YouTube Timestamp Link Generator
Create YouTube links that start at an exact time — short link, full link, and embed formats.
Written by Anil Gautam · Updated
Which YouTube links can I paste?
The tool reads the video ID from four kinds of address: youtu.be short links, watch links with a v= parameter (including m.youtube.com and music.youtube.com), Shorts links and embed links. Paste the full address with https://, because youtu.be/... typed without the scheme is rejected. Links in the youtube.com/live/ form are not recognized, so open the video and copy its watch link instead. A red line under the box saying the address doesn't look like a YouTube link means no video ID was found.
Only the video ID is kept. A playlist parameter, the si= code that share links add and any old t= value are all dropped, so a link copied from the app such as https://youtu.be/abc123XYZ_0?si=Kx9fQ2 comes out clean. Everything is worked out in your browser.
How is the start time converted to seconds?
The three boxes become one number: hours × 3600 + minutes × 60 + seconds. For 1 hour, 5 minutes and 30 seconds that is 3930 seconds, so a video with the ID abc123XYZ_0 gets https://youtu.be/abc123XYZ_0?t=3930, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abc123XYZ_0&t=3930s and https://www.youtube.com/embed/abc123XYZ_0?start=3930. The readout beside the boxes says starts at 1h 5m 30s (3930s), so you can confirm the total before copying. With the default values, 0 hours, 1 minute and 30 seconds, the total is 90.
The boxes do not roll over into each other. Typing 150 in Seconds with zeros elsewhere gives 150 seconds, the same moment as 2 minutes 30 seconds, which helps when an editor or transcript shows a position in seconds only. Decimals are passed through unrounded, so stick to whole numbers. Both t=3930 and t=3930s mean seconds, and YouTube accepts either form.
Which version of the link should I use?
The short link is the compact one for chats and social posts, and the full watch link suits documents and places where people expect a regular YouTube address. For an iframe, put the embed URL in its src attribute; if you copied embed code from YouTube's Share menu, replace its src with this one. Test the link opens the short link in a new tab so you can check the starting point before you send it.
Playback can begin a second or two before the exact time, because the player jumps to the nearest keyframe at or before that point. To share the moment on a printed handout or slide, turn the short link into a code with QR Code Generator.