When I reviewed the video player IINA (see “Prepare for Apple Dropping Old Media Formats with the IINA Video Player,” 6 May 2019), quite a few TidBITS readers took it as an opportunity to vent their frustrations about downloading videos from YouTube. Recent changes in Firefox have broken extensions like DownThemAll, which used to be a handy way to download videos.
Users can download videos which they find interesting or captivating. All videos can be saved on either PCs, tablets or mobile devices. Our tool is popular because it is free and 100% secure.
There are several reasons you might want to download videos from YouTube. Like most cloud-based things, YouTube videos are ephemeral—they vanish all the time for all kinds of reasons. The uploader might pull a video down, YouTube may remove a video in response to a copyright complaint (sometimes legitimate, sometimes not), and a video might disappear if it runs afoul of YouTube’s ever-changing and seemingly haphazard standards for acceptable content.
But preservation isn’t the only reason people download YouTube videos. For example, they may want to download short clips to use in their videos (honoring the doctrine of fair use, of course). A friend of mine accidentally deleted the “sizzle clip” he slaps on the front of every video in iMovie, and he solved the problem by downloading one of his own videos from YouTube and extracting that clip. Or, you may want to be able to play some YouTube videos in a situation where there’s no Internet access.
Whatever the reason, you don’t have to rely on Firefox to download videos from YouTube. There are several solutions on the Mac, and I review a few of them here.
Note that downloading YouTube videos with a utility other than YouTube’s apps (which require a YouTube Premium subscription) nominally violates YouTube’s terms of service:
You shall not download any Content unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content. You shall not copy, reproduce, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, or otherwise exploit any Content for any other purposes without the prior written consent of YouTube or the respective licensors of the Content. YouTube and its licensors reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Service and the Content.
That said, I’ve never heard of YouTube punishing a user for downloading videos, although using copyrighted material in videos you upload to YouTube could get you in trouble.
The Command-Line Grand Poobah: youtube-dl
Arguably, the greatest of the YouTube downloaders is the public-domain youtube-dl, a command-line utility that powers many apps like the aforementioned IINA. It’s not the friendliest option, but it’s free and powerful.
How To Download Any Video On A Mac: YouTube, Netflix, IPlayer ...
The project offers instructions for installing youtube-dl. You can use the curl command or rely on Homebrew, a command-line package manager that I strongly recommend—refer to Homebrew’s home page for a one-line command to install it from Terminal. Then, in Terminal, you can enter brew install youtube-dl to install the download utility.
Once you install youtube-dl, type man youtube-dl in Terminal to see its extensive list of options. But all you really need to do to use it is to type youtube-dl URL in Terminal, where URL is the link to the desired YouTube video. That downloads the video in your current directory. Type cd ~/Downloads before running youtube-dl to download the video to your Downloads folder.
You can play the video after you download it with QuickTime or with a third-party player like IINA or VLC.
The developers of youtube-dl issue updates frequently, which is why I recommend installing it with Homebrew. The first time I tried to download a video for this article, I received an error because I hadn’t updated youtube-dl first. Homebrew makes updating easy with the brew update youtube-dl command, which updates both youtube-dl and Homebrew itself, along with all the packages youtube-dl needs to function.
A Free Graphical App: ClipGrab
ClipGrab is a simple, free utility for macOS that can download individual YouTube videos and even convert them to other formats, including MP3 if you’re only interested in the audio.
It’s easy to use: copy a YouTube URL and open ClipGrab. It will automatically extract the URL from the clipboard. Use the Format drop-down menu to choose a format (Original is usually fine if you want video), and click Grab This Clip to download the video. The default download location is your Desktop, but you can change it in the Settings tab.
ClipGrab offers a search tab where you can search for and download videos, but I find it easier to use YouTube’s search engine to find videos and then paste the URL into ClipGrab.
A Setapp Option: Downie
A subscription to Setapp includes several utilities that can download YouTube videos: the torrent client Folx, media players Movist Pro and Elmedia Player, and an app purpose-built for downloading YouTube videos: Downie. (If you’re not a Setapp subscriber, Downie costs $19.99.)
Downie, unlike ClipGrab, is tailor-made for the Mac. You can drag and drop YouTube URLs to Downie’s window or its Dock icon. Downie also comes bundled with a Safari extension, which you enable in Safari > Preferences > Extensions. Once you enable the extension, you can click the Downie icon in Safari’s toolbar to download a video.
In addition to Downie’s simplicity, I like that it downloads subtitles with the video (YouTube automatically generates subtitles for videos). Downie saves subtitles alongside the video as an SRT file. Unfortunately, QuickTime Player doesn’t understand those files, so you need to use a more capable video player like IINA to view them. As long as the SRT file is in the same directory as the video, it works automatically when you play the video in IINA.
Downie can also download an entire YouTube playlist at once. Just drag the playlist URL into Downie and click Playlist to see all the available videos to download. You can then click Add Selected to download the playlist videos.
Download an Entire Channel with 4K Video Downloader
Downie can download an entire playlist, but there’s only one Mac app that I know of that can download an entire YouTube channel: 4K Video Downloader. You can try the app for free (it costs $15 to unlock the entire app). To use it, copy the channel’s URL, open 4K Video Downloader, and click Paste Link to load every video in the channel.
Even better, when 4K Downloader is running, you can subscribe to a channel to download every new video published on the channel automatically.
Note that if a channel has a lot of videos, it can take a long time to download them all and it may use considerable system resources to do so. Nonetheless, I’ve successfully downloaded entire channels containing hundreds of videos with 4K Video Downloader, making it my favorite utility of the bunch.
4K Video Download can also download subtitles, and it can convert YouTube videos to MP3 audio files. Of course, it downloads individual videos as well.
There you have it: four utilities that you can use to download YouTube videos in macOS. Do you have another favorite? Let us know in the comments.
- Overview
- Download
- Feature
- How to use
Free Mac video downloader is a web-based application specially designed for Mac users to download TV episodes, movies, music videos, news, sports and other online video clips from tons of video hosting sites. It covers video downloads for sites like YouTube, Dailymotion, Vimeo, Blip TV, Liveleak, Lynda, Break , Vube, Ustream, Ted and many others. Aside from its ability to download video on Mac, there are some other awesome features that are worth mentioning.
- Download videos in high quality, including 1080p video
- Directly convert video from websites to MP3 on Mac OS X
- Convert videos to any video/audio formats
- Provide video search engine to find desired videos
- Extreme function for capturing all screen activities
- Fully compatible with Mac OS X (Mavericks 10.9 included)
- Great integration with Safari, Firefox, Opera and Chrome
- 100% FREE and Safe
- No toolbars, adware or malware
Download Robust Video Downloader for Mac software
Free Mac video downloader combines the simplicity of usage, full functions and fast speed. But a good portion of people prefer the software program to the web-based tool. This is mainly because the software runs better, more stable and reliable. Fortunately, Free Video Downloader for Mac software is an effective way to download and convert videos for Mac. Being compared with the online application, the professional software excels at its accelerated downloading speed, expanded video formats, great stability and more complete functions.
Features of Video Downloader for Mac software
Download video instantly on Mac
The user-friendly interface makes downloading super easy, you simply get videos in one single mouse click. This video downloader for Mac provides the option to download videos in original quality, including HD and 4K videos. Users who do not want to download video one by one could perform multiple video downloads during one session.
Convert video effortlessly
More than a Mac downloader, it can convert any local or downloaded files to all kinds of formats such as MP4, MKV, MOV, MPEG, WMV, AVI, FLV, MP3, RM, VOB, OGG, AAC, AIFF, WAV, etc. After that, you may transfer the video to popular gadgets like iPod, iPad, iPhone, Zune, PSP, Android and more for endless enjoyment.
Detect and download video automatically
The tool features a smart detector, which facilitates to auto-detect and download the videos streamed in the built-in browser of the program. A list of top websites is displayed on the screen at run time. As long as you click on a certain site for playing the video you want to download, the advanced sniffer will grab it in a matter of seconds. Surely, you may navigate to other sites that are not listed; the videos being played can be captured as well.
Download YouTube playlist
Youtube Download For Mac
With this professional video downloader for Mac, users can download YouTube single videos as well the whole collections from YouTube users' channel, personal playlist, movies category, YouTube charts, artists' channel and music category. Within just one click, you can grab all videos in specified channle/list with 3X faster speed brought by advanced technologies.
Schedule video downloads
The program enables users to start and stop video downloading at any time you preset. Moreover, you can schedule your Mac computer to shut down, enter into sleeping mode or exit the program when download completes.
Manage video efficiently
It comes with handy video manager, letting you control over download progress and sort the downloaded files in order. In case you may need to quit the program for dealing with other cases, you can resume your downloads automatically. Also, the program makes it possible to preview the downloaded content with integrated media player.
How to use
1. Use free online tool to download videos on Mac
This free Mac video downloader does not require any installations or registrations; you simply copy the video link and paste it into the URL field. After clicking 'Grab it', it will display video formats available for saving your videos in FLV, WebM, 3GP, MP4 and other formats depending on the website you are downloading from. Nevertheless, before using the app, the very first step is to enable Java applet in Safari or other browsers. Please make sure that you check 'Enable Java check box' under 'Preferences' tab in your browser.
2. Use free Mac software to download videos
One click to download single video as well as the whole collections
- The program is very easy to use. To perform every single video download, you simply specify the video URL that you want to download and click 'Paste URL' button.
- The steps to download the entire YouTube playlist are exactly the same. All you need to do is to find the URL of YouTube playlist and hit on 'Paste URL'. Resume to interface, in the popup window, all the videos will be automatically fetched. Select all or part of them per your needs, and then click 'Add to download' to carry on multiple downloads simultaneously.
Auto-detect and grab video that is being played
Given that you do not want to process Mac video download simply by copying and pasting the URL manually, then you are suggested to take advantage of its 'Detector' function. As long as you load videos in the built-in browser, this Mac video downloader will take care of the rest.
3. Video Tips for Mac
Most video addicts like to enjoy abundant videos from video sharing sites including YouTube, Dailymotion, Vube, BBC, ESPN, Facebook, Vimeo, Hulu and other similar sites. You are looking for specific guides on downloading from a platform to your Mac computer, please refer the detailed instructions below
YouTube has had such an incredible string of successes. People want to download their favorite videos to watch offline and keep forever.
Download Dailymotion on Mac
Is there a way out here to watch Dailymotion videos without any data connection? Sure, you are in the right place to get the easiest tricks.
Still trying to find a way to download HD videos from Vimeo? Don¡¯t sweat it, spare a few minutes to check the detailed tutorial.
You may find the easy solutions to perform Facebook video download in this article. A wonderful Mac downloader is presented.
Download Hulu on Mac
Want to play TV episodes from Hulu to your Mac without being bothered by poor internet connection? Just download them for later playback.