How to get youtube video code from a URL

PHP
1

hello guys,
I’m using youtube API to post videos to my website, this API needs only the vid ID which is to be posted.
Can anyone tell me how can i get a video ID from a youtube URL?

for example from these URLs i want only the red part:
youtube.com/watch?v=KQ6zr6kCPj8&ob=av3e
youtube.com/watch?v=pIOOwhmkoLo&feature=player_embedded

urls can contain different parameters but i want only the string between the “v=” till it meets an “&” or end of the string.

Thanks.

2 

	$str = 'youtube.com/watch?v=KQ6zr6kCPj8&ob=av3e';
	
	preg_match('~v=([A-Za-z0-9]+)~', $str, $match);
	
	print_r($match);
3

Hey, thanks for the answer :slight_smile: however isnt there any simpler way that works like i said? anything between “v=” and “&” or end of string?
I say it because that string may contain about anything, not only letters/numbers, an example of link is this:
youtube.com/watch?v=-IqfDiA-esA

So if its possible to do it the way i want it’ll be better, if not then i can use the regex u gave while just adding ‘-’ and hope no other special chars will pop-up :slight_smile:

4

You can use a dot like this to match any character


preg_match('~v=(.*?)&~', $str, $match);
5

hey thanks, however i tested it and it didn’t work on the last example i gave when there’s no amp (&) in the string at all, any solution?

6

try this

$str = 'youtube.com/watch?v=-IqfDiA-esA';
$pattern = '#v=([^&]+)#i';
if (preg_match($pattern, $str, $match))
{
        $id = $match[1];
        echo $id;
}
7

works in all situations, thank you both for the help.