How to See Your YouTube Comment History

Seeing your past YouTube comments can be a trip down memory lane. Maybe you want to revisit an old debate you had in a comment thread years ago, or check if someone finally replied to your comment on that cat video from 2009.

Whatever the reason, finding your YouTube comment history is easy – if you know where to look.

In this comprehensive guide, we‘ll walk you through how to see your full YouTube comment history, from your very first comment to your latest. We‘ll also provide tips on searching your comments more easily, viewing comment replies and notifications, and more.

Let‘s dive in!

How to Find Your YouTube Comment History

Your YouTube comment history contains every comment you‘ve ever posted on YouTube videos and channels.

Here are the steps to view your full comment history on desktop:

Step 1: Go to YouTube on Desktop

Your comment history isn‘t viewable on the YouTube mobile app – you need to use the desktop website. Navigate to www.youtube.com and log into your Google account.

Once signed in, you‘ll arrive at your YouTube home page.

Step 2: Click Your Profile Picture

In the top right corner of the page, click on your profile picture or initial. This will open up a dropdown menu.

Step 3: Select “Your Channel”

In the dropdown menu, click on “Your Channel”. This will take you to your YouTube channel homepage.

Step 4: Click “Comments”

On the left sidebar, click on “Comments”. This will open up your comment history page.

And that‘s it! You‘ll now see a list of all comments you‘ve ever made on YouTube, starting from the most recent.

To find your very first comment, you‘ll need to scroll down to the bottom – your earliest comments will be at the end.

If you have years of commenting history, it may take awhile to get to the beginning! Using Ctrl + F to search keywords can help you jump to specific comments faster.

Tips for Navigating Your YouTube Comment History

Now that you‘ve found your comment archive, here are some tips for searching through it more easily:

Sort comments chronologically – By default, your comments are sorted from newest to oldest. You can switch to oldest first by clicking the toggle next to the search bar.
Search for keywords – Use Ctrl + F on PC or Command + F on Mac to search for keywords or phrases in your comments. This makes finding comments on specific videos much faster.
Open comment threads – To see the full context of a comment, right click the video title and select “Open in new tab”. This will open the video page with your comment highlighted.
Check notifications – The bell icon on YouTube will show you when someone replied to your comment. Replying also sends an email notification.
Use filters – Try filters like "Most relevant" or "Most likes" to surface your best comments.
Delete comments – Don‘t like what you see? You can delete comments from your history by clicking the three dots and selecting “Delete”.
Pause history – If you want to stop recording comments in your history, you can pause it. Just know this will erase your current history.

Why You Can Only See YouTube Comment History on Desktop

You might be wondering – why can I only see my YouTube comment history on the desktop site? Why isn‘t it on the mobile app?

There are a few reasons behind this limitation:

Legacy design – The ability to view comment history has been around since YouTube‘s early days. The mobile app was designed much later without this feature.
Cluttered interface – The YouTube mobile app has limited screen space. Showing your full comment history would clutter the interface.
Promotes engagement – YouTube wants people to comment more on mobile. Easy access to old comments could distract from that goal.
Development priorities – Building an in-app comment history viewer likely hasn‘t been a high priority for engineers compared to other features.
Push notifications – Comment replies already trigger push notifications on mobile. This reduces the need to constantly check a history.

So in summary – it‘s a legacy holdover and mobile-first design choice by YouTube. The feature may come eventually, but isn‘t high on the roadmap. For now, desktop it is!

How Do I Know If Someone Replied to My YouTube Comment?

Wondering if someone responded to your brilliant YouTube comment, but forgot to check back? Thankfully YouTube will notify you in two ways when someone replies.

YouTube Notifications

Every time someone replies to one of your comments, you‘ll get an alert on YouTube. On desktop, this notification will appear in the bell icon on the top right. On mobile, check the notifications tab of the YouTube app.

Replies will show the video title and the commenter‘s username. You can click these notifications to go directly to the reply.

Email Notifications

In addition to YouTube notifications, you‘ll also get an email to your associated Google account when someone replies to you.

This email contains the video name, commenter username, and full text of their reply. You can click the link in the email to be taken to the reply on YouTube.

So as long as you check your YouTube notifications or your email inbox somewhat regularly, you‘ll never miss a response to your comments. No need to constantly check your comment history!

How Often Does YouTube Update Comment History?

YouTube refreshes your comment history in near real-time. Typically, you‘ll see a new comment appear in your history within a few minutes of posting.

Sometimes if YouTube‘s servers are facing high traffic, it make take up to an hour for new comments to show in your history. But in most cases it‘s added very quickly.

One exception – if you delete a comment, it will remain visible in your history temporarily before getting removed. This is because YouTube wants to allow time for the deletion to fully propagate across its servers.

So in summary, your YouTube comment history stays up-to-date continuously, outside of the rare cases where traffic delays updates by an hour or two.

Can You Delete or Clear Your YouTube Comment History?

If your YouTube commenting days are filled with regret and embarrassment, you have two options:

Delete Individual Comments

You can remove specific comments from your history without deleting everything. Just click the three dots next to a comment and select “Delete”.

This will instantly remove it from your history. However, the comment will still be publicly visible to others until YouTube crawls and deletes it.

Clear All History

For a full reset, you can completely clear your entire YouTube history, including comments. Just be warned – this will also erase your watch history and other data.

To do this, click on your account picture > Settings > Privacy > Pause YouTube History. Then click Clear to wipe your history.

Clearing entirely is overkill if you just want to remove a few comments though. In most cases, deleting individual comments is sufficient.

Can You See Other Users‘ Comment History?

Unfortunately there is no way to view other users‘ entire YouTube comment history. The only public comments visible are those under videos.

Some reasons you can‘t see other users‘ full comment history:

Privacy – Viewing all of someone‘s comments without consent would violate their privacy.
Selective commenting – People often have different personalities across videos. Viewing cross-context comments provides limited value.
Harassment risks – Access to full histories could enable user harassment. YouTube aims to minimize these dangers.

The only case where you can see a user‘s comment history is on your own channel. As the channel owner, you have access to all comments left on your videos across YouTube.

But this is limited to just your channel – nowhere else. So comment history remains private to each user outside of this exception.

Why Isn‘t My Full YouTube Comment History Showing?

In some cases, your YouTube comment history section may not display your full history. Here are some possible reasons:

History paused – If your watch and comment history is paused, your archive will be blank. Just resume recording to fill it.
Bug or glitch – Temporary data glitches may cause missing comments. Trying again later typically resolves this.
Shadowbanned comments – If YouTube shadowbans your account, your comments become private and won‘t appear in history.
Recent history missing – Due to processing delays, your newest comments may take a few hours to appear.
Under 13 account – Accounts for users under 13 cannot record privacy-sensitive history data like comments.
Restricted Mode – Having Restricted Mode enabled hides some comments from history.

Outside of these cases, you should see your full history. Try the troubleshooting steps above if anything seems missing or out of order.

Can You Export Your YouTube Comment History?

There is no built-in tool to export your YouTube comment data. However, you can manually copy and paste comments from your history if needed.

Here are some cases where exporting comments could be useful:

Creating a personal archive
Backing up your data
Analyzing your commenting habits
Compiling comments for a video or book
Settling content disputes

To copy comments, just highlight the text of each one and paste it into a Word doc or other file. It can be time consuming for long histories, but works in a pinch.

Some third party tools also claim to export YouTube comments. Be cautious trying these though, as handing your login to third parties risks your privacy and account security.

The Evolution of YouTube Comment History Access

YouTube comment history access has changed a bit over the years:

2005 – YouTube launches. No comment history exists.

2007 – YouTube adds comment history on desktop site.

2009 – YouTube mobile app launches without comment history.

2013 – YouTube connects commenting with Google+ accounts.

2015 – YouTube removes Google+ requirement.

2020 – Comment history remains desktop-only with minor changes.

So the ability to see your comment history has been around since the early days of YouTube, predating the mobile experience.

And over 15 years later, it‘s still exclusively available on desktop. The feature persists largely in its original limited form – an untouched relic from YouTube‘s past. Perhaps someday it will get modernized, but that day has yet to come.

YouTube Comment History FAQs

Here are answers to some frequently asked questions about finding your YouTube comment history:

Q: Is comment history available on YouTube mobile?

A: No, currently comment history is only accessible on the YouTube desktop website.

Q: Do deleted comments show in your history?

A: Deleted comments will be temporarily visible in your history before getting removed.

Q: Can you see other users‘ full comment history?

A: No, you can only see comments left by others on videos – not their full history.

Q: Why can‘t I see all my comment history?

A: If history is missing, try resuming your history recording or checking for glitches.

Q: Do you get notified of comment replies?

A: Yes, reply notifications are sent via YouTube and email.

Q: Can you export your YouTube comment history?

A: No native export option exists, but comments can be manually copied and saved.

Q: How often does history update with new comments?

A: Typically within a few minutes, but can take 1-2 hours max during busy periods.

Conclusion

Digging through your YouTube comment history can be an interesting walk down memory lane. Following this guide, you should now be able to:

Find your full YouTube comment history on desktop
Navigate your history more easily with sorts, searches and filters
Get notified when someone replies to your comment
Delete or clear your history if desired
Understand why the feature is limited to desktop only

So open up YouTube on your computer, click into that comments tab, and enjoy scrolling through your commenting past. Just maybe have some eye bleach handy for the cringier artifacts you unearth!