A guideCategory resource identifies a category that YouTube algorithmically assigns based on a channel's content or other indicators, such as the channel's popularity. The list is similar to video categories, with the difference being that a video's uploader can assign a video category but only YouTube can assign a channel category.


The API supports the following methods for guideCategories resources:

Returns a list of categories that can be associated with YouTube channels. Try it now.

Resource representation

The JSON structure below shows the format of a guideCategories resource:

  "kind": "youtube#guideCategory",
  "etag": etag,
  "id": string,
  "snippet": {
    "channelId": "UCBR8-60-B28hp2BmDPdntcQ",
    "title": string


The following table defines the properties that appear in this resource:

kind string
Identifies the API resource's type. The value will be youtube#guideCategory.
etag etag
The Etag of this resource.
id string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the guide category.
snippet object
The snippet object contains basic details about the category, such as its title.
snippet.channelId string
The ID that YouTube uses to uniquely identify the channel publishing the guide category.
snippet.title string
The category's title.