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Developer Andrej Karpathy says he built HackerTube, a YouTube-style site populated with 6,454 videos linked in Hacker News comments from 2007 to 2026. He says an AI coding assistant helped collect and filter recommendations and build the site; its curation quality and ongoing operation have not been independently assessed.
Developer Andrej Karpathy says he built HackerTube, a YouTube-style video discovery site containing 6,454 videos linked in Hacker News comments from 2007 to 2026. The project recasts those recommendations as a browsable catalog across 150 topics, offering an alternative source of video discovery without requiring user accounts, according to Karpathy’s October 31, 2026, report.
Karpathy said the project began after he found YouTube’s recommendations unappealing. The next morning, he asked an AI coding assistant to make a YouTube clone using videos recommended on Hacker News. The resulting site, hackertube.org, uses a familiar video interface but draws its catalog from links posted in the discussion forum.
In his account, the collection process started with Hacker News comments. Karpathy said the system downloaded the comments, filtered them, used another AI model in a workflow to remove spam, and narrowed the material to about 40,000 comments recommending videos. Those comments yielded 6,454 distinct YouTube videos across 150 topics. The report does not provide a breakdown of videos by topic or describe how recommendations were ranked within the site.
Karpathy said HackerTube includes custom recommendations, keyboard shortcuts, and an option to export the site’s data for use in making another version. He also described a thumbnail treatment that displays an image at 50% rather than using the uploaded thumbnail as presented on YouTube. He said he used Claude Code with Opus 5.5 and Sonnet, and that his own manual tasks included obtaining a Google Cloud API key, starting a virtual private server and purchasing the domain.
A Different Route to Video Discovery
HackerTube is a small experiment in curation through community links rather than a viewer’s watch history. Hacker News users posted the videos over many years, and the site turns those recommendations into a single catalog that can be browsed without an account, as Karpathy describes it. That approach may appeal to viewers who want to explore material selected through discussion rather than through a personalized platform feed.
The project also illustrates how AI coding tools can be used to assemble a working website from a defined data source. Karpathy says he delegated much of the programming, data processing and deployment to Claude Code. His account is a report by the project’s creator, not an independent evaluation of the tools or the site. It does not establish that this workflow will be equally effective for projects with different technical, legal or maintenance requirements.
For readers, the immediate practical question is whether the catalog offers useful discovery beyond YouTube’s own interface. The size of the collection and its range of topics are measurable claims in Karpathy’s post; claims about the videos being higher quality or the recommendations being better reflect his assessment, not a published comparative test.
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From Forum Links to Video Catalog
Hacker News is a discussion forum where users share links and comment on technology and other subjects. Videos posted in its comment threads can be difficult to find again through the forum alone. HackerTube’s stated premise is to gather YouTube links from those discussions and present them in a dedicated interface.
Karpathy’s post, dated October 31, 2026, describes a project built over a short period. He estimated that the work took about two hours, while noting that he worked around the AI assistant’s tasks and handled several setup steps himself. The report does not detail the full timeline for collecting and processing the historical comments, so the two-hour estimate should not be read as a verified measure of every part of the project.
Karpathy also said the site’s data can be exported, allowing others to use it to create their own version. That makes the project more than a new interface in principle, but the post does not specify the export format, data license, or whether the data will remain available over time.
Curation and Site Details Still Unverified
Karpathy’s post is the available source for the project’s size, collection method and development timeline. The figures of 6,454 videos and roughly 40,000 comments have not been independently checked here. The post does not explain how duplicate links, deleted videos, unavailable videos or ambiguous recommendations were handled.
It is also unclear how HackerTube’s “ForYou” recommendations are generated, whether the catalog changes as new Hacker News comments appear, or what controls users have over personalization. Karpathy says no account is required and that state is stored in the local browser session, but does not provide technical details about data handling, privacy practices, uptime or hosting arrangements. The post’s claims about content quality and the time required to build the site remain the creator’s own assessment.
Availability and Catalog Updates
Karpathy’s report points readers to hackertube.org, but does not announce a release schedule, maintenance plan or next development milestone. Whether the site remains available and whether its collection will be refreshed are not specified. Readers can check the site directly for its current status and features; details about data export and the recommendation system would need to come from further documentation or a follow-up from Karpathy.
Key Questions
What is HackerTube?
It is a YouTube-style video discovery site that Karpathy says is built around links to videos recommended in Hacker News comments.
How many videos are in the catalog?
Karpathy reports 6,454 videos across 150 topics, drawn from comments posted between 2007 and 2026. Those figures have not been independently verified in the source material.
Does HackerTube require an account?
Karpathy says users do not need accounts and that site state is kept in the local browser session. The report does not include a fuller technical or privacy description.
How was the site built?
Karpathy says he used Claude Code with Opus 5.5 and Sonnet to process Hacker News comments and build and deploy the site. He also handled setup tasks, including obtaining a Google Cloud API key, starting a server and buying the domain.
Will HackerTube keep adding videos?
The announcement does not say whether the catalog will update automatically or how often new recommendations might be added. A schedule for future updates has not been provided.
Source: karpathy.bearblog.dev
