it, and the resource included in the playlist.

A playlistItem resource identifies another resource, such as a video, that is included in a playlist. In addition, the playlistItem resource contains details about the included resource that pertain specifically to how that resource is used in that playlist.

YouTube also uses a playlist to identify a channel's list of uploaded videos, with each playlistItem in that list representing one uploaded video. You can retrieve the playlist ID for that list from the channel resource for a given channel. You can then use the playlistItems.list method to the list.

Methods

The API supports the following methods for playlistItems resources:

list
Returns a collection of playlist items that match the API request parameters. You can retrieve all of the playlist items in a specified playlist or retrieve one or more playlist items by their unique IDs. Try it now.
insert
Adds a resource to a playlist. Try it now.
update
Modifies a playlist item. For example, you could update the item's position in the playlist. Try it now.
delete
Deletes a playlist item. Try it now.

Resource representation

The following JSON structure shows the format of a playlistItems resource:

{
  "kind": "youtube#playlistItem",
  "etag": etag,
  "id": string,
  "snippet": {
    "publishedAt": datetime,
    "channelId": string,
    "title": string,
    "description": string,
    "thumbnails": {
      (key): {
        "url": string,
        "width": unsigned integer,
        "height": unsigned integer
      }
    },
    "channelTitle": string,
    "videoOwnerChannelTitle": string,
    "videoOwnerChannelId": string,
    "playlistId": string,
    "position": unsigned integer,
    "resourceId": {
      "kind": string,
      "videoId": string,
    }
  },
  "contentDetails": {
    "videoId": string,
    "startAt": string,
    "endAt": string,
    "note": string,
    "videoPublishedAt": datetime
  },
  "status": {
    "privacyStatus": string
  }
}

Properties

The following table defines the properties that appear in this resource:

Properties
kind string
Identifies the API resource's type. The value will be youtube#playlistItem.
etag etag
The Etag of this resource.
id string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the playlist item.
snippet object
The snippet object contains basic details about the playlist item, such as its title and position in the playlist.
snippet.publishedAt datetime
The date and time that the item was added to the playlist. The value is specified in ISO 8601 format.
snippet.channelId string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the user that added the item to the playlist.
snippet.title string
The item's title.
snippet.description string
The item's description.
snippet.thumbnails object
A map of thumbnail images associated with the playlist item. For each object in the map, the key is the name of the thumbnail image, and the value is an object that contains other information about the thumbnail.
snippet.thumbnails.(key) object
Valid key values are:
  • default – The default thumbnail image. The default thumbnail for a video – or a resource that refers to a video, such as a playlist item or search result – is 120px wide and 90px tall. The default thumbnail for a channel is 88px wide and 88px tall.
  • medium – A higher resolution version of the thumbnail image. For a video (or a resource that refers to a video), this image is 320px wide and 180px tall. For a channel, this image is 240px wide and 240px tall.
  • high – A high resolution version of the thumbnail image. For a video (or a resource that refers to a video), this image is 480px wide and 360px tall. For a channel, this image is 800px wide and 800px tall.
  • standard – An even higher resolution version of the thumbnail image than the high resolution image. This image is available for some videos and other resources that refer to videos, like playlist items or search results. This image is 640px wide and 480px tall.
  • maxres – The highest resolution version of the thumbnail image. This image size is available for some videos and other resources that refer to videos, like playlist items or search results. This image is 1280px wide and 720px tall.
snippet.thumbnails.(key).url string
The image's URL.
snippet.thumbnails.(key).width unsigned integer
The image's width.
snippet.thumbnails.(key).height unsigned integer
The image's height.
snippet.channelTitle string
The channel title of the channel that the playlist item belongs to.
snippet.videoOwnerChannelTitle string
The channel title of the channel that uploaded this video.
snippet.videoOwnerChannelId string
The channel ID of the channel that uploaded this video.
snippet.playlistId string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the playlist that the playlist item is in.
snippet.position unsigned integer
The order in which the item appears in the playlist. The value uses a zero-based index, so the first item has a position of 0, the second item has a position of 1, and so forth.
snippet.resourceId object
The id object contains information that can be used to uniquely identify the resource that is included in the playlist as the playlist item.
snippet.resourceId.kind string
The kind, or type, of the referred resource.
snippet.resourceId.videoId string
If the snippet.resourceId.kind property's value is youtube#video, then this property will be present and its value will contain the ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the video in the playlist.
contentDetails object
The contentDetails object is included in the resource if the included item is a YouTube video. The object contains additional information about the video.
contentDetails.videoId string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify a video. To retrieve the video resource, set the id query parameter to this value in your API request.
contentDetails.startAt string
Note: This property has been deprecated and, if set, its value is ignored.

The time, measured in seconds from the start of the video, when the video should start playing. (The playlist owner can specify the times when the video should start and stop playing when the video is played in the context of the playlist.) The default value is 0.
contentDetails.endAt string
Note: This property has been deprecated and, if set, its value is ignored.

The time, measured in seconds from the start of the video, when the video should stop playing. (The playlist owner can specify the times when the video should start and stop playing when the video is played in the context of the playlist.) By default, assume that the video.endTime is the end of the video.
contentDetails.note string
A user-generated note for this item. The property value has a maximum length of 280 characters.
contentDetails.videoPublishedAt datetime
The date and time that the video was published to YouTube. The value is specified in ISO 8601 format.
status object
The status object contains information about the playlist item's privacy status.
status.privacyStatus string
The playlist item's privacy status. The channel that uploaded the video that the playlist item represents can set this value using either the videos.insert or videos.update method.