diff --git a/platypush/plugins/media/search/youtube.py b/platypush/plugins/media/search/youtube.py
index 7fa8a6fbfb..37f019e6fd 100644
--- a/platypush/plugins/media/search/youtube.py
+++ b/platypush/plugins/media/search/youtube.py
@@ -2,13 +2,19 @@ import re
 import urllib.parse
 import urllib.request
 
+import requests
+
 from platypush.context import get_plugin
-# noinspection PyProtectedMember
 from platypush.plugins.media.search import MediaSearcher
 
 
+# pylint: disable=too-few-public-methods
 class YoutubeMediaSearcher(MediaSearcher):
-    def search(self, query, **kwargs):
+    """
+    Search YouTube videos by query.
+    """
+
+    def search(self, query: str, *_, **__):
         """
         Performs a YouTube search either using the YouTube API (faster and
         recommended, it requires the :mod:`platypush.plugins.google.youtube`
@@ -16,48 +22,59 @@ class YoutubeMediaSearcher(MediaSearcher):
         slower method)
         """
 
-        self.logger.info('Searching YouTube for "{}"'.format(query))
+        self.logger.info('Searching YouTube for "%s"', query)
 
         try:
             return self._youtube_search_api(query=query)
         except Exception as e:
-            self.logger.warning('Unable to load the YouTube plugin, falling ' +
-                                'back to HTML parse method: {}'.format(str(e)))
+            self.logger.warning(
+                (
+                    'Unable to load the YouTube plugin, '
+                    'falling back to HTML parse method: %s'
+                ),
+                e,
+            )
 
-            return self._youtube_search_html_parse(query=query)
+        return self._youtube_search_html_parse(query=query)
 
     @staticmethod
     def _youtube_search_api(query):
+        yt = get_plugin('google.youtube')
+        assert yt, 'YouTube plugin not configured'
         return [
             {
                 'url': 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=' + item['id']['videoId'],
                 **item.get('snippet', {}),
             }
-            for item in get_plugin('google.youtube').search(query=query).output
+            for item in yt.search(query=query).output
             if item.get('id', {}).get('kind') == 'youtube#video'
         ]
 
     def _youtube_search_html_parse(self, query):
         query = urllib.parse.quote(query)
         url = "https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=" + query
-        response = urllib.request.urlopen(url)
-        html = response.read().decode('utf-8')
+        html = requests.get(url, timeout=10).content
         results = []
 
         while html:
-            m = re.search('(<a href="(/watch\?v=.+?)".+?yt-uix-tile-link.+?title="(.+?)".+?>)', html)
+            m = re.search(
+                r'(<a href="(/watch\?v=.+?)".+?yt-uix-tile-link.+?title="(.+?)".+?>)',
+                html,
+            )
             if m:
-                results.append({
-                    'url': 'https://www.youtube.com' + m.group(2),
-                    'title': m.group(3)
-                })
+                results.append(
+                    {'url': 'https://www.youtube.com' + m.group(2), 'title': m.group(3)}
+                )
 
                 html = html.split(m.group(1))[1]
             else:
                 html = ''
 
-        self.logger.info('{} YouTube video results for the search query "{}"'
-                         .format(len(results), query))
+        self.logger.info(
+            '%d YouTube video results for the search query "%s"',
+            len(results),
+            query,
+        )
 
         return results