YouTube is designed only to allow users to watch and view (stream) videos on their website. Many users want to download or save their favorite YouTube videos to their computer so they can be watched offline, viewed on other devices, or edit them.
As a third and final option, you may download a program for your Mac or Windows computer dedicated to downloading Web video. For Mac, check out MacTubes. Windows users can try Free YouTube. While many want to download YouTube videos, the only way to do so responsibly is on iOS and Android, by paying the $11.99 for YouTube Premium. Otherwise, you're violating YouTube's terms of. How to Download YouTube Videos on Mac for Free. 100% free, no ads, and no plugins, EaseUS.
YouTube does not allow you to download videos directly from their site. You need to use a third-party service, install software, or get a YouTube subscription service to download a YouTube video. Below are our recommendations for downloading and watching YouTube videos on your computer.
Tip
To download YouTube videos to your smartphone or tablet, see: How to download YouTube video on a smartphone or tablet.
Note
This page only provides recommendations for downloading or saving a video to your computer. For instructions for saving a video as audio, see: How can I record sound from YouTube videos?
Download a YouTube video using a website service
Most websites that offer a service of downloading a YouTube video for free are no longer safe to use. These websites often results in malware being downloaded to your computer, either from the website service itself or through one of their partner websites.
Websites that offered free YouTube video downloading services have now permanently shut down their sites (e.g., Savefrom.net), resorted to malware-related ads, or employ other deceptive tactics.
Due to these reasons, Computer Hope doesn't recommend the use of any website service offering free YouTube video downloads and no longer provides instructions for those websites.
Instead, we now recommend the use of youtube-dl, a screen recorder, or a YouTube Premium subscription. These are the best options to keep your computer free of malware.
Download a YouTube video using youtube-dl
One of the best ways, and our favorite method, to download a YouTube video is by using the free program youtube-dl. It's capable of downloading any available YouTube video format to your computer, including the HD version.
However, using youtube-dl is a bit more complex and is designed for more experienced, and advanced, computer users. Youtube-dl utilizes the Windows command line for Windows computers, and the Terminal for macOS and Linux computers.
For help with installing and using youtube-dl on your computer, click the link below to review the instructions.
Saving a YouTube video using a screen recorder
Screen recorders are software programs designed to run on a computer, smartphone, or tablet and record anything on the screen. In addition to recording your screen, these programs can also be used to record a video or sections of a video.
Download a YouTube video using YouTube Premium
Another safe option for downloading YouTube videos is YouTube Premium, which is a user-friendly service designed for computer and mobile device users at any level of experience.
YouTube Premium requires a monthly subscription, but at $11.99 per month, you're allowed to download as many videos as you want, and watch them offline at any time. Additionally, you can listen to music offline using the YouTube Music app, as well. Similar to other video streaming services, YouTube Premium provides unlimited access to YouTube videos and music, at a price that's cheaper than other streaming services.
Unlike youtube-dl, however, YouTube Premium only allows users to view videos from in the app. After 48 hours in your downloads library, you can no longer access the videos offline until reconnecting to the Internet to prove the validity of your YouTube Premium subscription.
YouTube offers a one-month free trial for YouTube Premium, so you can try it out and decide if you like it before paying for the service.
What about a private video?
Services and programs designed to record YouTube videos don't have the same rights as your YouTube account, and therefore would not be able to record a private video. However, if you can view the private video, you can use a screen recorder to record anything shown on your screen.
Related pages
youtube-dl is an Open Source command line tool that lets you download video from YouTube (and many other videos sites). It’s often considered better than those paid video downloaders. In our previous article, we saw how to use youtube-dl to download videos on Android terminal. Even Windows has a YouTube GUI client, there are no such resources available for macOS. So, in this article, we’ll give you a walkthrough on how to install youtube dl on mac. Let’s begin.
Read: 5 best ways to Password Protect folders on mac
![]() youtube-dl Installation
1. To install, youtube-dl, you need to install Wget first. And in order to install Wget, you need to install homebrew first. So, copy paste the following command on your Mac’s terminal (press cmd + space and type in terminal). Once you run the following command, you Mac will download Homebrew master file from Github. You may have to enter your Mac’s password several times. The whole process will take 10-15 minutes depending on your Internet speed.
2. Once you have downloaded Homebrew, you are ready to install Wget. Type in the following command and also enable OpenSSL for TLS support.
3. Now that we have Wget to download packages from the internet, we will use it to download and install Youtube-dl package. Type in the following command and press enter.
4. You have now successfully installed youtube-dl on your Mac, however, it won’t work yet. To check you can type youtube-dl on your terminal and it’ll throw a permission error. To fix this, you need to give the right permissions, type in the following command and press enter.
5. And that’s it, now you should be able to download YouTube videos (or any videos from youtube-dl supported sites) by simply typing youtube-dl [video-link]. For example, to download one of my videos from YouTube, I’ll type in the following command.
youtube-dl https://youtu.be/LxTcvc4cgCY
6. You can find the downloaded video in your home folder on your mac. To bring up the home folder simply go to Finder > Go > Home or press the keyboard shortcut CMD + Shift + H.
Must Read: 10 Free macOS apps to boost your Productivity
How To Download Youtube Video On Mac 2018 CrackDownload 1080p video using FFmpegHow To Download Youtube Video On Mac 2018 Download
By default, FFmpeg will download the second highest resolution. You may have to install FFmpeg to get the highest quality video. Without FFmpeg, you will likely get the second highest which in our case was 720p. To install FFmpeg, type in the following command.
brew install youtube-dl ffmpeg
Also Read: 5 ways to transfer files from mac to mac
Wrapping Up
So, this is how you use youtube-dl to download videos using your terminal. The app works exactly as advertised, yet not many people know about it. Anyway, if you wish to change your download location or download different resolution of the video, you can check out youtube-dl command line parameters on Github.
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December 2020
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