How can I get the actual video URL of a YouTube live stream?

casolorz picture casolorz · Feb 24, 2016 · Viewed 119.7k times · Source

Is there a way to get the HLS URL for YouTube live streams like this one https://www.youtube.com/embed/WVZpCdHq3Qg

I've tried the typical get_video_info methods but they don't seem to work with live streams.

Answer

JAL picture JAL · Feb 25, 2016

You need to get the HLS m3u8 playlist files from the video's manifest. There are ways to do this by hand, but for simplicity I'll be using the youtube-dl tool to get this information. I'll be using this live stream as an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Gtc-GtLlTk

First, get the formats of the video:

➜  ~ youtube-dl --list-formats https://www.youtube.com/watch\?v\=_Gtc-GtLlTk
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading webpage
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading video info webpage
[youtube] Downloading multifeed video (_Gtc-GtLlTk, aflWCT1tYL0) - add --no-playlist to just download video _Gtc-GtLlTk
[download] Downloading playlist: Southwest Florida Eagle Cam
[youtube] playlist Southwest Florida Eagle Cam: Collected 2 video ids (downloading 2 of them)
[download] Downloading video 1 of 2
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading webpage
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading video info webpage
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Extracting video information
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading formats manifest
[youtube] _Gtc-GtLlTk: Downloading DASH manifest
[info] Available formats for _Gtc-GtLlTk:
format code  extension  resolution note
140          m4a        audio only DASH audio  144k , m4a_dash container, mp4a.40.2@128k (48000Hz)
160          mp4        256x144    DASH video  124k , avc1.42c00b, 30fps, video only
133          mp4        426x240    DASH video  258k , avc1.4d4015, 30fps, video only
134          mp4        640x360    DASH video  646k , avc1.4d401e, 30fps, video only
135          mp4        854x480    DASH video 1171k , avc1.4d401f, 30fps, video only
136          mp4        1280x720   DASH video 2326k , avc1.4d401f, 30fps, video only
137          mp4        1920x1080  DASH video 4347k , avc1.640028, 30fps, video only
151          mp4        72p        HLS , h264, aac  @ 24k
132          mp4        240p       HLS , h264, aac  @ 48k
92           mp4        240p       HLS , h264, aac  @ 48k
93           mp4        360p       HLS , h264, aac  @128k
94           mp4        480p       HLS , h264, aac  @128k
95           mp4        720p       HLS , h264, aac  @256k
96           mp4        1080p      HLS , h264, aac  @256k (best)
[download] Downloading video 2 of 2
[youtube] aflWCT1tYL0: Downloading webpage
[youtube] aflWCT1tYL0: Downloading video info webpage
[youtube] aflWCT1tYL0: Extracting video information
[youtube] aflWCT1tYL0: Downloading formats manifest
[youtube] aflWCT1tYL0: Downloading DASH manifest
[info] Available formats for aflWCT1tYL0:
format code  extension  resolution note
140          m4a        audio only DASH audio  144k , m4a_dash container, mp4a.40.2@128k (48000Hz)
160          mp4        256x144    DASH video  124k , avc1.42c00b, 30fps, video only
133          mp4        426x240    DASH video  258k , avc1.4d4015, 30fps, video only
134          mp4        640x360    DASH video  646k , avc1.4d401e, 30fps, video only
135          mp4        854x480    DASH video 1171k , avc1.4d401f, 30fps, video only
136          mp4        1280x720   DASH video 2326k , avc1.4d401f, 30fps, video only
151          mp4        72p        HLS , h264, aac  @ 24k
132          mp4        240p       HLS , h264, aac  @ 48k
92           mp4        240p       HLS , h264, aac  @ 48k
93           mp4        360p       HLS , h264, aac  @128k
94           mp4        480p       HLS , h264, aac  @128k
95           mp4        720p       HLS , h264, aac  @256k (best)
[download] Finished downloading playlist: Southwest Florida Eagle Cam

In this case, there are two videos because the live stream contains two cameras. From here, we need to get the HLS URL for a specific stream. Use -f to pass in the format you would like to watch, and -g to get that stream's URL:

➜  ~ youtube-dl -f 95 -g https://www.youtube.com/watch\?v\=_Gtc-GtLlTk
https://manifest.googlevideo.com/api/manifest/hls_playlist/id/_Gtc-GtLlTk.2/itag/95/source/yt_live_broadcast/requiressl/yes/ratebypass/yes/live/1/cmbypass/yes/gir/yes/dg_shard/X0d0Yy1HdExsVGsuMg.95/hls_chunk_host/r1---sn-ab5l6ne6.googlevideo.com/playlist_type/LIVE/gcr/us/pmbypass/yes/mm/32/mn/sn-ab5l6ne6/ms/lv/mv/m/pl/20/dover/3/sver/3/fexp/9408495,9410706,9416126,9418581,9420452,9422596,9422780,9423059,9423661,9423662,9425349,9425959,9426661,9426720,9427325,9428422,9429306/upn/xmL7zNht848/mt/1456412649/ip/64.125.177.124/ipbits/0/expire/1456434315/sparams/ip,ipbits,expire,id,itag,source,requiressl,ratebypass,live,cmbypass,gir,dg_shard,hls_chunk_host,playlist_type,gcr,pmbypass,mm,mn,ms,mv,pl/signature/7E48A727654105FF82E158154FCBA7569D52521B.1FA117183C664F00B7508DDB81274644F520C27F/key/dg_yt0/playlist/index.m3u8
https://manifest.googlevideo.com/api/manifest/hls_playlist/id/aflWCT1tYL0.2/itag/95/source/yt_live_broadcast/requiressl/yes/ratebypass/yes/live/1/cmbypass/yes/gir/yes/dg_shard/YWZsV0NUMXRZTDAuMg.95/hls_chunk_host/r13---sn-ab5l6n7y.googlevideo.com/pmbypass/yes/playlist_type/LIVE/gcr/us/mm/32/mn/sn-ab5l6n7y/ms/lv/mv/m/pl/20/dover/3/sver/3/upn/vdBkD9lrq8Q/fexp/9408495,9410706,9416126,9418581,9420452,9422596,9422780,9423059,9423661,9423662,9425349,9425959,9426661,9426720,9427325,9428422,9429306/mt/1456412649/ip/64.125.177.124/ipbits/0/expire/1456434316/sparams/ip,ipbits,expire,id,itag,source,requiressl,ratebypass,live,cmbypass,gir,dg_shard,hls_chunk_host,pmbypass,playlist_type,gcr,mm,mn,ms,mv,pl/signature/4E83CD2DB23C2331CE349CE9AFE806C8293A01ED.880FD2E253FAC8FA56FAA304C78BD1D62F9D22B4/key/dg_yt0/playlist/index.m3u8

These are your HLS m3u8 playlists, one for each camera associated with the live stream.

Without youtube-dl, your flow might look like this:

Take your video id and make a GET request to the get_video_info endpoint:

HTTP GET: https://www.youtube.com/get_video_info?&video_id=_Gtc-GtLlTk&el=info&ps=default&eurl=&gl=US&hl=en

In the response, the hlsvp value will be the link to the m3u8 HLS playlist:

https://manifest.googlevideo.com/api/manifest/hls_variant/maudio/1/ipbits/0/key/yt6/ip/64.125.177.124/gcr/us/source/yt_live_broadcast/upn/BYS1YGuQtYI/id/_Gtc-GtLlTk.2/fexp/9416126%2C9416984%2C9417367%2C9420452%2C9422596%2C9423039%2C9423661%2C9423662%2C9423923%2C9425346%2C9427672%2C9428946%2C9429162/sparams/gcr%2Cid%2Cip%2Cipbits%2Citag%2Cmaudio%2Cplaylist_type%2Cpmbypass%2Csource%2Cexpire/sver/3/expire/1456449859/pmbypass/yes/playlist_type/LIVE/itag/0/signature/1E6874232CCAC397B601051699A03DC5A32F66D9.1CABCD9BFC87A2A886A29B86CF877077DD1AEEAA/file/index.m3u8