YouTube Video ID Extractor
Paste any YouTube link to instantly pull out the video ID and ready-made watch, embed and thumbnail URLs.
Your privacy is safe, this tool runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you enter is uploaded to or stored on our servers.
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How to use YouTube Video ID Extractor
- 1Paste any YouTube link (watch, share, Shorts or embed).
- 2Click “Extract”.
- 3Get the video ID plus ready-to-use watch, short, embed and thumbnail links.
- 4Click any “Copy” button to copy that value.
About the YouTube Video ID Extractor
Every YouTube video has a unique 11-character video ID. This tool pulls that ID out of any YouTube link and instantly builds the most useful URLs from it, the clean watch link, the short youtu.be link, the embed link and direct thumbnail links.
It is handy for developers, marketers and creators who need the ID for embeds, APIs, analytics or thumbnails. Everything is parsed in your browser.
Frequently asked questions
What is a YouTube video ID?
A YouTube video ID is the unique 11-character code that identifies a video, for example the “dQw4w9WgXcQ” part in youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ. Every video has its own ID.
How do I get the video ID from a YouTube URL?
Paste any YouTube link above and click Extract. The tool pulls out the 11-character ID and also builds clean watch, youtu.be, embed and thumbnail URLs from it.
How long is a YouTube video ID?
It is always 11 characters and can contain letters, numbers, hyphens and underscores. It is case-sensitive, so “abc” and “ABC” are different videos.
How do I get the thumbnail URL from a video ID?
This tool builds the thumbnail link for you automatically. The pattern is i.ytimg.com/vi/VIDEO_ID/maxresdefault.jpg, just swap in the ID.
Which YouTube link formats are supported?
Standard watch links, youtu.be short links, Shorts, embed and live URLs are all recognised, even with extra tracking parameters attached.
Is anything uploaded to a server?
No. The link is parsed locally in your browser, nothing is sent to or stored on our servers. It is free with no sign-up.