IssueTracker

I am using the youtube.upload sensitive scope to upload public YouTube Shorts videos via the videos.insert endpoint. While the videos successfully appear on my channel, they receive significantly fewer views compared to manually uploaded Shorts. This issue occurs every single time an upload is performed via the API. Notably, the problem existed even before my API client was granted access to this sensitive scope with the videos being publicly visible on my channel yet receiving virtually no views.

I have successfully completed OAuth verification and have been granted access to the youtube.upload scope. Additionally, I noticed that the videos.insert endpoint only consumes 100 quota points per request, whereas the official documentation states that it should consume 1600 quota points (https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3/determine_quota_cost).

I suspect that API-uploaded videos are being treated differently by YouTube's algorithm, leading to poor discoverability and viewership which is not stated anywhere in the documentation.


- API request with parameters used:
{
  "Timestamp": "2025-02-05T18:24:24.6586902Z",
  "Type": "API Request",
  "Data": {
    "RequestUrl": "https://www.googleapis.com/upload/youtube/v3/videos?uploadType=resumable\u0026part=snippet,status",
    "RequestPayload": {
      "AgeGating": null,
      "ContentDetails": null,
      "ETag": null,
      "FileDetails": null,
      "Id": null,
      "Kind": null,
      "LiveStreamingDetails": null,
      "Localizations": null,
      "MonetizationDetails": null,
      "PaidProductPlacementDetails": null,
      "Player": null,
      "ProcessingDetails": null,
      "ProjectDetails": null,
      "RecordingDetails": null,
      "Snippet": {
        "CategoryId": "24",
        "ChannelId": null,
        "ChannelTitle": null,
        "DefaultAudioLanguage": null,
        "DefaultLanguage": null,
        "Description": "ludwig",
        "LiveBroadcastContent": null,
        "Localized": null,
        "PublishedAtRaw": null,
        "PublishedAtDateTimeOffset": null,
        "PublishedAt": null,
        "Tags": [
          "Shorts",
          "Twitch",
          "ludwig"
        ],
        "Thumbnails": null,
        "Title": "Ludwig gets outplayed #shorts #twitch #ludwig",
        "ETag": null
      },
      "Statistics": null,
      "Status": {
        "ContainsSyntheticMedia": null,
        "Embeddable": null,
        "FailureReason": null,
        "License": null,
        "MadeForKids": false,
        "PrivacyStatus": "public",
        "PublicStatsViewable": null,
        "PublishAtRaw": null,
        "PublishAtDateTimeOffset": null,
        "PublishAt": null,
        "RejectionReason": null,
        "SelfDeclaredMadeForKids": false,
        "UploadStatus": null,
        "ETag": null
      },
      "Suggestions": null,
      "TopicDetails": null
    }
  }
}



- JSON Response:
{
  "Timestamp": "2025-02-05T18:24:28.1610674Z",
  "Type": "API Response",
  "Data": {
    "AgeGating": null,
    "ContentDetails": null,
    "ETag": "Qz8g-1tnSOsarJyl7HlNJiRtNYc",
    "FileDetails": null,
    "Id": "tOswNuPlP_U",
    "Kind": "youtube#video",
    "LiveStreamingDetails": null,
    "Localizations": null,
    "MonetizationDetails": null,
    "PaidProductPlacementDetails": null,
    "Player": null,
    "ProcessingDetails": null,
    "ProjectDetails": null,
    "RecordingDetails": null,
    "Snippet": {
      "CategoryId": "24",
      "ChannelId": "UC-gWFQa12esGIrxJxdcOwLw",
      "ChannelTitle": "Quality Twitch Clips",
      "DefaultAudioLanguage": null,
      "DefaultLanguage": null,
      "Description": "ludwig",
      "LiveBroadcastContent": "none",
      "Localized": {
        "Description": "ludwig",
        "Title": "Ludwig gets outplayed #shorts #twitch #ludwig",
        "ETag": null
      },
      "PublishedAtRaw": "2025-02-05T18:24:25Z",
      "PublishedAtDateTimeOffset": "2025-02-05T18:24:25+00:00",
      "PublishedAt": "2025-02-05T19:24:25+01:00",
      "Tags": [
        "Shorts",
        "Twitch",
        "ludwig"
      ],
      "Thumbnails": {
        "Default__": {
          "Height": 90,
          "Url": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tOswNuPlP_U/default.jpg",
          "Width": 120,
          "ETag": null
        },
        "High": {
          "Height": 360,
          "Url": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tOswNuPlP_U/hqdefault.jpg",
          "Width": 480,
          "ETag": null
        },
        "Maxres": null,
        "Medium": {
          "Height": 180,
          "Url": "https://i.ytimg.com/vi/tOswNuPlP_U/mqdefault.jpg",
          "Width": 320,
          "ETag": null
        },
        "Standard": null,
        "ETag": null
      },
      "Title": "Ludwig gets outplayed #shorts #twitch #ludwig",
      "ETag": null
    },
    "Statistics": null,
    "Status": {
      "ContainsSyntheticMedia": null,
      "Embeddable": true,
      "FailureReason": null,
      "License": "youtube",
      "MadeForKids": null,
      "PrivacyStatus": "public",
      "PublicStatsViewable": true,
      "PublishAtRaw": null,
      "PublishAtDateTimeOffset": null,
      "PublishAt": null,
      "RejectionReason": null,
      "SelfDeclaredMadeForKids": false,
      "UploadStatus": "uploaded",
      "ETag": null
    },
    "Suggestions": null,
    "TopicDetails": null
  }
}

- Expected result
1: The API-uploaded Shorts should receive similar visibility, reach, and engagement as manually uploaded Shorts.
2: The videos.insert endpoint should consume 1600 quota points per request, as stated in the official documentation, instead of 100 quota points.

- Is it 100% reproducible?
Yes, the issue occurs every single time I upload a Short via the API. All manually uploaded videos gain a couple of hundred views while API-uploaded videos struggle to break the ten-views mark. 100 quota points are used instead of the stated 1600 quota points in the documentation.

- Reproducible API explorer link
https://developers.google.com/youtube/v3/docs/videos/insert