Streams Charts has been collecting and analyzing statistics and providing access to ready-to-use analytics of the most popular streaming platforms for more than two years now. Our data is used by everyone: from agencies and brands to influencers and ordinary stats enthusiasts. However, the main metrics of streaming channels and streams audience are only a small part of our vast database, and everyone can get the data from it.
We have recently opened private access to the Streams Charts API. It allows everyone not only to download the necessary data on individual streamers and broadcasts, but also to integrate it into their own database in no time. Today we will tell you about the main advantages of the Streams Charts API, how to use it and how much it costs.
What data can be obtained with the Streams Charts API?
The API provides a wide variety of viewership statistics on the following platforms:
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Twitch;
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YouTube Live / YouTube Gaming
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Facebook Gaming
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AfreecaTV
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NimoTV
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Trovo
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Bigo LIVE
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Nonolive
You can get historical data in addition to up-to-date analytics. Stats are available from different times depending on the streaming service. Check the table below for details.
The data obtained with the API covers three main elements: channels, single streams (broadcasts), and lists of channels (TOP channels). Let's take a closer look at each of them.
Channels
Sponsors, agencies, and other companies in the streaming industry need to track the effectiveness of the streamers they work with. And our API is a great way to do that, since you can get all the key metrics for single channels with it. And here are the standard metrics we provide:
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Hours Watched. A key metric of channel performance used by almost all video hosting platforms and streaming services (this metric is sometimes referred to as "watch time"): for example, it is used by Netflix to measure the popularity of its shows. As you can easily guess, this metric reflects the total time viewers spent watching the content of a particular channel.
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Average Viewers. Another important metric upon which you can track how many viewers follow a streamer concurrently at any given time of his or her broadcast. The audience of the streamer during the broadcast is constantly changing: it increases in the heated moments of the stream, and decreases if the influencer, for example, leaves the broadcast for a short period of time. This metric balances out such leaps and reflects the average viewers number.
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Peak Viewers. Each channel aims to reach the largest audience, and the Peak Viewers metric reflects the maximum concurrent audience of a streamer. If the sample of streamers is big enough, then it is possible to analyze what content attracts the maximum audience, how big it can be, and by what content it can be built up.
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Airtime. The name of the metric speaks for itself, it is an indicator that tells how long the channel was on air. While it seems to be a commonplace metric, it is extremely important. For example, two completely different channels in terms of audience size might achieve the same Hours Watched number per broadcast, because one might stream for less time but to a larger audience, while the second might have a smaller number of viewers but stay on air longer, and then their overall result might be the same.
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Followers Gain. The Followers Gain metric is one of the metrics related to a channel's long-term growth. If Average and Peak Viewers metrics reflect the number of people on a channel at a given point in time, Followers Gain is an indicator of how many users of a streaming service (who might not have been following the channel on a regular basis before) were interested in the streamer and are likely to go back to it for a stream in the future. In addition to the growth of followers over a certain period, you can also get data on the total number of the channel's followers with the help of the Streams Charts API.
The channel metrics described above will be computed depending on the time period you select. For the selected period of time you will also get data on the number of streams held during this time, the total number of categories (games) in which broadcasts were held, as well as a detailed breakdown of the Hours Watched statistics on the five most popular categories (games) so that you can see in which categories broadcasts attract the most attention of viewers.
For the largest gaming streaming platform in the West, Twitch, we also have additional metrics that provide some unique and useful information about the channel's audience. All of these metrics (including the standard data set described above) are included in the Twitch Extra package. The additional metrics include:
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Live Views. While the main metrics for the most part reflect concurrent viewership, Live Views reflects how many total visits were recorded on a broadcast. Many viewers can open a broadcast, stay on it for a while, leave, then return again and then do the same many times more. All such visits are recorded by this metric, which gives a greater idea of the channel's reach.
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Unique Authorized Viewers. Live Views refers to the number of views per unit of content, but here we have specific authorized users of Twitch who watch a channel. These are the most enthusiastic and active users, who also usually communicate in streamer chats. In addition to providing numbers with our API, we also provide statistics on how long such viewers watch a channel on average.
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Unique Viewers. You don't have to be authorized on the platform to watch your favorite streamer at all. This metric counts all Twitch viewers who have visited the creator's channel: thanks to it you get a complete picture of the size of the audience attracted by a content creator you analyze. In addition, we provide data on the ratio of Unique Authorized Viewers to total Unique Viewers: a higher percentage means the channel is being followed by a more active audience.
The API for Twitch channels can be used to access two more data packages. The first of them is the streamer's subscription statistics — Sub Package. It allows you to see how many people subscribed to the creator's channel in a certain period of time, i.e. how many people decided to support the streamer financially through the tools of Twitch platform. In addition to the total number of such subscribers we provide a breakdown of subscriptions (called subs): bought subscriptions, gift subscriptions (when generous viewers give out subs to random users in chat) and Prime subscriptions (this type of subscription is available for free to Amazon Prime members). In addition, we calculate the income range of the streamer from subscriptions (because of the difference in subscription costs in different regions of the world), so you can track one of the creator's income.
The last data package is the Twitch chat activity one — Chat Package. The activity of viewers in the channel's chats is one of the most important indicators of viewer engagement: viewers communicate with the streamer himself, among themselves, or simply entertain themselves by spamming funny messages. This statistic set includes the following metrics:
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The total number of messages and single words sent to the chat
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The number of unique channel viewers who chatted/not chatted and their ratio.
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Statistics on users who have sent one or two or more messages.
Moreover, we also count the number of bits that viewers spent during the broadcast. Bits are Twitch's virtual currency, and by purchasing them, viewers support a partner streamer. This currency can also be spent on so-called cheer messages, which are also a way to support the creator (along with subscriptions). If viewers actively spend bits and send cheer messages, this also indicates active audience engagement.
Broadcasts (Streams)
Sponsors often prefer to work with streamers and organizations on a piece-rate basis rather than on a long-term basis. For example, many companies choose either an event or just a single stream, which integrates the brand. In short, to evaluate the effectiveness of such campaigns, you do not need data on a channel as a whole, but only on individual broadcasts. And this kind of statistics can also be obtained with our API.
All the data we described in detail above for channels is also available for single streams. Broadcasts can also be evaluated by concurrent viewership (standard set of statistics), and in the case of Twitch, by more advanced metrics as well.
Lists of Channels (TOP channels)
Companies often require a variety of channel (streamer) tops and lists, whether it's a ranking of the most popular Minecraft creators from the UK, a list of fast-growing CS:GO streamers from Brazil, or a sample of content creators streaming in a specific language with a specific Average Viewers number. With the Streams Charts API, you can also easily get all of this data.
You can get any specific channel top in our API by selecting the necessary filters. Streamers can be sorted by game, broadcast language, partner status, age, country and many other parameters. Here you can also select the time period for which you want the data — from the last 7 days to the statistics for the year (365 days). Note: each of these filters has its own fixed value in Streams Charts credits. Read more about it below.
How to access data using Streams Charts API and how much does it cost?
First, to get access to the Streams Charts API you need to register on the site, then there will be two unique IDs in your account — Client ID and Token (registered users can see them here). The first one is permanently assigned to your SC account and can't be changed, but the second one can be changed as many times as you want, if you are concerned about security.
The second step, you need to buy credits, the internal currency of Streams Charts, which you will use to pay for the statistics you get. We have a flexible pricing scale where the more credits you buy at a time, the more beneficial the cost per credit will be.
Note: every API request is charged, and the cost of the request depends on the selected data package or filter (in the case of Twitch statistics for subscribers and bits), as well as the amount of data and the time period for which you want to get the data. You can read more about this in our API documentation.
Can I test the Streams Charts API before I buy it?
We have specially designed a test mode for that. It works exactly the same way as the API itself, only in the output you get fictional data instead of actual data. More details about this here.
Plus, we provide data on Twitch's TOP 100 channels for the last seven days for free. You don't need to spend any credits to get these stats. You can read more about this by clicking on the link.
If you have any questions, contact [email protected] and we'll be happy to help you!