The invention discloses a video content and content source crawling method. The basic principle of the method is as follows: firstly setting an initial crawling period for each type of video contents, crawling and caching contents from a content source periodically, then dynamically adjusting the crawling period according to content heat and content update rate, and when the content heat or the update rate rises, shortening the crawling period; otherwise, when the heat or the update rate falls, prolonging the crawling period; and the classification basis of the ''each type of video contents'' is content metadata, including but not limited to content topic, content name, content label, etc. By implementation of the video content and content source crawling method, effectiveness of content crawling flow is improved, and the hit rate of content requests is improved. The technical scheme of the invention effectively crawls contents from a plurality of content sources (such as Internet video websites), locally caches the contents, provides video services for local users, and under a circumstance of not increasing crawling flow, improves the hit rate of the content requests.