How to copy YouTube comments
On a computer
- Open the video on youtube.com and scroll down to the comments.
- Click "Sort by" and choose "Newest first", so the list isn't limited to the top comments.
- Keep scrolling until no new comments load. Click the replies under a comment if replies should count.
- Select from the first comment to the last, copy with Ctrl+C or Cmd+C, and paste here. The picker reads the @handle above each comment and skips "Pinned by", timestamps such as 2 days ago or for 2 dage siden, like counts and Reply.
If you manage the channel, YouTube Studio also lists the comments on your videos. Whatever you copy, check the entries the picker finds before you draw.
On a phone
The YouTube app isn't made for copying a whole comment section. Do the draw on a computer.
YouTube's contest policies
YouTube has its own contest policies and guidelines. When we checked them, they said that you are solely responsible for your contest, that you need official rules which state that YouTube is not a sponsor, link to YouTube's Community Guidelines and include a privacy notice, and that the contest must be free to enter. They also say contests can't be run through ad units and you can't manipulate metrics on YouTube. Read the current version before you launch, and see our giveaway rules guide for the general points.
How the draw works
- Reading the paste. The picker goes through the pasted text line by line. It recognises timestamps, like counts, badges and buttons such as Reply in the 14 languages of this site, and treats the line above each comment as the username. You see every entry it found before anything is drawn.
- Applying your settings. Unticked rows, excluded accounts and comments without the required word are left out. With one entry per user, only the first qualifying comment from each account counts.
- Drawing. If N entries are left, each entry has a 1 in N chance of being picked first. The picker uses a Fisher-Yates shuffle with your browser's cryptographic random number generator, without the rounding bias of a simple modulo. Nobody can win twice: once someone is picked, the next place is drawn from the entries of everyone else. Reserve winners are drawn the same way, after the winners.
See how to pick a giveaway winner for closing times, reserves and how to contact the winner.
Why many brands run the entry on their own page
A comment gives you a username and nothing else. You can't email a username, and a comment is not consent to marketing. If you post the giveaway on YouTube but put the entry on your own page, each entry comes with an email address, the consent people choose to give you and one clean list. In Scratcher, people play a game or fill in a form, duplicate entries are stopped at the door and the winners are drawn automatically. See how it works for social media campaigns, plan the post itself with the giveaway post planner, or use the random winner picker for any other list.
