Creating a YouTube API Key for Video Importer

Posted Apr 21, 2015

This tutorial is written for Video Importer, but will work for anyone looking to create an API key for YouTube. The API key is used to identify your project when communicating with YouTube. Google is ending support for their v2 API, so an API key is now needed to run the v3 API.

  1. Create a Project: Visit the Google Developers Console and create a project. Click "Create Project", type in a name, then click "Create". It will take a few seconds for the project to be created, but when it is done you should be take taken to the project's dashboard.
  2. Enable the YouTube API: Open the "APIs and auth" section of the menu on the left then click "APIs". Find the YouTube section and click "YouTube Data API". Now click "Enable API".
  3. Create Credentials: Now that the YouTube API is enabled, click "Credentials" in the left menu. On this page we need to click "Create new Key" under "Public API access". Select "Server key" in the window that pops up, then click "Create". You should now see a long random bit of text which is your new API key.

You're done! Now you can copy and paste this key into Video Importer's settings or wherever you need a YouTube API key.