See the tags behind any YouTube video
Official API data · One-click copy · Character count · Free, no signup
See the tags behind any video
YouTube stopped showing tags in the page source years ago. Paste a competitor's link and we'll pull them straight from the official API.
What you get
Tags haven't been visible in a video's page source for years. Pull them from the official API instead and see exactly how the videos above you are describing themselves.
Grab the whole tag list comma-separated and ready to paste into YouTube Studio, copy any single tag, or download the lot as a plain text file.
YouTube caps the tag field at 500 characters. We show your running total against that limit so you can see how much of it a competitor actually used.
What tags actually do in 2026
Tags were once a genuine ranking lever, which is why they used to sit in plain sight in a video's page source. YouTube removed them from public view and has since said that tags play only a minimal role in discovery — they help most when your topic is routinely misspelled. The title, thumbnail, description and how long viewers actually stay do far more.
That doesn't make them worthless to look at. Reading a competitor's tags tells you how they think about their own video: which phrasing they consider primary, which adjacent topics they're reaching for, and whether they're targeting a broad category or a specific long-tail query. That framing is the useful part, not the keywords themselves.
If a video you're studying has no tags at all, that's worth noticing too. It usually means the channel is confident enough in its title and thumbnail not to bother — and it's a reminder of where your own effort is best spent. Run the same video through our thumbnail analyzer to see what it's doing that you aren't.
Frequently asked questions
How do I see the tags on a YouTube video?
Paste the video's URL into the box above and press Extract tags. YouTube removed tags from the visible page source, so browsing to the video and viewing source no longer shows them — this tool reads them through the official YouTube Data API instead.
Why does a video show no tags?
Because it genuinely has none. Many large channels stopped using tags entirely, since YouTube now relies mostly on the title, description, thumbnail and actual audio and video content to understand a video. An empty result is useful information, not a failure.
Do YouTube tags still matter in 2026?
They matter a little, and much less than they used to. YouTube's own guidance is that tags play a minimal role in discovery and are mainly useful when your topic is commonly misspelled. Your title, thumbnail and viewer retention do far more work. Treat tags as a small tidy-up, not a growth strategy.
How many tags should I use?
Use as many as genuinely describe the video, within the 500-character limit — typically somewhere between 5 and 15. Stuffing the field with loosely related terms doesn't help and can count as misleading metadata.
Is this free, and do you store what I look up?
It's free with no account. Lookups go through our server so our API key stays private, and we cache results by video ID for a day to stay inside the free quota. We don't build a profile of you or store your search history.
Can I extract tags from a private or deleted video?
No. The API only returns data for public videos. Private, unlisted and removed videos will come back as not found.
Tags are one piece. Pull their thumbnail, score it against yours, and work out what that video is earning them.