Get Started

This guide will show you how to use our Content Posting API to upload videos to TikTok.

Prerequisites

To successfully complete this tutorial, you will need the following:

1. A valid video:
• Ensure you have a video file in one of the supported formats, such as MP4 + H.264, stored on your local machine.
• Alternatively, you can provide a URL of a video from your verified domain or URL prefix. Learn how to verify your domain or URL prefix.
• Learn more about video restrictions.
2. A registered app on the TikTok for Developers website.
3. Grant appropriate authorization scope for Upload Video endpoint:

Approval and authorization of the video.upload scope. Learn more about scopes.

• Your app must be approved for the video.upload scope.
• The target TikTok user must have authorized your app for the video.upload scope.

4. The access token and open ID of the TikTok user who authorized your app. Learn how to obtain the access token and open ID.

Upload a video for a TikTok user using Upload Video endpoint

This section demonstrates how to successfully send a video to TikTok, ready for the user to review and post.

User notified of video upload

User reviews and posts video

1. To initiate video upload on TikTok's servers, you must invoke the Content Posting API - Video Upload endpoint. You have the following two options:
• If you have the video file locally, set the source parameter to FILE_UPLOAD in your request.
• If the video is hosted on a URL, set the source parameter to PULL_FROM_URL.

Examples

Example using source=FILE_UPLOAD:

Request:

curl --location 'https://open.tiktokapis.com/v2/post/publish/inbox/video/init/' \
--header 'Authorization: Bearer exampleUserAccessToken' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data '{
    "source_info": {
        "source": "FILE_UPLOAD",
        "video_size": exampleVideoSize,
        "chunk_size" : exampleVideoSize,
        "total_chunk_count": 1
    }
}'

Response:

200 OK

{
    "data": {
        "publish_id": "v_inbox_file~v2.123456789",
        "upload_url": "https://open-upload.tiktokapis.com/video/?upload_id=67890&upload_token=Xza123"    
    },
    "error": {
         "code": "ok",
         "message": "",
         "log_id": "202210112248442CB9319E1FB30C1073F3"
     }
}

Example using source=PULL_FROM_URL:

Request:

curl --location 'https://open.tiktokapis.com/v2/post/publish/inbox/video/init/' \
--header 'Authorization: Bearer exampleUserAccessToken' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data '{
    "source_info": {
        "source": "PULL_FROM_URL",
        "video_url": "https://example.verified.domain.com/example_video.mp4",
    }
}'

Response:

200 OK

{
    "data": {
        "publish_id": "v_inbox_url~v2.123456789"
    },
    "error": {
         "code": "ok",
         "message": "",
         "log_id": "202210112248442CB9319E1FB30C1073F4"
     }
}

2. If you are using source=FILE_UPLOAD:
1. Extract the upload_url and publish_id from the response data.
2. Send the video from your local filesystem to the extracted upload_url using a PUT request. The video processing will occur asynchronously once the upload is complete.

curl --location --request PUT 'https://open-upload.tiktokapis.com/video/?upload_id=67890&upload_token=Xza123' \
--header 'Content-Range: bytes 0-30567099/30567100' \
--header 'Content-Type: video/mp4' \
--data '@/path/to/file/example.mp4'

3. With the publish_id returned earlier, check for status updates using the Get Video Status endpoint.

curl --location 'https://open.tiktokapis.com/v2/post/publish/status/fetch/' \
--header 'Authorization: Bearer exampleUserAccessToken' \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json; charset=UTF-8' \
--data '{
    "publish_id": "v_inbox_file~v2.123456789"
}'