Linking YouTube Analytics as a source
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Contents
This source is currently in alpha. The interface and available tables may change.
The YouTube Analytics connector syncs channel daily, top videos, traffic sources, and more into the PostHog data warehouse, so you can analyze them alongside your product data.
Prerequisites
Credentials that can read the data you want to sync. PostHog only reads data, so read access is enough.
Adding a data source
- In PostHog, go to the Sources tab of the data pipeline section.
- Click + New source and click Link next to this source.
- Enter your credentials (see Configuration below) and click Next.
- Select the tables you want to sync, choose a sync method and frequency, then click Import.
Once the syncs are complete, you can start querying this data in PostHog.
Pull daily channel metrics from the YouTube Analytics API: views, watch time, subscribers, traffic sources, geography and demographics.
Connect the Google account that manages your channel, then pick the channel to sync. PostHog asks for read-only access to your YouTube Analytics reports and your list of channels.
You'll be asked for:
- Google account
- Channel: for example
Pick a channel the connected account owns.
Sync modes
Each table can be synced in one of several modes, depending on what the source supports:
- Webhook (when available) – the source pushes changes to PostHog in real time. Fastest freshness, lowest ongoing cost, and the only mode that reliably captures updates and deletes.
- Incremental – only new or updated rows are synced on each run, using a cursor field (such as an
updated_attimestamp). Cheaper than a full refresh, but deletes aren't captured. - Append only – new rows are appended using a cursor field; existing rows are never updated. Ideal for immutable, append-only tables like event logs.
- Full refresh – the whole table is reloaded on every sync. Use it when a table has no reliable cursor or when you need deletions reflected.
See sync methods for a full explanation of how each mode works and how to choose between them.
Some YouTube Analytics tables sync incrementally, so later runs only fetch new or updated rows. The rest are full refresh.
Configuration
| Option | Type | Required |
|---|---|---|
Google account | oauth | Yes |
Channel | oauth-account-select | Yes |
Start date | text | No |
Supported tables
| Table | Description | Sync method | Incremental field | Primary key |
|---|---|---|---|---|
channel_daily | Daily channel-level user activity: views, watch time, engagement and subscriber changes. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day |
top_videos | The channel's top videos for each day, ranked by watch time (up to 200 videos per day). | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, video |
traffic_sources | Daily views and watch time broken down by the referrer type that led viewers to the videos. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, insightTrafficSourceType |
playback_locations | Daily views and watch time broken down by the type of page or application where playback occurred. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, insightPlaybackLocationType |
device_types | Daily views and watch time broken down by the form factor of the device used for playback. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, deviceType |
operating_systems | Daily views and watch time broken down by the operating system of the playback device. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, operatingSystem |
geography | Daily views, watch time and subscriber changes broken down by viewer country. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, country |
demographics | Daily viewer distribution across age group and gender, for signed-in viewers only. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, ageGroup, gender |
sharing_services | Daily share counts broken down by the service videos were shared to. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, sharingService |
subscribed_status | Daily views and watch time split by whether the viewer was subscribed to the channel. | Incremental, Full refresh | day | day, subscribedStatus |
Troubleshooting
- If the connection fails with an authorization error, the google account is wrong, expired, or has been revoked. Create a new one, then reconnect the source.
- If a table syncs no rows, the credential may not have access to that data. Check its permissions, then reconnect the source.
If your sync is failing or data looks wrong, see the Data warehouse troubleshooting guide. If that doesn't help, contact support – we're happy to help.