download YouTube videos

Best ways to download YouTube videos

Want to download YouTube videos direct to your PC or phone? it’s very possible but is it legal to download videos from YouTube? My answer to this is a YES / NO. Unless you are downloading your own videos, it is not legal to download YouTube videos. What you should know is this is totally against YouTube terms of service. YouTube simply doesn’t allow any unauthorized downloads of videos from their website for offline use if you don’t fall within the red YouTube subscribers’ circle unless YouTube has explicitly granted you permission to download.

Google made it clear that “You shall not download any Content unless you see a ‘download’ or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content,” hence you have to fall within the rules. Whatever i talk about in this tutorial i assume you are trying to download your own videos either for editing or some other reasons. You can easily download your own videos through the video manager section in the dashboard of your account but in case you can’t remember your password or reach your download limit (2 videos per hour) you can try out any of these methods to download YouTube videos. Please note that these methods only apply to PC usersand not mobile users.

How to Download YouTube videos

Am going to share basically two ways you can easily download YouTube videos on your PC. The first method focuses on using third party apps and websites where as the second shows how to download YouTube videos using the popular VLC Media Player.

1 – Third Party Apps and Websites

There are very many third party applications and websites on the internet today that claim to offer YouTube video download services with more coming out. Not all with give you all the options you may need, some will install spyware on your computer, some are heavily advertised and will keep popping up ad windows on your browser, some will have misleading links and so on. You have to be extra cautious with the the third party application you are using.

From my own experience, i will recommend ClipConverter.cc and SaveFrom.net any day because they are simply the best third party websites you can use to download YouTube videos on your PC. While many third party websites and applications phase out, these two have been i existence for a good number of years.

ClipConverter.cc has existed for over 10 years, has over 1.6 million Facebook likes and is the most used tool for converting media online basing on their traffic volume. It offers options to download YouTube videos in both video and audio formats. The supported audio formats are MP3, M4A and AAC where as the supported video formats are MP4, 3GP, AVI and MOV. You can download YouTube videos in three resolutions (720p, 1080p, 4K) using this tool. All you have to do is paste your YouTube video URL at ‘Video URL’ input box on their website, press Continue, select the desired format and options for the conversion, click on start then wait for some minutes as your video gets converted. The moment the conversion climaxes you will have your video downloaded on your PC.

SaveFrom.net is another great tool you can use. Surprisingly it’s the one i use most of the times and and always able to download the videos i want. They have a browser extension too that can help you speed up the process. Visit their website, paste the URL of the YouTube video you wish to download, select the download options and proceed with your download. You should be able to have the YouTube video on your PC in no time.

1 – Use VLC Media Player

VLC Media Player is a great software you can use to download YouTube videos. One good thing with VLC Media Player is it will show you the exact url of the video. This is the URL you copy and paste on your browser to stream the video with an option of saving it. To download YouTube videos using VLC media Player, you have to open the software, click on “Network Stream”, paste the url of the YouTube video you wish to download and your video should start playing. Now right click on the streaming video, hover on tools, click on codec information and you should be able to see some information about the video. Now copy the link you see on the location bar below the codec information box, paste it on your browser and your video should start streaming on your browser. From here you just have to right click on the video and click on “Save As” to download the video. Am yet to come up with a detailed tutorial about downloading YouTube videos using VLC Media Player once VideoLAN releases an update for their youtube.luac file. YouTube is always releasing updates to block VLC Media Player from streaming it’s videos but VLC always patches the loophole too.

One drawback with this method is you are limited to download the video only in it’s original format. You cannot convert it to another format while downloading unless you first download it the way it is then use a secondary PC Video converter software to concert the video to your desired format.

If you have been struggling to download YouTube videos on your PC then by now you should be equipped with some methods to use. Have you downloaded YouTube videos before? how did you do it? Do you know any better third party application or website than the ones listed above? feel free to share it all out below. If this post helped you download your first YouTube video then show us some love by sharing it.

Authored By Kolo Pius

Kolo Pius is the founder of TutorialFAQ. He writes Badass articles for it and is an avid traveler too. Most of the time he travels while blogging and coding. You can hire me for your next Web Project, Mobile Project or SEO Services. About Me | Facebook | Twitter

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