How to Find the Video URL of Twitch.tv Streams

Both API calls still work for me
- http://api.justin.tv/api/br...
- http://usher.twitch.tv/sele...

The first call always returns JSON formatted data with a couple of video urls; the second call returns "[]" if the stream is offline. But it's Twitch after all and they are constantly trying to resolve their many issues by tinkering with their servers, so maybe the API was down for a while.

Edit: I updated the post with notes on how to get the token and signature for the live stream url. They might be required if your not visiting the channel page first.

For me too, it seems like they are checking the token now. I updated the post on how to get the token. This Python snippet currently works for me (with European and US IP): https://gist.github.com/bad...

Fixed it, thanks.

Nevermind, it works. I indeed did something wrong...

I prefer to use Wireshark.
- Start capturing; open the URL of the live stream in your browser; stop capturing when the video starts playing.
- Filter for <tt>http.response.phrase == "OK"</tt>. This should provide you with a list of delivered HTTP content.
- Look for interesting content types in the info column, like application/json or application/vnd.apple.mgegurl.

When I tested it today, the first "application/vnd.apple.mpegurl" was a list of urls to different qualities of the stream. To see what triggered this response, simply click the "[Request in frame: ...]" link in the HTTP header display in Wireshark or use "follow tcp stream". In my case there was a call to "usher.twitch.tv/select/gsl.......". This gives you the API call to get the video urls.

It seems like you used the semicolon to separate the nauthsig and nauth pairs, try to use &:
.... 59c0b2;nauth=%22{\\%22use ... ----> .... 59c0b2&nauth=%22{\\%22use ...

Thank you for pointing that out. It seems like the api.justin.tv has been shut down. The following works for me: If you want to download the past broadcast http://www.twitch.tv/riotga..., make the following API call: https://api.twitch.tv/api/v...

So for http://www.twitch.tv/riotga...

$ curl -H 'Accept: application/json' -X GET https://api.twitch.tv/api/v... | python -m json.tool

which should give you a JSON formatted list of video urls:

{
"api_id": "a577357806",
"broadcaster_software": "fme",
"channel": "riotgames",
"chunks": {
"240p": [
{
"length": 1800,
"upkeep": null,
"url": "http://media-cdn.twitch.tv/...",
"vod_count_url": "http://countess.twitch.tv/p..."
},
{
"length": 1802,
"upkeep": "pass",
"url": "http://media-cdn.twitch.tv/...",
"vod_count_url": "http://countess.twitch.tv/p..."
},

Edit: I updated the blog post and Gist.

I used the same url for about 2-3 months, now it doesn't work. I used Wireshark to get the requests the browser sends when viewing streams and for the last 2 days the requests look different every single time. Here are some examples:
The one I "fixed to work" 2 days ago:
usher.twitch.tv/api/channel..."+id123+".m3u8?token=%7B%22user_id%22%3Anull%2C%22channel%22%3A%22"+id+"%22%2C%22expires%22%3A"+expires+"%2C%22chansub%22%3A%7B%22view_until%22%3A"+view_until+"%2C%22restricted_bitrates%22%3A%5B%5D%7D%2C%22private%22%3A%7B%22allowed_to_view%22%3Atrue%7D%2C%22privileged%22%3Afalse%2C%22source_restricted%22%3Afalse%7D&segment_preference=2&sig="+sig;
Yesterday:
usher.twitch.tv/api/channel... HTTP/1.1

Today:

usher.twitch.tv/api/channel... HTTP/1.1

I don't know what they are doing. Is it possible they want to stop exactly what we are doing ?

code responce is always 404

That is right, twitch has updated their API (again)
you have to request a token here: http://api.twitch.tv/api/ch...{channel}/access_token
and then you have to use the new URL:

python code: "http://usher.twitch.tv/api/...{CHANNEL}.m3u8?player=twitchweb&token={ENCODED_TOKEN}&sig={SIG}&allow_audio_only=true&allow_source=true&type=any&p={RANDOM}".format(CHANNEL=channel,SIG=access_token_sig,ENCODED_TOKEN=urllib.quote_plus(access_token),RANDOM=int(random() * 999999))

this is an example of a valid request: "http://usher.twitch.tv/api/..."

It's right that you have to pass "allow_source=true". check my comment (the one above you). That should do the trick =). "allow_audio_only=true" also adds the option to only listen to the stream.

It seems like your request was correct. I've tried a request and it still seems to work.

Make sure that the channel is live ;) , I've only seen that message when i tried to get the m3u for a channel that wasn't live at that moment.

Okay, I finally had time to dig a little deeper.

what you have to do, is request an access token before you can request the M3U file that is used for the past broadcast stream (yes, this is totally different from how it worked previously, it's now quite close to grabbing the live url)

request a token via the following url:
https://api.twitch.tv/api/v...{ID of the VOD you want to wacht}/access_token?as3=t&oauth_token={the oauth token from your Twitch account}

after that, copy the strings in the following url:
"http://usher.justin.tv/vod/...{sig}&nauth={token}".format(sig=sig,token=token)

than you'll get an M3U file which you can watch via VLC or any other good video player ;)

preview of a valid url, yes if you try, it will say invalid, because I changed the ID's and the token probably ran out of time. It's here just so you have a preview of a correct looking url.

http://usher.justin.tv/vod/...{"user_id":35065643,"vod_id":4746543,"expires":1431063621,"chansub":{"restricted_bitrates":[]},"privileged":true}

The new link for the info of the broadcast can be found here:

https://api.twitch.tv/krake...{ID}

recently they changed the API, you now have to pass "allow_source=true" in the API call to retrieve the raw (Chunked) stream. just like you had to in the old API. The audio only is also gone, for that add "allow_audio_only=true" to the request. Example: http://usher.justin.tv/vod/{ID}?allow_source=true&allow_audio_only=true&nauth={NAUTH}&nauthsig={NAUTHSIG}&player=twitchweb