- [OPTIONS](#options)
- [CONFIGURATION](#configuration)
- [OUTPUT TEMPLATE](#output-template)
+- [FORMAT SELECTION](#format-selection)
- [VIDEO SELECTION](#video-selection)
- [FAQ](#faq)
- [DEVELOPER INSTRUCTIONS](#developer-instructions)
To install it right away for all UNIX users (Linux, OS X, etc.), type:
sudo curl https://yt-dl.org/latest/youtube-dl -o /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
- sudo chmod a+x /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
+ sudo chmod a+rx /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
If you do not have curl, you can alternatively use a recent wget:
sudo wget https://yt-dl.org/downloads/latest/youtube-dl -O /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
- sudo chmod a+x /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
+ sudo chmod a+rx /usr/local/bin/youtube-dl
Windows users can [download a .exe file](https://yt-dl.org/latest/youtube-dl.exe) and place it in their home directory or any other location on their [PATH](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PATH_%28variable%29).
youtube-dl [OPTIONS] URL [URL...]
# OPTIONS
- -h, --help print this help text and exit
- --version print program version and exit
- -U, --update update this program to latest version. Make sure that you have sufficient permissions (run with sudo if needed)
- -i, --ignore-errors continue on download errors, for example to skip unavailable videos in a playlist
+ -h, --help Print this help text and exit
+ --version Print program version and exit
+ -U, --update Update this program to latest version. Make sure that you have sufficient permissions (run with sudo if needed)
+ -i, --ignore-errors Continue on download errors, for example to skip unavailable videos in a playlist
--abort-on-error Abort downloading of further videos (in the playlist or the command line) if an error occurs
- --dump-user-agent display the current browser identification
- --list-extractors List all supported extractors and the URLs they would handle
+ --dump-user-agent Display the current browser identification
+ --list-extractors List all supported extractors
--extractor-descriptions Output descriptions of all supported extractors
- --default-search PREFIX Use this prefix for unqualified URLs. For example "gvsearch2:" downloads two videos from google videos for youtube-dl "large apple".
+ --force-generic-extractor Force extraction to use the generic extractor
+ --default-search PREFIX Use this prefix for unqualified URLs. For example "gvsearch2:" downloads two videos from google videos for youtube-dl "large apple".
Use the value "auto" to let youtube-dl guess ("auto_warning" to emit a warning when guessing). "error" just throws an error. The
default value "fixup_error" repairs broken URLs, but emits an error if this is not possible instead of searching.
--ignore-config Do not read configuration files. When given in the global configuration file /etc/youtube-dl.conf: Do not read the user configuration
in ~/.config/youtube-dl/config (%APPDATA%/youtube-dl/config.txt on Windows)
--flat-playlist Do not extract the videos of a playlist, only list them.
- --no-color Do not emit color codes in output.
+ --no-color Do not emit color codes in output
## Network Options:
--proxy URL Use the specified HTTP/HTTPS proxy. Pass in an empty string (--proxy "") for direct connection
--source-address IP Client-side IP address to bind to (experimental)
-4, --force-ipv4 Make all connections via IPv4 (experimental)
-6, --force-ipv6 Make all connections via IPv6 (experimental)
+ --cn-verification-proxy URL Use this proxy to verify the IP address for some Chinese sites. The default proxy specified by --proxy (or none, if the options is
+ not present) is used for the actual downloading. (experimental)
## Video Selection:
- --playlist-start NUMBER playlist video to start at (default is 1)
- --playlist-end NUMBER playlist video to end at (default is last)
- --playlist-items ITEM_SPEC playlist video items to download. Specify indices of the videos in the playlist seperated by commas like: "--playlist-items 1,2,5,8"
+ --playlist-start NUMBER Playlist video to start at (default is 1)
+ --playlist-end NUMBER Playlist video to end at (default is last)
+ --playlist-items ITEM_SPEC Playlist video items to download. Specify indices of the videos in the playlist separated by commas like: "--playlist-items 1,2,5,8"
if you want to download videos indexed 1, 2, 5, 8 in the playlist. You can specify range: "--playlist-items 1-3,7,10-13", it will
download the videos at index 1, 2, 3, 7, 10, 11, 12 and 13.
- --match-title REGEX download only matching titles (regex or caseless sub-string)
- --reject-title REGEX skip download for matching titles (regex or caseless sub-string)
+ --match-title REGEX Download only matching titles (regex or caseless sub-string)
+ --reject-title REGEX Skip download for matching titles (regex or caseless sub-string)
--max-downloads NUMBER Abort after downloading NUMBER files
--min-filesize SIZE Do not download any videos smaller than SIZE (e.g. 50k or 44.6m)
--max-filesize SIZE Do not download any videos larger than SIZE (e.g. 50k or 44.6m)
- --date DATE download only videos uploaded in this date
- --datebefore DATE download only videos uploaded on or before this date (i.e. inclusive)
- --dateafter DATE download only videos uploaded on or after this date (i.e. inclusive)
+ --date DATE Download only videos uploaded in this date
+ --datebefore DATE Download only videos uploaded on or before this date (i.e. inclusive)
+ --dateafter DATE Download only videos uploaded on or after this date (i.e. inclusive)
--min-views COUNT Do not download any videos with less than COUNT views
--max-views COUNT Do not download any videos with more than COUNT views
- --match-filter FILTER (Experimental) Generic video filter. Specify any key (see help for -o for a list of available keys) to match if the key is present,
+ --match-filter FILTER Generic video filter (experimental). Specify any key (see help for -o for a list of available keys) to match if the key is present,
!key to check if the key is not present,key > NUMBER (like "comment_count > 12", also works with >=, <, <=, !=, =) to compare against
a number, and & to require multiple matches. Values which are not known are excluded unless you put a question mark (?) after the
operator.For example, to only match videos that have been liked more than 100 times and disliked less than 50 times (or the dislike
functionality is not available at the given service), but who also have a description, use --match-filter "like_count > 100 &
dislike_count <? 50 & description" .
- --no-playlist If the URL refers to a video and a playlist, download only the video.
- --yes-playlist If the URL refers to a video and a playlist, download the playlist.
- --age-limit YEARS download only videos suitable for the given age
+ --no-playlist Download only the video, if the URL refers to a video and a playlist.
+ --yes-playlist Download the playlist, if the URL refers to a video and a playlist.
+ --age-limit YEARS Download only videos suitable for the given age
--download-archive FILE Download only videos not listed in the archive file. Record the IDs of all downloaded videos in it.
--include-ads Download advertisements as well (experimental)
## Download Options:
- -r, --rate-limit LIMIT maximum download rate in bytes per second (e.g. 50K or 4.2M)
- -R, --retries RETRIES number of retries (default is 10), or "infinite".
- --buffer-size SIZE size of download buffer (e.g. 1024 or 16K) (default is 1024)
- --no-resize-buffer do not automatically adjust the buffer size. By default, the buffer size is automatically resized from an initial value of SIZE.
+ -r, --rate-limit LIMIT Maximum download rate in bytes per second (e.g. 50K or 4.2M)
+ -R, --retries RETRIES Number of retries (default is 10), or "infinite".
+ --buffer-size SIZE Size of download buffer (e.g. 1024 or 16K) (default is 1024)
+ --no-resize-buffer Do not automatically adjust the buffer size. By default, the buffer size is automatically resized from an initial value of SIZE.
--playlist-reverse Download playlist videos in reverse order
- --xattr-set-filesize (experimental) set file xattribute ytdl.filesize with expected filesize
- --hls-prefer-native (experimental) Use the native HLS downloader instead of ffmpeg.
- --external-downloader COMMAND Use the specified external downloader. Currently supports aria2c,curl,wget
- --external-downloader-args ARGS Give these arguments to the external downloader.
+ --xattr-set-filesize Set file xattribute ytdl.filesize with expected filesize (experimental)
+ --hls-prefer-native Use the native HLS downloader instead of ffmpeg (experimental)
+ --external-downloader COMMAND Use the specified external downloader. Currently supports aria2c,curl,httpie,wget
+ --external-downloader-args ARGS Give these arguments to the external downloader
## Filesystem Options:
- -a, --batch-file FILE file containing URLs to download ('-' for stdin)
- --id use only video ID in file name
- -o, --output TEMPLATE output filename template. Use %(title)s to get the title, %(uploader)s for the uploader name, %(uploader_id)s for the uploader
+ -a, --batch-file FILE File containing URLs to download ('-' for stdin)
+ --id Use only video ID in file name
+ -o, --output TEMPLATE Output filename template. Use %(title)s to get the title, %(uploader)s for the uploader name, %(uploader_id)s for the uploader
nickname if different, %(autonumber)s to get an automatically incremented number, %(ext)s for the filename extension, %(format)s for
- the format description (like "22 - 1280x720" or "HD"), %(format_id)s for the unique id of the format (like Youtube's itags: "137"),
+ the format description (like "22 - 1280x720" or "HD"), %(format_id)s for the unique id of the format (like YouTube's itags: "137"),
%(upload_date)s for the upload date (YYYYMMDD), %(extractor)s for the provider (youtube, metacafe, etc), %(id)s for the video id,
%(playlist_title)s, %(playlist_id)s, or %(playlist)s (=title if present, ID otherwise) for the playlist the video is in,
%(playlist_index)s for the position in the playlist. %(height)s and %(width)s for the width and height of the video format.
%(resolution)s for a textual description of the resolution of the video format. %% for a literal percent. Use - to output to stdout.
Can also be used to download to a different directory, for example with -o '/my/downloads/%(uploader)s/%(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s' .
- --autonumber-size NUMBER Specifies the number of digits in %(autonumber)s when it is present in output filename template or --auto-number option is given
+ --autonumber-size NUMBER Specify the number of digits in %(autonumber)s when it is present in output filename template or --auto-number option is given
--restrict-filenames Restrict filenames to only ASCII characters, and avoid "&" and spaces in filenames
- -A, --auto-number [deprecated; use -o "%(autonumber)s-%(title)s.%(ext)s" ] number downloaded files starting from 00000
- -t, --title [deprecated] use title in file name (default)
- -l, --literal [deprecated] alias of --title
- -w, --no-overwrites do not overwrite files
- -c, --continue force resume of partially downloaded files. By default, youtube-dl will resume downloads if possible.
- --no-continue do not resume partially downloaded files (restart from beginning)
- --no-part do not use .part files - write directly into output file
- --no-mtime do not use the Last-modified header to set the file modification time
- --write-description write video description to a .description file
- --write-info-json write video metadata to a .info.json file
- --write-annotations write video annotations to a .annotation file
- --load-info FILE json file containing the video information (created with the "--write-json" option)
- --cookies FILE file to read cookies from and dump cookie jar in
+ -A, --auto-number [deprecated; use -o "%(autonumber)s-%(title)s.%(ext)s" ] Number downloaded files starting from 00000
+ -t, --title [deprecated] Use title in file name (default)
+ -l, --literal [deprecated] Alias of --title
+ -w, --no-overwrites Do not overwrite files
+ -c, --continue Force resume of partially downloaded files. By default, youtube-dl will resume downloads if possible.
+ --no-continue Do not resume partially downloaded files (restart from beginning)
+ --no-part Do not use .part files - write directly into output file
+ --no-mtime Do not use the Last-modified header to set the file modification time
+ --write-description Write video description to a .description file
+ --write-info-json Write video metadata to a .info.json file
+ --write-annotations Write video annotations to a .annotations.xml file
+ --load-info FILE JSON file containing the video information (created with the "--write-info-json" option)
+ --cookies FILE File to read cookies from and dump cookie jar in
--cache-dir DIR Location in the filesystem where youtube-dl can store some downloaded information permanently. By default $XDG_CACHE_HOME/youtube-dl
or ~/.cache/youtube-dl . At the moment, only YouTube player files (for videos with obfuscated signatures) are cached, but that may
change.
--rm-cache-dir Delete all filesystem cache files
## Thumbnail images:
- --write-thumbnail write thumbnail image to disk
- --write-all-thumbnails write all thumbnail image formats to disk
+ --write-thumbnail Write thumbnail image to disk
+ --write-all-thumbnails Write all thumbnail image formats to disk
--list-thumbnails Simulate and list all available thumbnail formats
## Verbosity / Simulation Options:
- -q, --quiet activates quiet mode
+ -q, --quiet Activate quiet mode
--no-warnings Ignore warnings
- -s, --simulate do not download the video and do not write anything to disk
- --skip-download do not download the video
- -g, --get-url simulate, quiet but print URL
- -e, --get-title simulate, quiet but print title
- --get-id simulate, quiet but print id
- --get-thumbnail simulate, quiet but print thumbnail URL
- --get-description simulate, quiet but print video description
- --get-duration simulate, quiet but print video length
- --get-filename simulate, quiet but print output filename
- --get-format simulate, quiet but print output format
- -j, --dump-json simulate, quiet but print JSON information. See --output for a description of available keys.
- -J, --dump-single-json simulate, quiet but print JSON information for each command-line argument. If the URL refers to a playlist, dump the whole playlist
+ -s, --simulate Do not download the video and do not write anything to disk
+ --skip-download Do not download the video
+ -g, --get-url Simulate, quiet but print URL
+ -e, --get-title Simulate, quiet but print title
+ --get-id Simulate, quiet but print id
+ --get-thumbnail Simulate, quiet but print thumbnail URL
+ --get-description Simulate, quiet but print video description
+ --get-duration Simulate, quiet but print video length
+ --get-filename Simulate, quiet but print output filename
+ --get-format Simulate, quiet but print output format
+ -j, --dump-json Simulate, quiet but print JSON information. See --output for a description of available keys.
+ -J, --dump-single-json Simulate, quiet but print JSON information for each command-line argument. If the URL refers to a playlist, dump the whole playlist
information in a single line.
--print-json Be quiet and print the video information as JSON (video is still being downloaded).
- --newline output progress bar as new lines
- --no-progress do not print progress bar
- --console-title display progress in console titlebar
- -v, --verbose print various debugging information
- --dump-intermediate-pages print downloaded pages to debug problems (very verbose)
+ --newline Output progress bar as new lines
+ --no-progress Do not print progress bar
+ --console-title Display progress in console titlebar
+ -v, --verbose Print various debugging information
+ --dump-pages Print downloaded pages encoded using base64 to debug problems (very verbose)
--write-pages Write downloaded intermediary pages to files in the current directory to debug problems
--print-traffic Display sent and read HTTP traffic
- -C, --call-home Contact the youtube-dl server for debugging.
- --no-call-home Do NOT contact the youtube-dl server for debugging.
+ -C, --call-home Contact the youtube-dl server for debugging
+ --no-call-home Do NOT contact the youtube-dl server for debugging
## Workarounds:
--encoding ENCODING Force the specified encoding (experimental)
- --no-check-certificate Suppress HTTPS certificate validation.
+ --no-check-certificate Suppress HTTPS certificate validation
--prefer-insecure Use an unencrypted connection to retrieve information about the video. (Currently supported only for YouTube)
- --user-agent UA specify a custom user agent
- --referer URL specify a custom referer, use if the video access is restricted to one domain
- --add-header FIELD:VALUE specify a custom HTTP header and its value, separated by a colon ':'. You can use this option multiple times
+ --user-agent UA Specify a custom user agent
+ --referer URL Specify a custom referer, use if the video access is restricted to one domain
+ --add-header FIELD:VALUE Specify a custom HTTP header and its value, separated by a colon ':'. You can use this option multiple times
--bidi-workaround Work around terminals that lack bidirectional text support. Requires bidiv or fribidi executable in PATH
--sleep-interval SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep before each download.
## Video Format Options:
- -f, --format FORMAT video format code, specify the order of preference using slashes, as in -f 22/17/18 . Instead of format codes, you can select by
- extension for the extensions aac, m4a, mp3, mp4, ogg, wav, webm. You can also use the special names "best", "bestvideo", "bestaudio",
- "worst". You can filter the video results by putting a condition in brackets, as in -f "best[height=720]" (or -f "[filesize>10M]").
- This works for filesize, height, width, tbr, abr, vbr, asr, and fps and the comparisons <, <=, >, >=, =, != and for ext, acodec,
- vcodec, container, and protocol and the comparisons =, != . Formats for which the value is not known are excluded unless you put a
- question mark (?) after the operator. You can combine format filters, so -f "[height <=? 720][tbr>500]" selects up to 720p videos
- (or videos where the height is not known) with a bitrate of at least 500 KBit/s. By default, youtube-dl will pick the best quality.
- Use commas to download multiple audio formats, such as -f 136/137/mp4/bestvideo,140/m4a/bestaudio. You can merge the video and audio
- of two formats into a single file using -f <video-format>+<audio-format> (requires ffmpeg or avconv), for example -f
- bestvideo+bestaudio.
- --all-formats download all available video formats
- --prefer-free-formats prefer free video formats unless a specific one is requested
- --max-quality FORMAT highest quality format to download
- -F, --list-formats list all available formats
- --youtube-skip-dash-manifest Do not download the DASH manifest on YouTube videos
- --merge-output-format FORMAT If a merge is required (e.g. bestvideo+bestaudio), output to given container format. One of mkv, mp4, ogg, webm, flv.Ignored if no
+ -f, --format FORMAT Video format code, see the "FORMAT SELECTION" for all the info
+ --all-formats Download all available video formats
+ --prefer-free-formats Prefer free video formats unless a specific one is requested
+ -F, --list-formats List all available formats
+ --youtube-skip-dash-manifest Do not download the DASH manifests and related data on YouTube videos
+ --merge-output-format FORMAT If a merge is required (e.g. bestvideo+bestaudio), output to given container format. One of mkv, mp4, ogg, webm, flv. Ignored if no
merge is required
## Subtitle Options:
- --write-sub write subtitle file
- --write-auto-sub write automatic subtitle file (youtube only)
- --all-subs downloads all the available subtitles of the video
- --list-subs lists all available subtitles for the video
- --sub-format FORMAT subtitle format, accepts formats preference, for example: "ass/srt/best"
- --sub-lang LANGS languages of the subtitles to download (optional) separated by commas, use IETF language tags like 'en,pt'
+ --write-sub Write subtitle file
+ --write-auto-sub Write automatic subtitle file (YouTube only)
+ --all-subs Download all the available subtitles of the video
+ --list-subs List all available subtitles for the video
+ --sub-format FORMAT Subtitle format, accepts formats preference, for example: "srt" or "ass/srt/best"
+ --sub-lang LANGS Languages of the subtitles to download (optional) separated by commas, use IETF language tags like 'en,pt'
## Authentication Options:
- -u, --username USERNAME login with this account ID
- -p, --password PASSWORD account password. If this option is left out, youtube-dl will ask interactively.
- -2, --twofactor TWOFACTOR two-factor auth code
- -n, --netrc use .netrc authentication data
- --video-password PASSWORD video password (vimeo, smotri)
+ -u, --username USERNAME Login with this account ID
+ -p, --password PASSWORD Account password. If this option is left out, youtube-dl will ask interactively.
+ -2, --twofactor TWOFACTOR Two-factor auth code
+ -n, --netrc Use .netrc authentication data
+ --video-password PASSWORD Video password (vimeo, smotri)
## Post-processing Options:
- -x, --extract-audio convert video files to audio-only files (requires ffmpeg or avconv and ffprobe or avprobe)
- --audio-format FORMAT "best", "aac", "vorbis", "mp3", "m4a", "opus", or "wav"; "best" by default
- --audio-quality QUALITY ffmpeg/avconv audio quality specification, insert a value between 0 (better) and 9 (worse) for VBR or a specific bitrate like 128K
- (default 5)
- --recode-video FORMAT Encode the video to another format if necessary (currently supported: mp4|flv|ogg|webm|mkv)
- -k, --keep-video keeps the video file on disk after the post-processing; the video is erased by default
- --no-post-overwrites do not overwrite post-processed files; the post-processed files are overwritten by default
- --embed-subs embed subtitles in the video (only for mp4 videos)
- --embed-thumbnail embed thumbnail in the audio as cover art
- --add-metadata write metadata to the video file
- --xattrs write metadata to the video file's xattrs (using dublin core and xdg standards)
- --fixup POLICY Automatically correct known faults of the file. One of never (do nothing), warn (only emit a warning), detect_or_warn(the default;
+ -x, --extract-audio Convert video files to audio-only files (requires ffmpeg or avconv and ffprobe or avprobe)
+ --audio-format FORMAT Specify audio format: "best", "aac", "vorbis", "mp3", "m4a", "opus", or "wav"; "best" by default
+ --audio-quality QUALITY Specify ffmpeg/avconv audio quality, insert a value between 0 (better) and 9 (worse) for VBR or a specific bitrate like 128K (default
+ 5)
+ --recode-video FORMAT Encode the video to another format if necessary (currently supported: mp4|flv|ogg|webm|mkv|avi)
+ --postprocessor-args ARGS Give these arguments to the postprocessor
+ -k, --keep-video Keep the video file on disk after the post-processing; the video is erased by default
+ --no-post-overwrites Do not overwrite post-processed files; the post-processed files are overwritten by default
+ --embed-subs Embed subtitles in the video (only for mkv and mp4 videos)
+ --embed-thumbnail Embed thumbnail in the audio as cover art
+ --add-metadata Write metadata to the video file
+ --metadata-from-title FORMAT Parse additional metadata like song title / artist from the video title. The format syntax is the same as --output, the parsed
+ parameters replace existing values. Additional templates: %(album)s, %(artist)s. Example: --metadata-from-title "%(artist)s -
+ %(title)s" matches a title like "Coldplay - Paradise"
+ --xattrs Write metadata to the video file's xattrs (using dublin core and xdg standards)
+ --fixup POLICY Automatically correct known faults of the file. One of never (do nothing), warn (only emit a warning), detect_or_warn (the default;
fix file if we can, warn otherwise)
--prefer-avconv Prefer avconv over ffmpeg for running the postprocessors (default)
--prefer-ffmpeg Prefer ffmpeg over avconv for running the postprocessors
You can configure youtube-dl by placing default arguments (such as `--extract-audio --no-mtime` to always extract the audio and not copy the mtime) into `/etc/youtube-dl.conf` and/or `~/.config/youtube-dl/config`. On Windows, the configuration file locations are `%APPDATA%\youtube-dl\config.txt` and `C:\Users\<user name>\youtube-dl.conf`.
+### Authentication with `.netrc` file ###
+
+You may also want to configure automatic credentials storage for extractors that support authentication (by providing login and password with `--username` and `--password`) in order not to pass credentials as command line arguments on every youtube-dl execution and prevent tracking plain text passwords in shell command history. You can achieve this using [`.netrc` file](http://stackoverflow.com/tags/.netrc/info) on per extractor basis. For that you will need to create `.netrc` file in your `$HOME` and restrict permissions to read/write by you only:
+```
+touch $HOME/.netrc
+chmod a-rwx,u+rw $HOME/.netrc
+```
+After that you can add credentials for extractor in the following format, where *extractor* is the name of extractor in lowercase:
+```
+machine <extractor> login <login> password <password>
+```
+For example:
+```
+machine youtube login myaccount@gmail.com password my_youtube_password
+machine twitch login my_twitch_account_name password my_twitch_password
+```
+To activate authentication with `.netrc` file you should pass `--netrc` to youtube-dl or to place it in [configuration file](#configuration).
+
+On Windows you may also need to setup `%HOME%` environment variable manually.
+
# OUTPUT TEMPLATE
The `-o` option allows users to indicate a template for the output file names. The basic usage is not to set any template arguments when downloading a single file, like in `youtube-dl -o funny_video.flv "http://some/video"`. However, it may contain special sequences that will be replaced when downloading each video. The special sequences have the format `%(NAME)s`. To clarify, that is a percent symbol followed by a name in parenthesis, followed by a lowercase S. Allowed names are:
youtube-dl_test_video_.mp4 # A simple file name
```
+# FORMAT SELECTION
+
+By default youtube-dl tries to download the best quality, but sometimes you may want to download other format.
+The simplest case is requesting a specific format, for example `-f 22`. You can get the list of available formats using `--list-formats`, you can also use a file extension (currently it supports aac, m4a, mp3, mp4, ogg, wav, webm) or the special names `best`, `bestvideo`, `bestaudio` and `worst`.
+
+If you want to download multiple videos and they don't have the same formats available, you can specify the order of preference using slashes, as in `-f 22/17/18`. You can also filter the video results by putting a condition in brackets, as in `-f "best[height=720]"` (or `-f "[filesize>10M]"`). This works for filesize, height, width, tbr, abr, vbr, asr, and fps and the comparisons <, <=, >, >=, =, != and for ext, acodec, vcodec, container, and protocol and the comparisons =, != . Formats for which the value is not known are excluded unless you put a question mark (?) after the operator. You can combine format filters, so `-f "[height <=? 720][tbr>500]"` selects up to 720p videos (or videos where the height is not known) with a bitrate of at least 500 KBit/s. Use commas to download multiple formats, such as `-f 136/137/mp4/bestvideo,140/m4a/bestaudio`. You can merge the video and audio of two formats into a single file using `-f <video-format>+<audio-format>` (requires ffmpeg or avconv), for example `-f bestvideo+bestaudio`. Format selectors can also be grouped using parentheses, for example if you want to download the best mp4 and webm formats with a height lower than 480 you can use `-f '(mp4,webm)[height<480]'`.
+
+Since the end of April 2015 and version 2015.04.26 youtube-dl uses `-f bestvideo+bestaudio/best` as default format selection (see #5447, #5456). If ffmpeg or avconv are installed this results in downloading `bestvideo` and `bestaudio` separately and muxing them together into a single file giving the best overall quality available. Otherwise it falls back to `best` and results in downloading best available quality served as a single file. `best` is also needed for videos that don't come from YouTube because they don't provide the audio and video in two different files. If you want to only download some dash formats (for example if you are not interested in getting videos with a resolution higher than 1080p), you can add `-f bestvideo[height<=?1080]+bestaudio/best` to your configuration file. Note that if you use youtube-dl to stream to `stdout` (and most likely to pipe it to your media player then), i.e. you explicitly specify output template as `-o -`, youtube-dl still uses `-f best` format selection in order to start content delivery immediately to your player and not to wait until `bestvideo` and `bestaudio` are downloaded and muxed.
+
+If you want to preserve the old format selection behavior (prior to youtube-dl 2015.04.26), i.e. you want to download best available quality media served as a single file, you should explicitly specify your choice with `-f best`. You may want to add it to the [configuration file](#configuration) in order not to type it every time you run youtube-dl.
+
# VIDEO SELECTION
Videos can be filtered by their upload date using the options `--date`, `--datebefore` or `--dateafter`, they accept dates in two formats:
If you have installed youtube-dl with a package manager, pip, setup.py or a tarball, please use that to update. Note that Ubuntu packages do not seem to get updated anymore. Since we are not affiliated with Ubuntu, there is little we can do. Feel free to [report bugs](https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/youtube-dl/+filebug) to the [Ubuntu packaging guys](mailto:ubuntu-motu@lists.ubuntu.com?subject=outdated%20version%20of%20youtube-dl) - all they have to do is update the package to a somewhat recent version. See above for a way to update.
-### Do I always have to pass in `--max-quality FORMAT`, or `-citw`?
+### Do I always have to pass `-citw`?
-By default, youtube-dl intends to have the best options (incidentally, if you have a convincing case that these should be different, [please file an issue where you explain that](https://yt-dl.org/bug)). Therefore, it is unnecessary and sometimes harmful to copy long option strings from webpages. In particular, `--max-quality` *limits* the video quality (so if you want the best quality, do NOT pass it in), and the only option out of `-citw` that is regularly useful is `-i`.
+By default, youtube-dl intends to have the best options (incidentally, if you have a convincing case that these should be different, [please file an issue where you explain that](https://yt-dl.org/bug)). Therefore, it is unnecessary and sometimes harmful to copy long option strings from webpages. In particular, the only option out of `-citw` that is regularly useful is `-i`.
### Can you please put the -b option back?
YouTube requires an additional signature since September 2012 which is not supported by old versions of youtube-dl. See [above](#how-do-i-update-youtube-dl) for how to update youtube-dl.
+### Video URL contains an ampersand and I'm getting some strange output `[1] 2839` or `'v' is not recognized as an internal or external command` ###
+
+That's actually the output from your shell. Since ampersand is one of the special shell characters it's interpreted by shell preventing you from passing the whole URL to youtube-dl. To disable your shell from interpreting the ampersands (or any other special characters) you have to either put the whole URL in quotes or escape them with a backslash (which approach will work depends on your shell).
+
+For example if your URL is https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=4&v=BaW_jenozKc you should end up with following command:
+
+```youtube-dl 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=4&v=BaW_jenozKc'```
+
+or
+
+```youtube-dl https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=4\&v=BaW_jenozKc```
+
+For Windows you have to use the double quotes:
+
+```youtube-dl "https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=4&v=BaW_jenozKc"```
+
### ExtractorError: Could not find JS function u'OF'
In February 2015, the new YouTube player contained a character sequence in a string that was misinterpreted by old versions of youtube-dl. See [above](#how-do-i-update-youtube-dl) for how to update youtube-dl.
### HTTP Error 429: Too Many Requests or 402: Payment Required
-These two error codes indicate that the service is blocking your IP address because of overuse. Contact the service and ask them to unblock your IP address, or - if you have acquired a whitelisted IP address already - use the [`--proxy` or `--network-address` options](#network-options) to select another IP address.
+These two error codes indicate that the service is blocking your IP address because of overuse. Contact the service and ask them to unblock your IP address, or - if you have acquired a whitelisted IP address already - use the [`--proxy` or `--source-address` options](#network-options) to select another IP address.
### SyntaxError: Non-ASCII character ###
youtube-dl -- -wNyEUrxzFU
youtube-dl "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wNyEUrxzFU"
+### How do I pass cookies to youtube-dl?
+
+Use the `--cookies` option, for example `--cookies /path/to/cookies/file.txt`. Note that cookies file must be in Mozilla/Netscape format and the first line of cookies file must be either `# HTTP Cookie File` or `# Netscape HTTP Cookie File`. Make sure you have correct [newline format](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newline) in cookies file and convert newlines if necessary to correspond your OS, namely `CRLF` (`\r\n`) for Windows, `LF` (`\n`) for Linux and `CR` (`\r`) for Mac OS. `HTTP Error 400: Bad Request` when using `--cookies` is a good sign of invalid newline format.
+
+Passing cookies to youtube-dl is a good way to workaround login when particular extractor does not implement it explicitly.
+
### Can you add support for this anime video site, or site which shows current movies for free?
As a matter of policy (as well as legality), youtube-dl does not include support for services that specialize in infringing copyright. As a rule of thumb, if you cannot easily find a video that the service is quite obviously allowed to distribute (i.e. that has been uploaded by the creator, the creator's distributor, or is published under a free license), the service is probably unfit for inclusion to youtube-dl.
Support requests for services that **do** purchase the rights to distribute their content are perfectly fine though. If in doubt, you can simply include a source that mentions the legitimate purchase of content.
+### How can I speed up work on my issue?
+
+(Also known as: Help, my important issue not being solved!) The youtube-dl core developer team is quite small. While we do our best to solve as many issues as possible, sometimes that can take quite a while. To speed up your issue, here's what you can do:
+
+First of all, please do report the issue [at our issue tracker](https://yt-dl.org/bugs). That allows us to coordinate all efforts by users and developers, and serves as a unified point. Unfortunately, the youtube-dl project has grown too large to use personal email as an effective communication channel.
+
+Please read the [bug reporting instructions](#bugs) below. A lot of bugs lack all the necessary information. If you can, offer proxy, VPN, or shell access to the youtube-dl developers. If you are able to, test the issue from multiple computers in multiple countries to exclude local censorship or misconfiguration issues.
+
+If nobody is interested in solving your issue, you are welcome to take matters into your own hands and submit a pull request (or coerce/pay somebody else to do so).
+
+Feel free to bump the issue from time to time by writing a small comment ("Issue is still present in youtube-dl version ...from France, but fixed from Belgium"), but please not more than once a month. Please do not declare your issue as `important` or `urgent`.
+
### How can I detect whether a given URL is supported by youtube-dl?
For one, have a look at the [list of supported sites](docs/supportedsites.md). Note that it can sometimes happen that the site changes its URL scheme (say, from http://example.com/video/1234567 to http://example.com/v/1234567 ) and youtube-dl reports an URL of a service in that list as unsupported. In that case, simply report a bug.
From a Python program, you can embed youtube-dl in a more powerful fashion, like this:
```python
+from __future__ import unicode_literals
import youtube_dl
ydl_opts = {}
Here's a more complete example of a program that outputs only errors (and a short message after the download is finished), and downloads/converts the video to an mp3 file:
```python
+from __future__ import unicode_literals
import youtube_dl
For bug reports, this means that your report should contain the *complete* output of youtube-dl when called with the -v flag. The error message you get for (most) bugs even says so, but you would not believe how many of our bug reports do not contain this information.
-Site support requests **must contain an example URL**. An example URL is a URL you might want to download, like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc . There should be an obvious video present. Except under very special circumstances, the main page of a video service (e.g. http://www.youtube.com/ ) is *not* an example URL.
+If your server has multiple IPs or you suspect censorship, adding --call-home may be a good idea to get more diagnostics. If the error is `ERROR: Unable to extract ...` and you cannot reproduce it from multiple countries, add `--dump-pages` (warning: this will yield a rather large output, redirect it to the file `log.txt` by adding `>log.txt 2>&1` to your command-line) or upload the `.dump` files you get when you add `--write-pages` [somewhere](https://gist.github.com/).
+
+**Site support requests must contain an example URL**. An example URL is a URL you might want to download, like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc . There should be an obvious video present. Except under very special circumstances, the main page of a video service (e.g. http://www.youtube.com/ ) is *not* an example URL.
### Are you using the latest version?
projects / youtube-dl / blobdiff