1 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
4 [](#readme)
6 [](#installation "Installation")
7 []
(https://pypi.org/project/yt-dlp "PyPi")
8 [](Collaborators.md#collaborators "Donate")
9 []
(https://matrix.to/#/#yt-dlp:matrix.org "Matrix")
10 []
(https://discord.gg/H5MNcFW63r "Discord")
11 [](supportedsites.md "Supported Sites")
12 [](LICENSE "License")
13 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/actions "CI Status")
14 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commits "Commit History")
15 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commits "Commit History")
18 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
20 yt-dlp is a
[youtube-dl](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl) fork based on the now inactive
[youtube-dlc](https://github.com/blackjack4494/yt-dlc). The main focus of this project is adding new features and patches while also keeping up to date with the original project
22 <!-- MANPAGE: MOVE "USAGE AND OPTIONS" SECTION HERE -->
24 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
25 * [NEW FEATURES](#new-features)
26 * [Differences in default behavior](#differences-in-default-behavior)
27 * [INSTALLATION](#installation)
28 * [Detailed instructions](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Installation)
30 * [Release Files](#release-files)
31 * [Dependencies](#dependencies)
33 * [USAGE AND OPTIONS](#usage-and-options)
34 * [General Options](#general-options)
35 * [Network Options](#network-options)
36 * [Geo-restriction](#geo-restriction)
37 * [Video Selection](#video-selection)
38 * [Download Options](#download-options)
39 * [Filesystem Options](#filesystem-options)
40 * [Thumbnail Options](#thumbnail-options)
41 * [Internet Shortcut Options](#internet-shortcut-options)
42 * [Verbosity and Simulation Options](#verbosity-and-simulation-options)
43 * [Workarounds](#workarounds)
44 * [Video Format Options](#video-format-options)
45 * [Subtitle Options](#subtitle-options)
46 * [Authentication Options](#authentication-options)
47 * [Post-processing Options](#post-processing-options)
48 * [SponsorBlock Options](#sponsorblock-options)
49 * [Extractor Options](#extractor-options)
50 * [CONFIGURATION](#configuration)
51 * [Configuration file encoding](#configuration-file-encoding)
52 * [Authentication with .netrc file](#authentication-with-netrc-file)
53 * [Notes about environment variables](#notes-about-environment-variables)
54 * [OUTPUT TEMPLATE](#output-template)
55 * [Output template examples](#output-template-examples)
56 * [FORMAT SELECTION](#format-selection)
57 * [Filtering Formats](#filtering-formats)
58 * [Sorting Formats](#sorting-formats)
59 * [Format Selection examples](#format-selection-examples)
60 * [MODIFYING METADATA](#modifying-metadata)
61 * [Modifying metadata examples](#modifying-metadata-examples)
62 * [EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS](#extractor-arguments)
64 * [EMBEDDING YT-DLP](#embedding-yt-dlp)
65 * [Embedding examples](#embedding-examples)
66 * [DEPRECATED OPTIONS](#deprecated-options)
67 * [CONTRIBUTING](CONTRIBUTING.md#contributing-to-yt-dlp)
68 * [Opening an Issue](CONTRIBUTING.md#opening-an-issue)
69 * [Developer Instructions](CONTRIBUTING.md#developer-instructions)
70 * [WIKI](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki)
71 * [FAQ](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/FAQ)
72 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
77 * Merged with **youtube-dl v2021.12
.17+
[commit/ed5c44e](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/commit/ed5c44e7b74ac77f87ca5ed6cb5e964a0c6a0678)**<!--(
[exceptions](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/21))--> and **youtube-dlc v2020.11
.11-
3+
[commit/f9401f2](https://github.com/blackjack4494/yt-dlc/commit/f9401f2a91987068139c5f757b12fc711d4c0cee)**: You get all the features and patches of
[youtube-dlc](https://github.com/blackjack4494/yt-dlc) in addition to the latest
[youtube-dl](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl)
79 * **
[SponsorBlock Integration](#sponsorblock-options)**: You can mark/remove sponsor sections in YouTube videos by utilizing the [SponsorBlock](https://sponsor.ajay.app) API
81 * **[Format Sorting](#sorting-formats)**: The default format sorting options have been changed so that higher resolution and better codecs will be now preferred instead of simply using larger bitrate. Furthermore, you can now specify the sort order using
`-S`. This allows for much easier format selection than what is possible by simply using
`--format` ([examples](#format-selection-examples))
83 * **Merged with animelover1984/youtube-dl**: You get most of the features and improvements from
[animelover1984/youtube-dl](https://github.com/animelover1984/youtube-dl) including
`--write-comments`,
`BiliBiliSearch`,
`BilibiliChannel`, Embedding thumbnail in mp4/ogg/opus, playlist infojson etc. Note that the NicoNico livestreams are not available. See
[#31](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/pull/31) for details.
85 * **YouTube improvements**:
86 * Supports Clips, Stories (
`ytstories:<channel UCID>`), Search (including filters)**\***, YouTube Music Search, Channel-specific search, Search prefixes (
`ytsearch:`,
`ytsearchdate:`)**\***, Mixes, YouTube Music Albums/Channels (
[except self-uploaded music](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/723)), and Feeds (
`:ytfav`,
`:ytwatchlater`,
`:ytsubs`,
`:ythistory`,
`:ytrec`,
`:ytnotif`)
87 * Fix for
[n-sig based throttling](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/issues/29326) **\***
88 * Supports some (but not all) age-gated content without cookies
89 * Download livestreams from the start using
`--live-from-start` (*experimental*)
90 * `255kbps` audio is extracted (if available) from YouTube Music when premium cookies are given
91 * Channel URLs download all uploads of the channel, including shorts and live
93 * **Cookies from browser**: Cookies can be automatically extracted from all major web browsers using
`--cookies-from-browser BROWSER[+KEYRING][:PROFILE][::CONTAINER]`
95 * **Download time range**: Videos can be downloaded partially based on either timestamps or chapters using
`--download-sections`
97 * **Split video by chapters**: Videos can be split into multiple files based on chapters using
`--split-chapters`
99 * **Multi-threaded fragment downloads**: Download multiple fragments of m3u8/mpd videos in parallel. Use
`--concurrent-fragments` (
`-N`) option to set the number of threads used
101 * **Aria2c with HLS/DASH**: You can use
`aria2c` as the external downloader for DASH(mpd) and HLS(m3u8) formats
103 * **New and fixed extractors**: Many new extractors have been added and a lot of existing ones have been fixed. See the [changelog](Changelog.md) or the [list of supported sites](supportedsites.md)
105 * **New MSOs**: Philo, Spectrum, SlingTV, Cablevision, RCN etc.
107 * **Subtitle extraction from manifests**: Subtitles can be extracted from streaming media manifests. See
[commit/be6202f](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commit/be6202f12b97858b9d716e608394b51065d0419f) for details
109 * **Multiple paths and output templates**: You can give different [output templates](#output-template) and download paths for different types of files. You can also set a temporary path where intermediary files are downloaded to using
`--paths` (
`-P`)
111 * **Portable Configuration**: Configuration files are automatically loaded from the home and root directories. See [CONFIGURATION](#configuration) for details
113 * **Output template improvements**: Output templates can now have date-time formatting, numeric offsets, object traversal etc. See [output template](#output-template) for details. Even more advanced operations can also be done with the help of
`--parse-metadata` and
`--replace-in-metadata`
115 * **Other new options**: Many new options have been added such as
`--alias`,
`--print`,
`--concat-playlist`,
`--wait-for-video`,
`--retry-sleep`,
`--sleep-requests`,
`--convert-thumbnails`,
`--force-download-archive`,
`--force-overwrites`,
`--break-on-reject` etc
117 * **Improvements**: Regex and other operators in
`--format`/
`--match-filter`, multiple
`--postprocessor-args` and
`--downloader-args`, faster archive checking, more [format selection options](#format-selection), merge multi-video/audio, multiple
`--config-locations`,
`--exec` at different stages, etc
119 * **Plugins**: Extractors and PostProcessors can be loaded from an external file. See [plugins](#plugins) for details
121 * **Self-updater**: The releases can be updated using
`yt-dlp -U`
123 See
[changelog](Changelog.md) or [commits](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commits) for the full list of changes
125 Features marked with a **\*** have been back-ported to youtube-dl
127 ### Differences in default behavior
129 Some of yt-dlp's default options are different from that of youtube-dl and youtube-dlc:
131 * The options
`--auto-number` (
`-A`),
`--title` (
`-t`) and
`--literal` (
`-l`), no longer work. See [removed options](#Removed) for details
132 * `avconv` is not supported as an alternative to
`ffmpeg`
133 * yt-dlp stores config files in slightly different locations to youtube-dl. See [CONFIGURATION](#configuration) for a list of correct locations
134 * The default [output template](#output-template) is
`%(title)s [%(id)s].%(ext)s`. There is no real reason for this change. This was changed before yt-dlp was ever made public and now there are no plans to change it back to
`%(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s`. Instead, you may use
`--compat-options filename`
135 * The default [format sorting](#sorting-formats) is different from youtube-dl and prefers higher resolution and better codecs rather than higher bitrates. You can use the
`--format-sort` option to change this to any order you prefer, or use
`--compat-options format-sort` to use youtube-dl's sorting order
136 * The default format selector is
`bv*+ba/b`. This means that if a combined video + audio format that is better than the best video-only format is found, the former will be preferred. Use
`-f bv+ba/b` or
`--compat-options format-spec` to revert this
137 * Unlike youtube-dlc, yt-dlp does not allow merging multiple audio/video streams into one file by default (since this conflicts with the use of
`-f bv*+ba`). If needed, this feature must be enabled using
`--audio-multistreams` and
`--video-multistreams`. You can also use
`--compat-options multistreams` to enable both
138 * `--no-abort-on-error` is enabled by default. Use
`--abort-on-error` or
`--compat-options abort-on-error` to abort on errors instead
139 * When writing metadata files such as thumbnails, description or infojson, the same information (if available) is also written for playlists. Use
`--no-write-playlist-metafiles` or
`--compat-options no-playlist-metafiles` to not write these files
140 * `--add-metadata` attaches the
`infojson` to
`mkv` files in addition to writing the metadata when used with
`--write-info-json`. Use
`--no-embed-info-json` or
`--compat-options no-attach-info-json` to revert this
141 * Some metadata are embedded into different fields when using
`--add-metadata` as compared to youtube-dl. Most notably,
`comment` field contains the
`webpage_url` and
`synopsis` contains the
`description`. You can [use
`--parse-metadata`](#modifying-metadata) to modify this to your liking or use
`--compat-options embed-metadata` to revert this
142 * `playlist_index` behaves differently when used with options like
`--playlist-reverse` and
`--playlist-items`. See
[#302](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/302) for details. You can use
`--compat-options playlist-index` if you want to keep the earlier behavior
143 * The output of
`-F` is listed in a new format. Use
`--compat-options list-formats` to revert this
144 * Live chats (if available) are considered as subtitles. Use
`--sub-langs all,-live_chat` to download all subtitles except live chat. You can also use
`--compat-options no-live-chat` to prevent any live chat/danmaku from downloading
145 * YouTube channel URLs download all uploads of the channel. To download only the videos in a specific tab, pass the tab's URL. If the channel does not show the requested tab, an error will be raised. Also,
`/live` URLs raise an error if there are no live videos instead of silently downloading the entire channel. You may use
`--compat-options no-youtube-channel-redirect` to revert all these redirections
146 * Unavailable videos are also listed for YouTube playlists. Use
`--compat-options no-youtube-unavailable-videos` to remove this
147 * The upload dates extracted from YouTube are in UTC
[when available](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/89e4d86171c7b7c997c77d4714542e0383bf0db0/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py#L3898-L3900). Use
`--compat-options no-youtube-prefer-utc-upload-date` to prefer the non-UTC upload date.
148 * If
`ffmpeg` is used as the downloader, the downloading and merging of formats happen in a single step when possible. Use
`--compat-options no-direct-merge` to revert this
149 * Thumbnail embedding in
`mp4` is done with mutagen if possible. Use
`--compat-options embed-thumbnail-atomicparsley` to force the use of AtomicParsley instead
150 * Some private fields such as filenames are removed by default from the infojson. Use
`--no-clean-infojson` or
`--compat-options no-clean-infojson` to revert this
151 * When
`--embed-subs` and
`--write-subs` are used together, the subtitles are written to disk and also embedded in the media file. You can use just
`--embed-subs` to embed the subs and automatically delete the separate file. See
[#630 (comment)](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/630#issuecomment-893659460) for more info.
`--compat-options no-keep-subs` can be used to revert this
152 * `certifi` will be used for SSL root certificates, if installed. If you want to use system certificates (e.g. self-signed), use
`--compat-options no-certifi`
153 * yt-dlp's sanitization of invalid characters in filenames is different/smarter than in youtube-dl. You can use
`--compat-options filename-sanitization` to revert to youtube-dl's behavior
155 For ease of use, a few more compat options are available:
157 * `--compat-options all`: Use all compat options (Do NOT use)
158 * `--compat-options youtube-dl`: Same as
`--compat-options all,-multistreams`
159 * `--compat-options youtube-dlc`: Same as
`--compat-options all,-no-live-chat,-no-youtube-channel-redirect`
164 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
165 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.exe)
166 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp)
167 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos)
168 []
(https://pypi.org/project/yt-dlp)
169 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)
170 [](#release-files)
171 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases)
172 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
174 You can install yt-dlp using
[the binaries](#release-files), [PIP](https://pypi.org/project/yt-dlp) or one using a third-party package manager. See
[the wiki](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Installation) for detailed instructions
178 You can use
`yt-dlp -U` to update if you are [using the release binaries](#release-files)
180 If you
[installed with PIP](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Installation#with-pip), simply re-run the same command that was used to install the program
182 For other third-party package managers, see
[the wiki](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Installation) or refer their documentation
185 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
192 [yt-dlp](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp)|Platform-independent
[zipimport](https://docs.python.org/3/library/zipimport.html) binary. Needs Python (recommended for **Linux/BSD**)
193 [yt-dlp.exe](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.exe)|Windows (Win7 SP1+) standalone x64 binary (recommended for **Windows**)
194 [yt-dlp_macos](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos)|Universal MacOS (
10.15+) standalone executable (recommended for **MacOS**)
200 [yt-dlp_x86.exe](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_x86.exe)|Windows (Vista SP2+) standalone x86 (
32-bit) binary
201 [yt-dlp_min.exe](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_min.exe)|Windows (Win7 SP1+) standalone x64 binary built with
`py2exe`<br/> ([Not recommended](#standalone-py2exe-builds-windows))
202 [yt-dlp_linux](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux)|Linux standalone x64 binary
203 [yt-dlp_linux.zip](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux.zip)|Unpackaged Linux executable (no auto-update)
204 [yt-dlp_linux_armv7l](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux_armv7l)|Linux standalone armv7l (
32-bit) binary
205 [yt-dlp_linux_aarch64](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux_aarch64)|Linux standalone aarch64 (
64-bit) binary
206 [yt-dlp_win.zip](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_win.zip)|Unpackaged Windows executable (no auto-update)
207 [yt-dlp_macos.zip](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos.zip)|Unpackaged MacOS (
10.15+) executable (no auto-update)
208 [yt-dlp_macos_legacy](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos_legacy)|MacOS (
10.9+) standalone x64 executable
214 [yt-dlp.tar.gz](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)|Source tarball
215 [SHA2-512SUMS](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-512SUMS)|GNU-style SHA512 sums
216 [SHA2-256SUMS](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-256SUMS)|GNU-style SHA256 sums
217 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
220 Note: The manpages, shell completion files etc. are available in the
[source tarball](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)
223 Python versions
3.7+ (CPython and PyPy) are supported. Other versions and implementations may or may not work correctly.
225 <!-- Python
3.5+ uses VC++
14 and it is already embedded in the binary created
226 <!x-- https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=
26999 --x>
227 On windows,
[Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 SP1 Redistributable Package (x86)](https://download.microsoft.com/download/1/6/5/165255E7-1014-4D0A-B094-B6A430A6BFFC/vcredist_x86.exe) is also necessary to run yt-dlp. You probably already have this, but if the executable throws an error due to missing
`MSVCR100.dll` you need to install it manually.
230 While all the other dependencies are optional,
`ffmpeg` and
`ffprobe` are highly recommended
232 ### Strongly recommended
234 * [**ffmpeg** and **ffprobe**](https://www.ffmpeg.org) - Required for
[merging separate video and audio files](#format-selection) as well as for various [post-processing](#post-processing-options) tasks. License [depends on the build](https://www.ffmpeg.org/legal.html)
236 <!-- TODO: ffmpeg has merged this patch. Remove this note once there is new release -->
237 **Note**: There are some regressions in newer ffmpeg versions that causes various issues when used alongside yt-dlp. Since ffmpeg is such an important dependency, we provide
[custom builds](https://github.com/yt-dlp/FFmpeg-Builds#ffmpeg-static-auto-builds) with patches for these issues at
[yt-dlp/FFmpeg-Builds](https://github.com/yt-dlp/FFmpeg-Builds). See
[the readme](https://github.com/yt-dlp/FFmpeg-Builds#patches-applied) for details on the specific issues solved by these builds
240 * [**certifi**](https://github.com/certifi/python-certifi)\* - Provides Mozilla's root certificate bundle. Licensed under
[MPLv2](https://github.com/certifi/python-certifi/blob/master/LICENSE)
241 * [**brotli**](https://github.com/google/brotli)\* or
[**brotlicffi**](https://github.com/python-hyper/brotlicffi) -
[Brotli](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brotli) content encoding support. Both licensed under MIT <sup>
[1](https://github.com/google/brotli/blob/master/LICENSE) [2](https://github.com/python-hyper/brotlicffi/blob/master/LICENSE) </sup>
242 * [**websockets**](https://github.com/aaugustin/websockets)\* - For downloading over websocket. Licensed under
[BSD-3-Clause](https://github.com/aaugustin/websockets/blob/main/LICENSE)
246 * [**mutagen**](https://github.com/quodlibet/mutagen)\* - For
`--embed-thumbnail` in certain formats. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](https://github.com/quodlibet/mutagen/blob/master/COPYING)
247 * [**AtomicParsley**](https://github.com/wez/atomicparsley) - For
`--embed-thumbnail` in
`mp4`/
`m4a` files when
`mutagen`/
`ffmpeg` cannot. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](https://github.com/wez/atomicparsley/blob/master/COPYING)
248 * [**xattr**](https://github.com/xattr/xattr),
[**pyxattr**](https://github.com/iustin/pyxattr) or
[**setfattr**](http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/attr) - For writing xattr metadata (
`--xattr`) on **Linux**. Licensed under
[MIT](https://github.com/xattr/xattr/blob/master/LICENSE.txt),
[LGPL2.1](https://github.com/iustin/pyxattr/blob/master/COPYING) and
[GPLv2+](http://git.savannah.nongnu.org/cgit/attr.git/tree/doc/COPYING) respectively
252 * [**pycryptodomex**](https://github.com/Legrandin/pycryptodome)\* - For decrypting AES-
128 HLS streams and various other data. Licensed under
[BSD-2-Clause](https://github.com/Legrandin/pycryptodome/blob/master/LICENSE.rst)
253 * [**phantomjs**](https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs) - Used in extractors where javascript needs to be run. Licensed under
[BSD-3-Clause](https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/LICENSE.BSD)
254 * [**secretstorage**](https://github.com/mitya57/secretstorage) - For
`--cookies-from-browser` to access the **Gnome** keyring while decrypting cookies of **Chromium**-based browsers on **Linux**. Licensed under
[BSD-3-Clause](https://github.com/mitya57/secretstorage/blob/master/LICENSE)
255 * Any external downloader that you want to use with
`--downloader`
259 * [**avconv** and **avprobe**](https://www.libav.org) - Now **deprecated** alternative to ffmpeg. License
[depends on the build](https://libav.org/legal)
260 * [**sponskrub**](https://github.com/faissaloo/SponSkrub) - For using the now **deprecated**
[sponskrub options](#sponskrub-options). Licensed under [GPLv3+](https://github.com/faissaloo/SponSkrub/blob/master/LICENCE.md)
261 * [**rtmpdump**](http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu) - For downloading
`rtmp` streams. ffmpeg can be used instead with
`--downloader ffmpeg`. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu)
262 * [**mplayer**](http://mplayerhq.hu/design7/info.html) or
[**mpv**](https://mpv.io) - For downloading
`rstp`/
`mms` streams. ffmpeg can be used instead with
`--downloader ffmpeg`. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/blob/master/Copyright)
264 To use or redistribute the dependencies, you must agree to their respective licensing terms.
266 The standalone release binaries are built with the Python interpreter and the packages marked with **\*** included.
268 If you do not have the necessary dependencies for a task you are attempting, yt-dlp will warn you. All the currently available dependencies are visible at the top of the
`--verbose` output
273 ### Standalone PyInstaller Builds
274 To build the standalone executable, you must have Python and
`pyinstaller` (plus any of yt-dlp's [optional dependencies](#dependencies) if needed). Once you have all the necessary dependencies installed, simply run
`pyinst.py`. The executable will be built for the same architecture (x86/ARM,
32/
64 bit) as the Python used.
276 python3 -m pip install -U pyinstaller -r requirements.txt
277 python3 devscripts/make_lazy_extractors.py
280 On some systems, you may need to use
`py` or
`python` instead of
`python3`.
282 `pyinst.py` accepts any arguments that can be passed to
`pyinstaller`, such as
`--onefile/-F` or
`--onedir/-D`, which is further
[documented here](https://pyinstaller.org/en/stable/usage.html#what-to-generate).
284 Note that pyinstaller with versions below
4.4 [do not support](https://github.com/pyinstaller/pyinstaller#requirements-and-tested-platforms) Python installed from the Windows store without using a virtual environment.
286 **Important**: Running
`pyinstaller` directly **without** using
`pyinst.py` is **not** officially supported. This may or may not work correctly.
288 ### Platform-independent Binary (UNIX)
289 You will need the build tools
`python` (
3.7+),
`zip`,
`make` (GNU),
`pandoc`\* and
`pytest`\*.
291 After installing these, simply run
`make`.
293 You can also run
`make yt-dlp` instead to compile only the binary without updating any of the additional files. (The build tools marked with **\*** are not needed for this)
295 ### Standalone Py2Exe Builds (Windows)
297 While we provide the option to build with
[py2exe](https://www.py2exe.org), it is recommended to build [using PyInstaller](#standalone-pyinstaller-builds) instead since the py2exe builds **cannot contain
`pycryptodomex`/
`certifi` and needs VC++
14** on the target computer to run.
299 If you wish to build it anyway, install Python and py2exe, and then simply run
`setup.py py2exe`
301 py -m pip install -U py2exe -r requirements.txt
302 py devscripts/make_lazy_extractors.py
307 * **
`devscripts/update-version.py [revision]`** - Update the version number based on current date
308 * **
`devscripts/set-variant.py variant [-M update_message]`** - Set the build variant of the executable
309 * **
`devscripts/make_lazy_extractors.py`** - Create lazy extractors. Running this before building the binaries (any variant) will improve their startup performance. Set the environment variable
`YTDLP_NO_LAZY_EXTRACTORS=1` if you wish to forcefully disable lazy extractor loading.
311 You can also fork the project on GitHub and run your fork's [build workflow](.github/workflows/build.yml) to automatically build a full release
315 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
316 yt-dlp [OPTIONS] [--] URL [URL...]
318 `Ctrl+F` is your friend :D
319 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
321 <!-- Auto generated -->
323 -h, --help Print this help text and exit
324 --version Print program version and exit
325 -U, --update Update this program to the latest version
326 --no-update Do not check for updates (default)
327 -i, --ignore-errors Ignore download and postprocessing errors.
328 The download will be considered successful
329 even if the postprocessing fails
330 --no-abort-on-error Continue with next video on download errors;
331 e.g. to skip unavailable videos in a
333 --abort-on-error Abort downloading of further videos if an
334 error occurs (Alias: --no-ignore-errors)
335 --dump-user-agent Display the current user-agent and exit
336 --list-extractors List all supported extractors and exit
337 --extractor-descriptions Output descriptions of all supported
339 --use-extractors NAMES Extractor names to use separated by commas.
340 You can also use regexes, "all", "default"
341 and "end" (end URL matching); e.g. --ies
342 "holodex.*,end,youtube". Prefix the name
343 with a "-" to exclude it, e.g. --ies
344 default,-generic. Use --list-extractors for
345 a list of extractor names. (Alias: --ies)
346 --default-search PREFIX Use this prefix for unqualified URLs. E.g.
347 "gvsearch2:python" downloads two videos from
348 google videos for the search term "python".
349 Use the value "auto" to let yt-dlp guess
350 ("auto_warning" to emit a warning when
351 guessing). "error" just throws an error. The
352 default value "fixup_error" repairs broken
353 URLs, but emits an error if this is not
354 possible instead of searching
355 --ignore-config Don't load any more configuration files
356 except those given by --config-locations.
357 For backward compatibility, if this option
358 is found inside the system configuration
359 file, the user configuration is not loaded.
361 --no-config-locations Do not load any custom configuration files
362 (default). When given inside a configuration
363 file, ignore all previous --config-locations
364 defined in the current file
365 --config-locations PATH Location of the main configuration file;
366 either the path to the config or its
367 containing directory ("-" for stdin). Can be
368 used multiple times and inside other
370 --flat-playlist Do not extract the videos of a playlist,
372 --no-flat-playlist Extract the videos of a playlist
373 --live-from-start Download livestreams from the start.
374 Currently only supported for YouTube
376 --no-live-from-start Download livestreams from the current time
378 --wait-for-video MIN[-MAX] Wait for scheduled streams to become
379 available. Pass the minimum number of
380 seconds (or range) to wait between retries
381 --no-wait-for-video Do not wait for scheduled streams (default)
382 --mark-watched Mark videos watched (even with --simulate)
383 --no-mark-watched Do not mark videos watched (default)
384 --no-colors Do not emit color codes in output (Alias:
386 --compat-options OPTS Options that can help keep compatibility
387 with youtube-dl or youtube-dlc
388 configurations by reverting some of the
389 changes made in yt-dlp. See "Differences in
390 default behavior" for details
391 --alias ALIASES OPTIONS Create aliases for an option string. Unless
392 an alias starts with a dash "-", it is
393 prefixed with "--". Arguments are parsed
394 according to the Python string formatting
395 mini-language. E.g. --alias get-audio,-X
396 "-S=aext:{
0},abr -x --audio-format {
0}"
397 creates options "--get-audio" and "-X" that
398 takes an argument (ARG0) and expands to
399 "-S=aext:ARG0,abr -x --audio-format ARG0".
400 All defined aliases are listed in the --help
401 output. Alias options can trigger more
402 aliases; so be careful to avoid defining
403 recursive options. As a safety measure, each
404 alias may be triggered a maximum of
100
405 times. This option can be used multiple times
408 --proxy URL Use the specified HTTP/HTTPS/SOCKS proxy. To
409 enable SOCKS proxy, specify a proper scheme,
410 e.g. socks5://user:pass@
127.0.0.1:
1080/.
411 Pass in an empty string (--proxy "") for
413 --socket-timeout SECONDS Time to wait before giving up, in seconds
414 --source-address IP Client-side IP address to bind to
415 -4, --force-ipv4 Make all connections via IPv4
416 -6, --force-ipv6 Make all connections via IPv6
419 --geo-verification-proxy URL Use this proxy to verify the IP address for
420 some geo-restricted sites. The default proxy
421 specified by --proxy (or none, if the option
422 is not present) is used for the actual
424 --geo-bypass Bypass geographic restriction via faking
425 X-Forwarded-For HTTP header (default)
426 --no-geo-bypass Do not bypass geographic restriction via
427 faking X-Forwarded-For HTTP header
428 --geo-bypass-country CODE Force bypass geographic restriction with
429 explicitly provided two-letter ISO
3166-
2
431 --geo-bypass-ip-block IP_BLOCK Force bypass geographic restriction with
432 explicitly provided IP block in CIDR notation
435 -I, --playlist-items ITEM_SPEC Comma separated playlist_index of the videos
436 to download. You can specify a range using
437 "[START]:[STOP][:STEP]". For backward
438 compatibility, START-STOP is also supported.
439 Use negative indices to count from the right
440 and negative STEP to download in reverse
441 order. E.g. "-I
1:
3,
7,-
5::
2" used on a
442 playlist of size
15 will download the videos
443 at index
1,
2,
3,
7,
11,
13,
15
444 --min-filesize SIZE Do not download any videos smaller than
445 SIZE, e.g.
50k or
44.6M
446 --max-filesize SIZE Do not download any videos larger than SIZE,
448 --date DATE Download only videos uploaded on this date.
449 The date can be "YYYYMMDD" or in the format
450 [now|today|yesterday][-N[day|week|month|year]].
451 E.g. --date today-
2weeks
452 --datebefore DATE Download only videos uploaded on or before
453 this date. The date formats accepted is the
455 --dateafter DATE Download only videos uploaded on or after
456 this date. The date formats accepted is the
458 --match-filters FILTER Generic video filter. Any "OUTPUT TEMPLATE"
459 field can be compared with a number or a
460 string using the operators defined in
461 "Filtering Formats". You can also simply
462 specify a field to match if the field is
463 present, use "!field" to check if the field
464 is not present, and "&" to check multiple
465 conditions. Use a "
\" to escape "&" or
466 quotes if needed. If used multiple times,
467 the filter matches if atleast one of the
468 conditions are met. E.g. --match-filter
469 !is_live --match-filter "like_count>?
100 &
470 description~='(?i)
\bcats \& dogs
\b'" matches
471 only videos that are not live OR those that
472 have a like count more than
100 (or the like
473 field is not available) and also has a
474 description that contains the phrase "cats &
475 dogs" (caseless). Use "--match-filter -" to
476 interactively ask whether to download each
478 --no-match-filter Do not use generic video filter (default)
479 --no-playlist Download only the video, if the URL refers
480 to a video and a playlist
481 --yes-playlist Download the playlist, if the URL refers to
482 a video and a playlist
483 --age-limit YEARS Download only videos suitable for the given
485 --download-archive FILE Download only videos not listed in the
486 archive file. Record the IDs of all
487 downloaded videos in it
488 --no-download-archive Do not use archive file (default)
489 --max-downloads NUMBER Abort after downloading NUMBER files
490 --break-on-existing Stop the download process when encountering
491 a file that is in the archive
492 --break-on-reject Stop the download process when encountering
493 a file that has been filtered out
494 --break-per-input --break-on-existing, --break-on-reject,
495 --max-downloads, and autonumber resets per
497 --no-break-per-input --break-on-existing and similar options
498 terminates the entire download queue
499 --skip-playlist-after-errors N Number of allowed failures until the rest of
500 the playlist is skipped
503 -N, --concurrent-fragments N Number of fragments of a dash/hlsnative
504 video that should be downloaded concurrently
506 -r, --limit-rate RATE Maximum download rate in bytes per second,
508 --throttled-rate RATE Minimum download rate in bytes per second
509 below which throttling is assumed and the
510 video data is re-extracted, e.g.
100K
511 -R, --retries RETRIES Number of retries (default is
10), or
513 --file-access-retries RETRIES Number of times to retry on file access
514 error (default is
3), or "infinite"
515 --fragment-retries RETRIES Number of retries for a fragment (default is
516 10), or "infinite" (DASH, hlsnative and ISM)
517 --retry-sleep [TYPE:]EXPR Time to sleep between retries in seconds
518 (optionally) prefixed by the type of retry
519 (http (default), fragment, file_access,
520 extractor) to apply the sleep to. EXPR can
521 be a number, linear=START[:END[:STEP=
1]] or
522 exp=START[:END[:BASE=
2]]. This option can be
523 used multiple times to set the sleep for the
524 different retry types, e.g. --retry-sleep
525 linear=
1::
2 --retry-sleep fragment:exp=
1:
20
526 --skip-unavailable-fragments Skip unavailable fragments for DASH,
527 hlsnative and ISM downloads (default)
528 (Alias: --no-abort-on-unavailable-fragment)
529 --abort-on-unavailable-fragment
530 Abort download if a fragment is unavailable
531 (Alias: --no-skip-unavailable-fragments)
532 --keep-fragments Keep downloaded fragments on disk after
533 downloading is finished
534 --no-keep-fragments Delete downloaded fragments after
535 downloading is finished (default)
536 --buffer-size SIZE Size of download buffer, e.g.
1024 or
16K
538 --resize-buffer The buffer size is automatically resized
539 from an initial value of --buffer-size
541 --no-resize-buffer Do not automatically adjust the buffer size
542 --http-chunk-size SIZE Size of a chunk for chunk-based HTTP
543 downloading, e.g.
10485760 or
10M (default
544 is disabled). May be useful for bypassing
545 bandwidth throttling imposed by a webserver
547 --playlist-random Download playlist videos in random order
548 --lazy-playlist Process entries in the playlist as they are
549 received. This disables n_entries,
550 --playlist-random and --playlist-reverse
551 --no-lazy-playlist Process videos in the playlist only after
552 the entire playlist is parsed (default)
553 --xattr-set-filesize Set file xattribute ytdl.filesize with
555 --hls-use-mpegts Use the mpegts container for HLS videos;
556 allowing some players to play the video
557 while downloading, and reducing the chance
558 of file corruption if download is
559 interrupted. This is enabled by default for
561 --no-hls-use-mpegts Do not use the mpegts container for HLS
562 videos. This is default when not downloading
564 --download-sections REGEX Download only chapters whose title matches
565 the given regular expression. Time ranges
566 prefixed by a "*" can also be used in place
567 of chapters to download the specified range.
568 Needs ffmpeg. This option can be used
569 multiple times to download multiple
570 sections, e.g. --download-sections
571 "*
10:
15-inf" --download-sections "intro"
572 --downloader [PROTO:]NAME Name or path of the external downloader to
573 use (optionally) prefixed by the protocols
574 (http, ftp, m3u8, dash, rstp, rtmp, mms) to
575 use it for. Currently supports native,
576 aria2c, avconv, axel, curl, ffmpeg, httpie,
577 wget. You can use this option multiple times
578 to set different downloaders for different
579 protocols. E.g. --downloader aria2c
580 --downloader "dash,m3u8:native" will use
581 aria2c for http/ftp downloads, and the
582 native downloader for dash/m3u8 downloads
583 (Alias: --external-downloader)
584 --downloader-args NAME:ARGS Give these arguments to the external
585 downloader. Specify the downloader name and
586 the arguments separated by a colon ":". For
587 ffmpeg, arguments can be passed to different
588 positions using the same syntax as
589 --postprocessor-args. You can use this
590 option multiple times to give different
591 arguments to different downloaders (Alias:
592 --external-downloader-args)
594 ## Filesystem Options:
595 -a, --batch-file FILE File containing URLs to download ("-" for
596 stdin), one URL per line. Lines starting
597 with "#", ";" or "]" are considered as
599 --no-batch-file Do not read URLs from batch file (default)
600 -P, --paths [TYPES:]PATH The paths where the files should be
601 downloaded. Specify the type of file and the
602 path separated by a colon ":". All the same
603 TYPES as --output are supported.
604 Additionally, you can also provide "home"
605 (default) and "temp" paths. All intermediary
606 files are first downloaded to the temp path
607 and then the final files are moved over to
608 the home path after download is finished.
609 This option is ignored if --output is an
611 -o, --output [TYPES:]TEMPLATE Output filename template; see "OUTPUT
612 TEMPLATE" for details
613 --output-na-placeholder TEXT Placeholder for unavailable fields in
614 "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" (default: "NA")
615 --restrict-filenames Restrict filenames to only ASCII characters,
616 and avoid "&" and spaces in filenames
617 --no-restrict-filenames Allow Unicode characters, "&" and spaces in
619 --windows-filenames Force filenames to be Windows-compatible
620 --no-windows-filenames Make filenames Windows-compatible only if
621 using Windows (default)
622 --trim-filenames LENGTH Limit the filename length (excluding
623 extension) to the specified number of
625 -w, --no-overwrites Do not overwrite any files
626 --force-overwrites Overwrite all video and metadata files. This
627 option includes --no-continue
628 --no-force-overwrites Do not overwrite the video, but overwrite
629 related files (default)
630 -c, --continue Resume partially downloaded files/fragments
632 --no-continue Do not resume partially downloaded
633 fragments. If the file is not fragmented,
634 restart download of the entire file
635 --part Use .part files instead of writing directly
636 into output file (default)
637 --no-part Do not use .part files - write directly into
639 --mtime Use the Last-modified header to set the file
640 modification time (default)
641 --no-mtime Do not use the Last-modified header to set
642 the file modification time
643 --write-description Write video description to a .description file
644 --no-write-description Do not write video description (default)
645 --write-info-json Write video metadata to a .info.json file
646 (this may contain personal information)
647 --no-write-info-json Do not write video metadata (default)
648 --write-playlist-metafiles Write playlist metadata in addition to the
649 video metadata when using --write-info-json,
650 --write-description etc. (default)
651 --no-write-playlist-metafiles Do not write playlist metadata when using
652 --write-info-json, --write-description etc.
653 --clean-info-json Remove some private fields such as filenames
654 from the infojson. Note that it could still
655 contain some personal information (default)
656 --no-clean-info-json Write all fields to the infojson
657 --write-comments Retrieve video comments to be placed in the
658 infojson. The comments are fetched even
659 without this option if the extraction is
660 known to be quick (Alias: --get-comments)
661 --no-write-comments Do not retrieve video comments unless the
662 extraction is known to be quick (Alias:
664 --load-info-json FILE JSON file containing the video information
665 (created with the "--write-info-json" option)
666 --cookies FILE Netscape formatted file to read cookies from
667 and dump cookie jar in
668 --no-cookies Do not read/dump cookies from/to file
670 --cookies-from-browser BROWSER[+KEYRING][:PROFILE][::CONTAINER]
671 The name of the browser to load cookies
672 from. Currently supported browsers are:
673 brave, chrome, chromium, edge, firefox,
674 opera, safari, vivaldi. Optionally, the
675 KEYRING used for decrypting Chromium cookies
676 on Linux, the name/path of the PROFILE to
677 load cookies from, and the CONTAINER name
678 (if Firefox) ("none" for no container) can
679 be given with their respective seperators.
680 By default, all containers of the most
681 recently accessed profile are used.
682 Currently supported keyrings are: basictext,
683 gnomekeyring, kwallet
684 --no-cookies-from-browser Do not load cookies from browser (default)
685 --cache-dir DIR Location in the filesystem where yt-dlp can
686 store some downloaded information (such as
687 client ids and signatures) permanently. By
688 default ${XDG_CACHE_HOME}/yt-dlp
689 --no-cache-dir Disable filesystem caching
690 --rm-cache-dir Delete all filesystem cache files
692 ## Thumbnail Options:
693 --write-thumbnail Write thumbnail image to disk
694 --no-write-thumbnail Do not write thumbnail image to disk (default)
695 --write-all-thumbnails Write all thumbnail image formats to disk
696 --list-thumbnails List available thumbnails of each video.
697 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
699 ## Internet Shortcut Options:
700 --write-link Write an internet shortcut file, depending
701 on the current platform (.url, .webloc or
702 .desktop). The URL may be cached by the OS
703 --write-url-link Write a .url Windows internet shortcut. The
704 OS caches the URL based on the file path
705 --write-webloc-link Write a .webloc macOS internet shortcut
706 --write-desktop-link Write a .desktop Linux internet shortcut
708 ## Verbosity and Simulation Options:
709 -q, --quiet Activate quiet mode. If used with --verbose,
710 print the log to stderr
711 --no-warnings Ignore warnings
712 -s, --simulate Do not download the video and do not write
714 --no-simulate Download the video even if printing/listing
716 --ignore-no-formats-error Ignore "No video formats" error. Useful for
717 extracting metadata even if the videos are
718 not actually available for download
720 --no-ignore-no-formats-error Throw error when no downloadable video
721 formats are found (default)
722 --skip-download Do not download the video but write all
723 related files (Alias: --no-download)
724 -O, --print [WHEN:]TEMPLATE Field name or output template to print to
725 screen, optionally prefixed with when to
726 print it, separated by a ":". Supported
727 values of "WHEN" are the same as that of
728 --use-postprocessor, and "video" (default).
729 Implies --quiet. Implies --simulate unless
730 --no-simulate or later stages of WHEN are
731 used. This option can be used multiple times
732 --print-to-file [WHEN:]TEMPLATE FILE
733 Append given template to the file. The
734 values of WHEN and TEMPLATE are same as that
735 of --print. FILE uses the same syntax as the
736 output template. This option can be used
738 -j, --dump-json Quiet, but print JSON information for each
739 video. Simulate unless --no-simulate is
740 used. See "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for a
741 description of available keys
742 -J, --dump-single-json Quiet, but print JSON information for each
743 url or infojson passed. Simulate unless
744 --no-simulate is used. If the URL refers to
745 a playlist, the whole playlist information
746 is dumped in a single line
747 --force-write-archive Force download archive entries to be written
748 as far as no errors occur, even if -s or
749 another simulation option is used (Alias:
750 --force-download-archive)
751 --newline Output progress bar as new lines
752 --no-progress Do not print progress bar
753 --progress Show progress bar, even if in quiet mode
754 --console-title Display progress in console titlebar
755 --progress-template [TYPES:]TEMPLATE
756 Template for progress outputs, optionally
757 prefixed with one of "download:" (default),
758 "download-title:" (the console title),
759 "postprocess:", or "postprocess-title:".
760 The video's fields are accessible under the
761 "info" key and the progress attributes are
762 accessible under "progress" key. E.g.
763 --console-title --progress-template
764 "download-title:%(info.id)s-%(progress.eta)s"
765 -v, --verbose Print various debugging information
766 --dump-pages Print downloaded pages encoded using base64
767 to debug problems (very verbose)
768 --write-pages Write downloaded intermediary pages to files
769 in the current directory to debug problems
770 --print-traffic Display sent and read HTTP traffic
773 --encoding ENCODING Force the specified encoding (experimental)
774 --legacy-server-connect Explicitly allow HTTPS connection to servers
775 that do not support RFC
5746 secure
777 --no-check-certificates Suppress HTTPS certificate validation
778 --prefer-insecure Use an unencrypted connection to retrieve
779 information about the video (Currently
780 supported only for YouTube)
781 --add-header FIELD:VALUE Specify a custom HTTP header and its value,
782 separated by a colon ":". You can use this
783 option multiple times
784 --bidi-workaround Work around terminals that lack
785 bidirectional text support. Requires bidiv
786 or fribidi executable in PATH
787 --sleep-requests SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep between requests
788 during data extraction
789 --sleep-interval SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep before each
790 download. This is the minimum time to sleep
791 when used along with --max-sleep-interval
792 (Alias: --min-sleep-interval)
793 --max-sleep-interval SECONDS Maximum number of seconds to sleep. Can only
794 be used along with --min-sleep-interval
795 --sleep-subtitles SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep before each
798 ## Video Format Options:
799 -f, --format FORMAT Video format code, see "FORMAT SELECTION"
801 -S, --format-sort SORTORDER Sort the formats by the fields given, see
802 "Sorting Formats" for more details
803 --format-sort-force Force user specified sort order to have
804 precedence over all fields, see "Sorting
805 Formats" for more details (Alias: --S-force)
806 --no-format-sort-force Some fields have precedence over the user
807 specified sort order (default)
808 --video-multistreams Allow multiple video streams to be merged
810 --no-video-multistreams Only one video stream is downloaded for each
811 output file (default)
812 --audio-multistreams Allow multiple audio streams to be merged
814 --no-audio-multistreams Only one audio stream is downloaded for each
815 output file (default)
816 --prefer-free-formats Prefer video formats with free containers
817 over non-free ones of same quality. Use with
818 "-S ext" to strictly prefer free containers
819 irrespective of quality
820 --no-prefer-free-formats Don't give any special preference to free
822 --check-formats Make sure formats are selected only from
823 those that are actually downloadable
824 --check-all-formats Check all formats for whether they are
825 actually downloadable
826 --no-check-formats Do not check that the formats are actually
828 -F, --list-formats List available formats of each video.
829 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
830 --merge-output-format FORMAT Containers that may be used when merging
831 formats, separated by "/", e.g. "mp4/mkv".
832 Ignored if no merge is required. (currently
833 supported: avi, flv, mkv, mov, mp4, webm)
836 --write-subs Write subtitle file
837 --no-write-subs Do not write subtitle file (default)
838 --write-auto-subs Write automatically generated subtitle file
839 (Alias: --write-automatic-subs)
840 --no-write-auto-subs Do not write auto-generated subtitles
841 (default) (Alias: --no-write-automatic-subs)
842 --list-subs List available subtitles of each video.
843 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
844 --sub-format FORMAT Subtitle format; accepts formats preference,
845 e.g. "srt" or "ass/srt/best"
846 --sub-langs LANGS Languages of the subtitles to download (can
847 be regex) or "all" separated by commas, e.g.
848 --sub-langs "en.*,ja". You can prefix the
849 language code with a "-" to exclude it from
850 the requested languages, e.g. --sub-langs
851 all,-live_chat. Use --list-subs for a list
852 of available language tags
854 ## Authentication Options:
855 -u, --username USERNAME Login with this account ID
856 -p, --password PASSWORD Account password. If this option is left
857 out, yt-dlp will ask interactively
858 -2, --twofactor TWOFACTOR Two-factor authentication code
859 -n, --netrc Use .netrc authentication data
860 --netrc-location PATH Location of .netrc authentication data;
861 either the path or its containing directory.
863 --video-password PASSWORD Video password (vimeo, youku)
864 --ap-mso MSO Adobe Pass multiple-system operator (TV
865 provider) identifier, use --ap-list-mso for
866 a list of available MSOs
867 --ap-username USERNAME Multiple-system operator account login
868 --ap-password PASSWORD Multiple-system operator account password.
869 If this option is left out, yt-dlp will ask
871 --ap-list-mso List all supported multiple-system operators
872 --client-certificate CERTFILE Path to client certificate file in PEM
873 format. May include the private key
874 --client-certificate-key KEYFILE
875 Path to private key file for client
877 --client-certificate-password PASSWORD
878 Password for client certificate private key,
879 if encrypted. If not provided, and the key
880 is encrypted, yt-dlp will ask interactively
882 ## Post-Processing Options:
883 -x, --extract-audio Convert video files to audio-only files
884 (requires ffmpeg and ffprobe)
885 --audio-format FORMAT Format to convert the audio to when -x is
886 used. (currently supported: best (default),
887 aac, alac, flac, m4a, mp3, opus, vorbis,
888 wav). You can specify multiple rules using
889 similar syntax as --remux-video
890 --audio-quality QUALITY Specify ffmpeg audio quality to use when
891 converting the audio with -x. Insert a value
892 between
0 (best) and
10 (worst) for VBR or a
893 specific bitrate like
128K (default
5)
894 --remux-video FORMAT Remux the video into another container if
895 necessary (currently supported: avi, flv,
896 mkv, mov, mp4, webm, aac, aiff, alac, flac,
897 m4a, mka, mp3, ogg, opus, vorbis, wav). If
898 target container does not support the
899 video/audio codec, remuxing will fail. You
900 can specify multiple rules; e.g.
901 "aac>m4a/mov>mp4/mkv" will remux aac to m4a,
902 mov to mp4 and anything else to mkv
903 --recode-video FORMAT Re-encode the video into another format if
904 necessary. The syntax and supported formats
905 are the same as --remux-video
906 --postprocessor-args NAME:ARGS Give these arguments to the postprocessors.
907 Specify the postprocessor/executable name
908 and the arguments separated by a colon ":"
909 to give the argument to the specified
910 postprocessor/executable. Supported PP are:
911 Merger, ModifyChapters, SplitChapters,
912 ExtractAudio, VideoRemuxer, VideoConvertor,
913 Metadata, EmbedSubtitle, EmbedThumbnail,
914 SubtitlesConvertor, ThumbnailsConvertor,
915 FixupStretched, FixupM4a, FixupM3u8,
916 FixupTimestamp and FixupDuration. The
917 supported executables are: AtomicParsley,
918 FFmpeg and FFprobe. You can also specify
919 "PP+EXE:ARGS" to give the arguments to the
920 specified executable only when being used by
921 the specified postprocessor. Additionally,
922 for ffmpeg/ffprobe, "_i"/"_o" can be
923 appended to the prefix optionally followed
924 by a number to pass the argument before the
925 specified input/output file, e.g. --ppa
926 "Merger+ffmpeg_i1:-v quiet". You can use
927 this option multiple times to give different
928 arguments to different postprocessors.
930 -k, --keep-video Keep the intermediate video file on disk
931 after post-processing
932 --no-keep-video Delete the intermediate video file after
933 post-processing (default)
934 --post-overwrites Overwrite post-processed files (default)
935 --no-post-overwrites Do not overwrite post-processed files
936 --embed-subs Embed subtitles in the video (only for mp4,
938 --no-embed-subs Do not embed subtitles (default)
939 --embed-thumbnail Embed thumbnail in the video as cover art
940 --no-embed-thumbnail Do not embed thumbnail (default)
941 --embed-metadata Embed metadata to the video file. Also
942 embeds chapters/infojson if present unless
943 --no-embed-chapters/--no-embed-info-json are
944 used (Alias: --add-metadata)
945 --no-embed-metadata Do not add metadata to file (default)
946 (Alias: --no-add-metadata)
947 --embed-chapters Add chapter markers to the video file
948 (Alias: --add-chapters)
949 --no-embed-chapters Do not add chapter markers (default) (Alias:
951 --embed-info-json Embed the infojson as an attachment to
953 --no-embed-info-json Do not embed the infojson as an attachment
955 --parse-metadata FROM:TO Parse additional metadata like title/artist
956 from other fields; see "MODIFYING METADATA"
958 --replace-in-metadata FIELDS REGEX REPLACE
959 Replace text in a metadata field using the
960 given regex. This option can be used
962 --xattrs Write metadata to the video file's xattrs
963 (using dublin core and xdg standards)
964 --concat-playlist POLICY Concatenate videos in a playlist. One of
965 "never", "always", or "multi_video"
966 (default; only when the videos form a single
967 show). All the video files must have same
968 codecs and number of streams to be
969 concatable. The "pl_video:" prefix can be
970 used with "--paths" and "--output" to set
971 the output filename for the concatenated
972 files. See "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for details
973 --fixup POLICY Automatically correct known faults of the
974 file. One of never (do nothing), warn (only
975 emit a warning), detect_or_warn (the
976 default; fix file if we can, warn
977 otherwise), force (try fixing even if file
979 --ffmpeg-location PATH Location of the ffmpeg binary; either the
980 path to the binary or its containing directory
981 --exec [WHEN:]CMD Execute a command, optionally prefixed with
982 when to execute it (after_move if
983 unspecified), separated by a ":". Supported
984 values of "WHEN" are the same as that of
985 --use-postprocessor. Same syntax as the
986 output template can be used to pass any
987 field as arguments to the command. After
988 download, an additional field "filepath"
989 that contains the final path of the
990 downloaded file is also available, and if no
991 fields are passed, %(filepath)q is appended
992 to the end of the command. This option can
993 be used multiple times
994 --no-exec Remove any previously defined --exec
995 --convert-subs FORMAT Convert the subtitles to another format
996 (currently supported: ass, lrc, srt, vtt)
997 (Alias: --convert-subtitles)
998 --convert-thumbnails FORMAT Convert the thumbnails to another format
999 (currently supported: jpg, png, webp). You
1000 can specify multiple rules using similar
1001 syntax as --remux-video
1002 --split-chapters Split video into multiple files based on
1003 internal chapters. The "chapter:" prefix can
1004 be used with "--paths" and "--output" to set
1005 the output filename for the split files. See
1006 "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for details
1007 --no-split-chapters Do not split video based on chapters (default)
1008 --remove-chapters REGEX Remove chapters whose title matches the
1009 given regular expression. The syntax is the
1010 same as --download-sections. This option can
1011 be used multiple times
1012 --no-remove-chapters Do not remove any chapters from the file
1014 --force-keyframes-at-cuts Force keyframes at cuts when
1015 downloading/splitting/removing sections.
1016 This is slow due to needing a re-encode, but
1017 the resulting video may have fewer artifacts
1019 --no-force-keyframes-at-cuts Do not force keyframes around the chapters
1020 when cutting/splitting (default)
1021 --use-postprocessor NAME[:ARGS]
1022 The (case sensitive) name of plugin
1023 postprocessors to be enabled, and
1024 (optionally) arguments to be passed to it,
1025 separated by a colon ":". ARGS are a
1026 semicolon ";" delimited list of NAME=VALUE.
1027 The "when" argument determines when the
1028 postprocessor is invoked. It can be one of
1029 "pre_process" (after video extraction),
1030 "after_filter" (after video passes filter),
1031 "before_dl" (before each video download),
1032 "post_process" (after each video download;
1033 default), "after_move" (after moving video
1034 file to it's final locations), "after_video"
1035 (after downloading and processing all
1036 formats of a video), or "playlist" (at end
1037 of playlist). This option can be used
1038 multiple times to add different postprocessors
1040 ## SponsorBlock Options:
1041 Make chapter entries for, or remove various segments (sponsor,
1042 introductions, etc.) from downloaded YouTube videos using the
1043 [SponsorBlock API](https://sponsor.ajay.app)
1045 --sponsorblock-mark CATS SponsorBlock categories to create chapters
1046 for, separated by commas. Available
1047 categories are sponsor, intro, outro,
1048 selfpromo, preview, filler, interaction,
1049 music_offtopic, poi_highlight, chapter, all and
1050 default (=all). You can prefix the category
1051 with a "-" to exclude it. See [
1] for
1052 description of the categories. E.g.
1053 --sponsorblock-mark all,-preview
1054 [
1] https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Segment_Categories
1055 --sponsorblock-remove CATS SponsorBlock categories to be removed from
1056 the video file, separated by commas. If a
1057 category is present in both mark and remove,
1058 remove takes precedence. The syntax and
1059 available categories are the same as for
1060 --sponsorblock-mark except that "default"
1061 refers to "all,-filler" and poi_highlight and
1062 chapter are not available
1063 --sponsorblock-chapter-title TEMPLATE
1064 An output template for the title of the
1065 SponsorBlock chapters created by
1066 --sponsorblock-mark. The only available
1067 fields are start_time, end_time, category,
1068 categories, name, category_names. Defaults
1069 to "[SponsorBlock]: %(category_names)l"
1070 --no-sponsorblock Disable both --sponsorblock-mark and
1071 --sponsorblock-remove
1072 --sponsorblock-api URL SponsorBlock API location, defaults to
1073 https://sponsor.ajay.app
1075 ## Extractor Options:
1076 --extractor-retries RETRIES Number of retries for known extractor errors
1077 (default is
3), or "infinite"
1078 --allow-dynamic-mpd Process dynamic DASH manifests (default)
1079 (Alias: --no-ignore-dynamic-mpd)
1080 --ignore-dynamic-mpd Do not process dynamic DASH manifests
1081 (Alias: --no-allow-dynamic-mpd)
1082 --hls-split-discontinuity Split HLS playlists to different formats at
1083 discontinuities such as ad breaks
1084 --no-hls-split-discontinuity Do not split HLS playlists to different
1085 formats at discontinuities such as ad breaks
1087 --extractor-args IE_KEY:ARGS Pass ARGS arguments to the IE_KEY extractor.
1088 See "EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS" for details. You
1089 can use this option multiple times to give
1090 arguments for different extractors
1094 You can configure yt-dlp by placing any supported command line option to a configuration file. The configuration is loaded from the following locations:
1096 1. **Main Configuration**:
1097 * The file given by
`--config-location`
1098 1. **Portable Configuration**: (Recommended for portable installations)
1099 * If using a binary,
`yt-dlp.conf` in the same directory as the binary
1100 * If running from source-code,
`yt-dlp.conf` in the parent directory of
`yt_dlp`
1101 1. **Home Configuration**:
1102 * `yt-dlp.conf` in the home path given by
`-P`
1103 * If
`-P` is not given, the current directory is searched
1104 1. **User Configuration**:
1105 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp/config` (recommended on Linux/macOS)
1106 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp.conf`
1107 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp/config` (recommended on Windows)
1108 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp/config.txt`
1110 * `~/yt-dlp.conf.txt`
1112 See also: [Notes about environment variables](#notes-about-environment-variables)
1113 1. **System Configuration**:
1114 * `/etc/yt-dlp.conf`
1116 E.g. with the following configuration file yt-dlp will always extract the audio, not copy the mtime, use a proxy and save all videos under
`YouTube` directory in your home directory:
1118 # Lines starting with # are comments
1120 # Always extract audio
1123 # Do not copy the mtime
1127 --proxy 127.0.0.1:3128
1129 # Save all videos under YouTube directory in your home directory
1130 -o ~/YouTube/%(title)s.%(ext)s
1133 Note that options in configuration file are just the same options aka switches used in regular command line calls; thus there **must be no whitespace** after
`-` or
`--`, e.g.
`-o` or
`--proxy` but not
`- o` or
`-- proxy`. They must also be quoted when necessary as-if it were a UNIX shell.
1135 You can use
`--ignore-config` if you want to disable all configuration files for a particular yt-dlp run. If
`--ignore-config` is found inside any configuration file, no further configuration will be loaded. For example, having the option in the portable configuration file prevents loading of home, user, and system configurations. Additionally, (for backward compatibility) if
`--ignore-config` is found inside the system configuration file, the user configuration is not loaded.
1137 ### Configuration file encoding
1139 The configuration files are decoded according to the UTF BOM if present, and in the encoding from system locale otherwise.
1141 If you want your file to be decoded differently, add
`# coding: ENCODING` to the beginning of the file (e.g.
`# coding: shift-jis`). There must be no characters before that, even spaces or BOM.
1143 ### Authentication with `.netrc` file
1145 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 yt-dlp execution and prevent tracking plain text passwords in the shell command history. You can achieve this using a
[`.netrc` file](https://stackoverflow.com/tags/.netrc/info) on a per-extractor basis. For that you will need to create a
`.netrc` file in
`--netrc-location` and restrict permissions to read/write by only you:
1147 touch ${HOME}/.netrc
1148 chmod a-rwx,u+rw ${HOME}/.netrc
1150 After that you can add credentials for an extractor in the following format, where *extractor* is the name of the extractor in lowercase:
1152 machine <extractor> login <username> password <password>
1156 machine youtube login myaccount@gmail.com password my_youtube_password
1157 machine twitch login my_twitch_account_name password my_twitch_password
1159 To activate authentication with the
`.netrc` file you should pass
`--netrc` to yt-dlp or place it in the [configuration file](#configuration).
1161 The default location of the .netrc file is
`~` (see below).
1163 ### Notes about environment variables
1164 * Environment variables are normally specified as
`${VARIABLE}`/
`$VARIABLE` on UNIX and
`%VARIABLE%` on Windows; but is always shown as
`${VARIABLE}` in this documentation
1165 * yt-dlp also allow using UNIX-style variables on Windows for path-like options; e.g.
`--output`,
`--config-location`
1166 * If unset,
`${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}` defaults to
`~/.config` and
`${XDG_CACHE_HOME}` to
`~/.cache`
1167 * On Windows,
`~` points to
`${HOME}` if present; or,
`${USERPROFILE}` or
`${HOMEDRIVE}${HOMEPATH}` otherwise
1168 * On Windows,
`${USERPROFILE}` generally points to
`C:\Users\<user name>` and
`${APPDATA}` to
`${USERPROFILE}\AppData\Roaming`
1172 The
`-o` option is used to indicate a template for the output file names while
`-P` option is used to specify the path each type of file should be saved to.
1174 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1175 **tl;dr:** [navigate me to examples](#output-template-examples).
1176 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1178 The simplest usage of
`-o` is not to set any template arguments when downloading a single file, like in
`yt-dlp -o funny_video.flv "https://some/video"` (hard-coding file extension like this is _not_ recommended and could break some post-processing).
1180 It may however also contain special sequences that will be replaced when downloading each video. The special sequences may be formatted according to
[Python string formatting operations](https://docs.python.org/3/library/stdtypes.html#printf-style-string-formatting), e.g.
`%(NAME)s` or
`%(NAME)05d`. To clarify, that is a percent symbol followed by a name in parentheses, followed by formatting operations.
1182 The field names themselves (the part inside the parenthesis) can also have some special formatting:
1184 1. **Object traversal**: The dictionaries and lists available in metadata can be traversed by using a dot
`.` separator; e.g.
`%(tags.0)s`,
`%(subtitles.en.-1.ext)s`. You can do Python slicing with colon
`:`; E.g.
`%(id.3:7:-1)s`,
`%(formats.:.format_id)s`. Curly braces
`{}` can be used to build dictionaries with only specific keys; e.g.
`%(formats.:.{format_id,height})#j`. An empty field name
`%()s` refers to the entire infodict; e.g.
`%(.{id,title})s`. Note that all the fields that become available using this method are not listed below. Use
`-j` to see such fields
1186 1. **Addition**: Addition and subtraction of numeric fields can be done using
`+` and
`-` respectively. E.g.
`%(playlist_index+10)03d`,
`%(n_entries+1-playlist_index)d`
1188 1. **Date/time Formatting**: Date/time fields can be formatted according to
[strftime formatting](https://docs.python.org/3/library/datetime.html#strftime-and-strptime-format-codes) by specifying it separated from the field name using a
`>`. E.g.
`%(duration>%H-%M-%S)s`,
`%(upload_date>%Y-%m-%d)s`,
`%(epoch-3600>%H-%M-%S)s`
1190 1. **Alternatives**: Alternate fields can be specified separated with a
`,`. E.g.
`%(release_date>%Y,upload_date>%Y|Unknown)s`
1192 1. **Replacement**: A replacement value can be specified using a
`&` separator. If the field is *not* empty, this replacement value will be used instead of the actual field content. This is done after alternate fields are considered; thus the replacement is used if *any* of the alternative fields is *not* empty.
1194 1. **Default**: A literal default value can be specified for when the field is empty using a
`|` separator. This overrides
`--output-na-placeholder`. E.g.
`%(uploader|Unknown)s`
1196 1. **More Conversions**: In addition to the normal format types
`diouxXeEfFgGcrs`, yt-dlp additionally supports converting to
`B` = **B**ytes,
`j` = **j**son (flag
`#` for pretty-printing,
`+` for Unicode),
`h` = HTML escaping,
`l` = a comma separated **l**ist (flag
`#` for
`\n` newline-separated),
`q` = a string **q**uoted for the terminal (flag
`#` to split a list into different arguments),
`D` = add **D**ecimal suffixes (e.g.
10M) (flag
`#` to use
1024 as factor), and
`S` = **S**anitize as filename (flag
`#` for restricted)
1198 1. **Unicode normalization**: The format type
`U` can be used for NFC
[Unicode normalization](https://docs.python.org/3/library/unicodedata.html#unicodedata.normalize). The alternate form flag (
`#`) changes the normalization to NFD and the conversion flag
`+` can be used for NFKC/NFKD compatibility equivalence normalization. E.g.
`%(title)+.100U` is NFKC
1200 To summarize, the general syntax for a field is:
1202 %(name[.keys][addition][>strf][,alternate][&replacement][|default])[flags][width][.precision][length]type
1205 Additionally, you can set different output templates for the various metadata files separately from the general output template by specifying the type of file followed by the template separated by a colon
`:`. The different file types supported are
`subtitle`,
`thumbnail`,
`description`,
`annotation` (deprecated),
`infojson`,
`link`,
`pl_thumbnail`,
`pl_description`,
`pl_infojson`,
`chapter`,
`pl_video`. E.g.
`-o "%(title)s.%(ext)s" -o "thumbnail:%(title)s\%(title)s.%(ext)s"` will put the thumbnails in a folder with the same name as the video. If any of the templates is empty, that type of file will not be written. E.g.
`--write-thumbnail -o "thumbnail:"` will write thumbnails only for playlists and not for video.
1207 The available fields are:
1209 - `id` (string): Video identifier
1210 - `title` (string): Video title
1211 - `fulltitle` (string): Video title ignoring live timestamp and generic title
1212 - `ext` (string): Video filename extension
1213 - `alt_title` (string): A secondary title of the video
1214 - `description` (string): The description of the video
1215 - `display_id` (string): An alternative identifier for the video
1216 - `uploader` (string): Full name of the video uploader
1217 - `license` (string): License name the video is licensed under
1218 - `creator` (string): The creator of the video
1219 - `timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video became available
1220 - `upload_date` (string): Video upload date in UTC (YYYYMMDD)
1221 - `release_timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video was released
1222 - `release_date` (string): The date (YYYYMMDD) when the video was released in UTC
1223 - `modified_timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video was last modified
1224 - `modified_date` (string): The date (YYYYMMDD) when the video was last modified in UTC
1225 - `uploader_id` (string): Nickname or id of the video uploader
1226 - `channel` (string): Full name of the channel the video is uploaded on
1227 - `channel_id` (string): Id of the channel
1228 - `channel_follower_count` (numeric): Number of followers of the channel
1229 - `location` (string): Physical location where the video was filmed
1230 - `duration` (numeric): Length of the video in seconds
1231 - `duration_string` (string): Length of the video (HH:mm:ss)
1232 - `view_count` (numeric): How many users have watched the video on the platform
1233 - `concurrent_view_count` (numeric): How many users are currently watching the video on the platform.
1234 - `like_count` (numeric): Number of positive ratings of the video
1235 - `dislike_count` (numeric): Number of negative ratings of the video
1236 - `repost_count` (numeric): Number of reposts of the video
1237 - `average_rating` (numeric): Average rating give by users, the scale used depends on the webpage
1238 - `comment_count` (numeric): Number of comments on the video (For some extractors, comments are only downloaded at the end, and so this field cannot be used)
1239 - `age_limit` (numeric): Age restriction for the video (years)
1240 - `live_status` (string): One of "not_live", "is_live", "is_upcoming", "was_live", "post_live" (was live, but VOD is not yet processed)
1241 - `is_live` (boolean): Whether this video is a live stream or a fixed-length video
1242 - `was_live` (boolean): Whether this video was originally a live stream
1243 - `playable_in_embed` (string): Whether this video is allowed to play in embedded players on other sites
1244 - `availability` (string): Whether the video is "private", "premium_only", "subscriber_only", "needs_auth", "unlisted" or "public"
1245 - `start_time` (numeric): Time in seconds where the reproduction should start, as specified in the URL
1246 - `end_time` (numeric): Time in seconds where the reproduction should end, as specified in the URL
1247 - `extractor` (string): Name of the extractor
1248 - `extractor_key` (string): Key name of the extractor
1249 - `epoch` (numeric): Unix epoch of when the information extraction was completed
1250 - `autonumber` (numeric): Number that will be increased with each download, starting at
`--autonumber-start`
1251 - `video_autonumber` (numeric): Number that will be increased with each video
1252 - `n_entries` (numeric): Total number of extracted items in the playlist
1253 - `playlist_id` (string): Identifier of the playlist that contains the video
1254 - `playlist_title` (string): Name of the playlist that contains the video
1255 - `playlist` (string):
`playlist_id` or
`playlist_title`
1256 - `playlist_count` (numeric): Total number of items in the playlist. May not be known if entire playlist is not extracted
1257 - `playlist_index` (numeric): Index of the video in the playlist padded with leading zeros according the final index
1258 - `playlist_autonumber` (numeric): Position of the video in the playlist download queue padded with leading zeros according to the total length of the playlist
1259 - `playlist_uploader` (string): Full name of the playlist uploader
1260 - `playlist_uploader_id` (string): Nickname or id of the playlist uploader
1261 - `webpage_url` (string): A URL to the video webpage which if given to yt-dlp should allow to get the same result again
1262 - `webpage_url_basename` (string): The basename of the webpage URL
1263 - `webpage_url_domain` (string): The domain of the webpage URL
1264 - `original_url` (string): The URL given by the user (or same as
`webpage_url` for playlist entries)
1266 All the fields in [Filtering Formats](#filtering-formats) can also be used
1268 Available for the video that belongs to some logical chapter or section:
1270 - `chapter` (string): Name or title of the chapter the video belongs to
1271 - `chapter_number` (numeric): Number of the chapter the video belongs to
1272 - `chapter_id` (string): Id of the chapter the video belongs to
1274 Available for the video that is an episode of some series or programme:
1276 - `series` (string): Title of the series or programme the video episode belongs to
1277 - `season` (string): Title of the season the video episode belongs to
1278 - `season_number` (numeric): Number of the season the video episode belongs to
1279 - `season_id` (string): Id of the season the video episode belongs to
1280 - `episode` (string): Title of the video episode
1281 - `episode_number` (numeric): Number of the video episode within a season
1282 - `episode_id` (string): Id of the video episode
1284 Available for the media that is a track or a part of a music album:
1286 - `track` (string): Title of the track
1287 - `track_number` (numeric): Number of the track within an album or a disc
1288 - `track_id` (string): Id of the track
1289 - `artist` (string): Artist(s) of the track
1290 - `genre` (string): Genre(s) of the track
1291 - `album` (string): Title of the album the track belongs to
1292 - `album_type` (string): Type of the album
1293 - `album_artist` (string): List of all artists appeared on the album
1294 - `disc_number` (numeric): Number of the disc or other physical medium the track belongs to
1295 - `release_year` (numeric): Year (YYYY) when the album was released
1297 Available only when using
`--download-sections` and for
`chapter:` prefix when using
`--split-chapters` for videos with internal chapters:
1299 - `section_title` (string): Title of the chapter
1300 - `section_number` (numeric): Number of the chapter within the file
1301 - `section_start` (numeric): Start time of the chapter in seconds
1302 - `section_end` (numeric): End time of the chapter in seconds
1304 Available only when used in
`--print`:
1306 - `urls` (string): The URLs of all requested formats, one in each line
1307 - `filename` (string): Name of the video file. Note that the actual filename may be different due to post-processing. Use
`--exec echo` to get the name after all postprocessing is complete
1308 - `formats_table` (table): The video format table as printed by
`--list-formats`
1309 - `thumbnails_table` (table): The thumbnail format table as printed by
`--list-thumbnails`
1310 - `subtitles_table` (table): The subtitle format table as printed by
`--list-subs`
1311 - `automatic_captions_table` (table): The automatic subtitle format table as printed by
`--list-subs`
1314 Available only in
`--sponsorblock-chapter-title`:
1316 - `start_time` (numeric): Start time of the chapter in seconds
1317 - `end_time` (numeric): End time of the chapter in seconds
1318 - `categories` (list): The
[SponsorBlock categories](https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Types#Category) the chapter belongs to
1319 - `category` (string): The smallest SponsorBlock category the chapter belongs to
1320 - `category_names` (list): Friendly names of the categories
1321 - `name` (string): Friendly name of the smallest category
1322 - `type` (string): The
[SponsorBlock action type](https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Types#Action_Type) of the chapter
1324 Each aforementioned sequence when referenced in an output template will be replaced by the actual value corresponding to the sequence name. E.g. for
`-o %(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s` and an mp4 video with title
`yt-dlp test video` and id
`BaW_jenozKc`, this will result in a
`yt-dlp test video-BaW_jenozKc.mp4` file created in the current directory.
1326 Note that some of the sequences are not guaranteed to be present since they depend on the metadata obtained by a particular extractor. Such sequences will be replaced with placeholder value provided with
`--output-na-placeholder` (
`NA` by default).
1328 **Tip**: Look at the
`-j` output to identify which fields are available for the particular URL
1330 For numeric sequences you can use
[numeric related formatting](https://docs.python.org/3/library/stdtypes.html#printf-style-string-formatting); e.g.
`%(view_count)05d` will result in a string with view count padded with zeros up to
5 characters, like in
`00042`.
1332 Output templates can also contain arbitrary hierarchical path, e.g.
`-o "%(playlist)s/%(playlist_index)s - %(title)s.%(ext)s"` which will result in downloading each video in a directory corresponding to this path template. Any missing directory will be automatically created for you.
1334 To use percent literals in an output template use
`%%`. To output to stdout use
`-o -`.
1336 The current default template is
`%(title)s [%(id)s].%(ext)s`.
1338 In some cases, you don't want special characters such as 中, spaces, or &, such as when transferring the downloaded filename to a Windows system or the filename through an
8bit-unsafe channel. In these cases, add the
`--restrict-filenames` flag to get a shorter title.
1340 #### Output template examples
1343 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "test video.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc
1344 test video.webm # Literal name with correct extension
1346 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc
1347 youtube-dl test video ''_ä↭𝕐.webm # All kinds of weird characters
1349 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc --restrict-filenames
1350 youtube-dl_test_video_.webm # Restricted file name
1352 # Download YouTube playlist videos in separate directory indexed by video order in a playlist
1353 $ yt-dlp -o "%(playlist)s/%(playlist_index)s - %(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwiyx1dc3P2JR9N8gQaQN_BCvlSlap7re"
1355 # Download YouTube playlist videos in separate directories according to their uploaded year
1356 $ yt-dlp -o "%(upload_date>%Y)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwiyx1dc3P2JR9N8gQaQN_BCvlSlap7re"
1358 # Prefix playlist index with " - " separator, but only if it is available
1359 $ yt-dlp -o '%(playlist_index|)s%(playlist_index& - |)s%(title)s.%(ext)s' BaW_jenozKc "https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLinuxFoundation/playlists"
1361 # Download all playlists of YouTube channel/user keeping each playlist in separate directory:
1362 $ yt-dlp -o "%(uploader)s/%(playlist)s/%(playlist_index)s - %(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLinuxFoundation/playlists"
1364 # Download Udemy course keeping each chapter in separate directory under MyVideos directory in your home
1365 $ yt-dlp -u user -p password -P "~/MyVideos" -o "%(playlist)s/%(chapter_number)s - %(chapter)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.udemy.com/java-tutorial"
1367 # Download entire series season keeping each series and each season in separate directory under C:/MyVideos
1368 $ yt-dlp -P "C:/MyVideos" -o "%(series)s/%(season_number)s - %(season)s/%(episode_number)s - %(episode)s.%(ext)s" "https://videomore.ru/kino_v_detalayah/5_sezon/367617"
1370 # Download video as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\title.ext", subtitles as "C:\MyVideos\subs\uploader\title.ext"
1371 # and put all temporary files in "C:\MyVideos\tmp"
1372 $ yt-dlp -P "C:/MyVideos" -P "temp:tmp" -P "subtitle:subs" -o "%(uploader)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenoz --write-subs
1374 # Download video as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\title.ext" and subtitles as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\subs\title.ext"
1375 $ yt-dlp -P "C:/MyVideos" -o "%(uploader)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" -o "subtitle:%(uploader)s/subs/%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc --write-subs
1377 # Stream the video being downloaded to stdout
1378 $ yt-dlp -o - BaW_jenozKc
1383 By default, yt-dlp tries to download the best available quality if you **don't** pass any options.
1384 This is generally equivalent to using
`-f bestvideo*+bestaudio/best`. However, if multiple audiostreams is enabled (
`--audio-multistreams`), the default format changes to
`-f bestvideo+bestaudio/best`. Similarly, if ffmpeg is unavailable, or if you use yt-dlp to stream to
`stdout` (
`-o -`), the default becomes
`-f best/bestvideo+bestaudio`.
1386 **Deprecation warning**: Latest versions of yt-dlp can stream multiple formats to the stdout simultaneously using ffmpeg. So, in future versions, the default for this will be set to
`-f bv*+ba/b` similar to normal downloads. If you want to preserve the
`-f b/bv+ba` setting, it is recommended to explicitly specify it in the configuration options.
1388 The general syntax for format selection is
`-f FORMAT` (or
`--format FORMAT`) where
`FORMAT` is a *selector expression*, i.e. an expression that describes format or formats you would like to download.
1390 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1391 **tl;dr:** [navigate me to examples](#format-selection-examples).
1392 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1394 The simplest case is requesting a specific format; e.g. with
`-f 22` you can download the format with format code equal to
22. You can get the list of available format codes for particular video using
`--list-formats` or
`-F`. Note that these format codes are extractor specific.
1396 You can also use a file extension (currently
`3gp`,
`aac`,
`flv`,
`m4a`,
`mp3`,
`mp4`,
`ogg`,
`wav`,
`webm` are supported) to download the best quality format of a particular file extension served as a single file, e.g.
`-f webm` will download the best quality format with the
`webm` extension served as a single file.
1398 You can use
`-f -` to interactively provide the format selector *for each video*
1400 You can also use special names to select particular edge case formats:
1402 - `all`: Select **all formats** separately
1403 - `mergeall`: Select and **merge all formats** (Must be used with
`--audio-multistreams`,
`--video-multistreams` or both)
1404 - `b*`,
`best*`: Select the best quality format that **contains either** a video or an audio or both (ie;
`vcodec!=none or acodec!=none`)
1405 - `b`,
`best`: Select the best quality format that **contains both** video and audio. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec!=none][acodec!=none]`
1406 - `bv`,
`bestvideo`: Select the best quality **video-only** format. Equivalent to
`best*[acodec=none]`
1407 - `bv*`,
`bestvideo*`: Select the best quality format that **contains video**. It may also contain audio. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec!=none]`
1408 - `ba`,
`bestaudio`: Select the best quality **audio-only** format. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec=none]`
1409 - `ba*`,
`bestaudio*`: Select the best quality format that **contains audio**. It may also contain video. Equivalent to
`best*[acodec!=none]` ([Do not use!](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/979#issuecomment-919629354))
1410 - `w*
`, `worst*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains either a video or an audio
1411 - `w
`, `worst
`: Select the worst quality format that contains both video and audio. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec!=none][acodec!=none]
`
1412 - `wv
`, `worstvideo
`: Select the worst quality video-only format. Equivalent to `worst*[acodec=none]
`
1413 - `wv*
`, `worstvideo*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains video. It may also contain audio. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec!=none]
`
1414 - `wa
`, `worstaudio
`: Select the worst quality audio-only format. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec=none]
`
1415 - `wa*
`, `worstaudio*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains audio. It may also contain video. Equivalent to `worst*[acodec!=none]
`
1417 For example, to download the worst quality video-only format you can use `-f worstvideo
`. It is however recommended not to use `worst
` and related options. When your format selector is `worst
`, the format which is worst in all respects is selected. Most of the time, what you actually want is the video with the smallest filesize instead. So it is generally better to use `-S +size
` or more rigorously, `-S +size,+br,+res,+fps
` instead of `-f worst
`. See [Sorting Formats](#sorting-formats) for more details.
1419 You can select the n'th best format of a type by using `best<type>.<n>
`. For example, `best
.2` will select the 2nd best combined format. Similarly, `bv*
.3` will select the 3rd best format that contains a video stream.
1421 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. Note that formats on the left hand side are preferred; e.g. `-f
22/
17/
18` will download format 22 if it's available, otherwise it will download format 17 if it's available, otherwise it will download format 18 if it's available, otherwise it will complain that no suitable formats are available for download.
1423 If you want to download several formats of the same video use a comma as a separator, e.g. `-f
22,
17,
18` will download all these three formats, of course if they are available. Or a more sophisticated example combined with the precedence feature: `-f
136/
137/mp4/bestvideo,
140/m4a/bestaudio
`.
1425 You can merge the video and audio of multiple formats into a single file using `-f <format1>+<format2>+...
` (requires ffmpeg installed); e.g. `-f bestvideo+bestaudio
` will download the best video-only format, the best audio-only format and mux them together with ffmpeg.
1427 **Deprecation warning**: Since the *below* described behavior is complex and counter-intuitive, this will be removed and multistreams will be enabled by default in the future. A new operator will be instead added to limit formats to single audio/video
1429 Unless `--video-multistreams
` is used, all formats with a video stream except the first one are ignored. Similarly, unless `--audio-multistreams
` is used, all formats with an audio stream except the first one are ignored. E.g. `-f bestvideo+best+bestaudio --video-multistreams --audio-multistreams
` will download and merge all 3 given formats. The resulting file will have 2 video streams and 2 audio streams. But `-f bestvideo+best+bestaudio --no-video-multistreams
` will download and merge only `bestvideo
` and `bestaudio
`. `best
` is ignored since another format containing a video stream (`bestvideo
`) has already been selected. The order of the formats is therefore important. `-f best+bestaudio --no-audio-multistreams
` will download only `best
` while `-f bestaudio+best --no-audio-multistreams
` will ignore `best
` and download only `bestaudio
`.
1431 ## Filtering Formats
1433 You can also filter the video formats by putting a condition in brackets, as in `-f "best[height=
720]"
` (or `-f "[filesize>
10M]"
`).
1435 The following numeric meta fields can be used with comparisons `<
`, `<=
`, `>
`, `>=
`, `=
` (equals), `!=
` (not equals):
1437 - `filesize
`: The number of bytes, if known in advance
1438 - `filesize_approx
`: An estimate for the number of bytes
1439 - `width
`: Width of the video, if known
1440 - `height
`: Height of the video, if known
1441 - `tbr
`: Average bitrate of audio and video in KBit/s
1442 - `abr
`: Average audio bitrate in KBit/s
1443 - `vbr
`: Average video bitrate in KBit/s
1444 - `asr
`: Audio sampling rate in Hertz
1446 - `audio_channels
`: The number of audio channels
1447 - `stretched_ratio
`: `width:height
` of the video's pixels, if not square
1449 Also filtering work for comparisons `=
` (equals), `^=
` (starts with), `$=
` (ends with), `*=
` (contains), `~=
` (matches regex) and following string meta fields:
1452 - `ext
`: File extension
1453 - `acodec
`: Name of the audio codec in use
1454 - `vcodec
`: Name of the video codec in use
1455 - `container
`: Name of the container format
1456 - `protocol
`: The protocol that will be used for the actual download, lower-case (`http
`, `https
`, `rtsp
`, `rtmp
`, `rtmpe
`, `mms
`, `f4m
`, `ism
`, `http_dash_segments
`, `m3u8
`, or `m3u8_native
`)
1457 - `language
`: Language code
1458 - `dynamic_range
`: The dynamic range of the video
1459 - `format_id
`: A short description of the format
1460 - `format
`: A human-readable description of the format
1461 - `format_note
`: Additional info about the format
1462 - `resolution
`: Textual description of width and height
1464 Any string comparison may be prefixed with negation `!
` in order to produce an opposite comparison, e.g. `!*=
` (does not contain). The comparand of a string comparison needs to be quoted with either double or single quotes if it contains spaces or special characters other than `._-
`.
1466 Note that none of the aforementioned meta fields are guaranteed to be present since this solely depends on the metadata obtained by particular extractor, i.e. the metadata offered by the website. Any other field made available by the extractor can also be used for filtering.
1468 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. You can also use the filters with `all
` to download all formats that satisfy the filter, e.g. `-f "all[vcodec=none]"
` selects all audio-only formats.
1470 Format selectors can also be grouped using parentheses; e.g. `-f "(mp4,webm)[height<
480]"
` will download the best pre-merged mp4 and webm formats with a height lower than 480.
1474 You can change the criteria for being considered the `best
` by using `-S
` (`--format-sort
`). The general format for this is `--format-sort field1,field2...
`.
1476 The available fields are:
1478 - `hasvid
`: Gives priority to formats that have a video stream
1479 - `hasaud
`: Gives priority to formats that have an audio stream
1480 - `ie_pref
`: The format preference
1481 - `lang
`: The language preference
1482 - `quality
`: The quality of the format
1483 - `source
`: The preference of the source
1484 - `proto
`: Protocol used for download (`https
`/`ftps
` > `http
`/`ftp
` > `m3u8_native
`/`m3u8
` > `http_dash_segments
`> `websocket_frag
` > `mms
`/`rtsp
` > `f4f
`/`f4m
`)
1485 - `vcodec
`: Video Codec (`av01
` > `vp9.2
` > `vp9
` > `h265
` > `h264
` > `vp8
` > `h263
` > `theora
` > other)
1486 - `acodec
`: Audio Codec (`flac
`/`alac
` > `wav
`/`aiff
` > `opus
` > `vorbis
` > `aac
` > `mp4a
` > `mp3
` > `eac3
` > `ac3
` > `dts
` > other)
1487 - `codec
`: Equivalent to `vcodec,acodec
`
1488 - `vext
`: Video Extension (`mp4
` > `webm
` > `flv
` > other). If `--prefer-free-formats
` is used, `webm
` is preferred.
1489 - `aext
`: Audio Extension (`m4a
` > `aac
` > `mp3
` > `ogg
` > `opus
` > `webm
` > other). If `--prefer-free-formats
` is used, the order changes to `ogg
` > `opus
` > `webm
` > `mp3
` > `m4a
` > `aac
`
1490 - `ext
`: Equivalent to `vext,aext
`
1491 - `filesize
`: Exact filesize, if known in advance
1492 - `fs_approx
`: Approximate filesize calculated from the manifests
1493 - `size
`: Exact filesize if available, otherwise approximate filesize
1494 - `height
`: Height of video
1495 - `width
`: Width of video
1496 - `res
`: Video resolution, calculated as the smallest dimension.
1497 - `fps
`: Framerate of video
1498 - `hdr
`: The dynamic range of the video (`DV
` > `HDR12
` > `HDR10+
` > `HDR10
` > `HLG
` > `SDR
`)
1499 - `channels
`: The number of audio channels
1500 - `tbr
`: Total average bitrate in KBit/s
1501 - `vbr
`: Average video bitrate in KBit/s
1502 - `abr
`: Average audio bitrate in KBit/s
1503 - `br
`: Equivalent to using `tbr,vbr,abr
`
1504 - `asr
`: Audio sample rate in Hz
1506 **Deprecation warning**: Many of these fields have (currently undocumented) aliases, that may be removed in a future version. It is recommended to use only the documented field names.
1508 All fields, unless specified otherwise, are sorted in descending order. To reverse this, prefix the field with a `+
`. E.g. `+res
` prefers format with the smallest resolution. Additionally, you can suffix a preferred value for the fields, separated by a `:
`. E.g. `res:
720` prefers larger videos, but no larger than 720p and the smallest video if there are no videos less than 720p. For `codec
` and `ext
`, you can provide two preferred values, the first for video and the second for audio. E.g. `+codec:avc:m4a
` (equivalent to `+vcodec:avc,+acodec:m4a
`) sets the video codec preference to `h264
` > `h265
` > `vp9
` > `vp9.2
` > `av01
` > `vp8
` > `h263
` > `theora
` and audio codec preference to `mp4a
` > `aac
` > `vorbis
` > `opus
` > `mp3
` > `ac3
` > `dts
`. You can also make the sorting prefer the nearest values to the provided by using `~
` as the delimiter. E.g. `filesize~
1G
` prefers the format with filesize closest to 1 GiB.
1510 The fields `hasvid
` and `ie_pref
` are always given highest priority in sorting, irrespective of the user-defined order. This behaviour can be changed by using `--format-sort-force
`. Apart from these, the default order used is: `lang,quality,res,fps,hdr:
12,vcodec:vp9.2,channels,acodec,size,br,asr,proto,ext,hasaud,source,id
`. The extractors may override this default order, but they cannot override the user-provided order.
1512 Note that the default has `vcodec:vp9.2
`; i.e. `av1
` is not preferred. Similarly, the default for hdr is `hdr:
12`; i.e. dolby vision is not preferred. These choices are made since DV and AV1 formats are not yet fully compatible with most devices. This may be changed in the future as more devices become capable of smoothly playing back these formats.
1514 If your format selector is `worst
`, the last item is selected after sorting. This means it will select the format that is worst in all respects. Most of the time, what you actually want is the video with the smallest filesize instead. So it is generally better to use `-f best -S +size,+br,+res,+fps
`.
1516 **Tip**: You can use the `-v -F
` to see how the formats have been sorted (worst to best).
1518 ## Format Selection examples
1521 # Download and merge the best video-only format and the best audio-only format,
1522 # or download the best combined format if video-only format is not available
1523 $ yt-dlp -f "bv+ba/b"
1525 # Download best format that contains video,
1526 # and if it doesn't already have an audio stream, merge it with best audio-only format
1527 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba/b"
1532 # Download the best video-only format and the best audio-only format without merging them
1533 # For this case, an output template should be used since
1534 # by default, bestvideo and bestaudio will have the same file name.
1535 $ yt-dlp -f "bv,ba" -o "%(title)s.f%(format_id)s.%(ext)s"
1537 # Download and merge the best format that has a video stream,
1538 # and all audio-only formats into one file
1539 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+mergeall[vcodec=none]" --audio-multistreams
1541 # Download and merge the best format that has a video stream,
1542 # and the best 2 audio-only formats into one file
1543 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba+ba.2" --audio-multistreams
1546 # The following examples show the old method (without -S) of format selection
1547 # and how to use -S to achieve a similar but (generally) better result
1549 # Download the worst video available (old method)
1550 $ yt-dlp -f "wv*+wa/w"
1552 # Download the best video available but with the smallest resolution
1555 # Download the smallest video available
1556 $ yt-dlp -S "+size,+br"
1560 # Download the best mp4 video available, or the best video if no mp4 available
1561 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*[ext=mp4]+ba[ext=m4a]/b[ext=mp4] / bv*+ba/b"
1563 # Download the best video with the best extension
1564 # (For video, mp4 > webm > flv. For audio, m4a > aac > mp3 ...)
1569 # Download the best video available but no better than 480p,
1570 # or the worst video if there is no video under 480p
1571 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*[height<=480]+ba/b[height<=480] / wv*+ba/w"
1573 # Download the best video available with the largest height but no better than 480p,
1574 # or the best video with the smallest resolution if there is no video under 480p
1575 $ yt-dlp -S "height:480"
1577 # Download the best video available with the largest resolution but no better than 480p,
1578 # or the best video with the smallest resolution if there is no video under 480p
1579 # Resolution is determined by using the smallest dimension.
1580 # So this works correctly for vertical videos as well
1581 $ yt-dlp -S "res:480"
1585 # Download the best video (that also has audio) but no bigger than 50 MB,
1586 # or the worst video (that also has audio) if there is no video under 50 MB
1587 $ yt-dlp -f "b[filesize<50M] / w"
1589 # Download largest video (that also has audio) but no bigger than 50 MB,
1590 # or the smallest video (that also has audio) if there is no video under 50 MB
1591 $ yt-dlp -f "b" -S "filesize:50M"
1593 # Download best video (that also has audio) that is closest in size to 50 MB
1594 $ yt-dlp -f "b" -S "filesize~50M"
1598 # Download best video available via direct link over HTTP/HTTPS protocol,
1599 # or the best video available via any protocol if there is no such video
1600 $ yt-dlp -f "(bv*+ba/b)[protocol^=http][protocol!*=dash] / (bv*+ba/b)"
1602 # Download best video available via the best protocol
1603 # (https/ftps > http/ftp > m3u8_native > m3u8 > http_dash_segments ...)
1608 # Download the best video with either h264 or h265 codec,
1609 # or the best video if there is no such video
1610 $ yt-dlp -f "(bv*[vcodec~='^((he|a)vc|h26[45])']+ba) / (bv*+ba/b)"
1612 # Download the best video with best codec no better than h264,
1613 # or the best video with worst codec if there is no such video
1614 $ yt-dlp -S "codec:h264"
1616 # Download the best video with worst codec no worse than h264,
1617 # or the best video with best codec if there is no such video
1618 $ yt-dlp -S "+codec:h264"
1622 # More complex examples
1624 # Download the best video no better than 720p preferring framerate greater than 30,
1625 # or the worst video (still preferring framerate greater than 30) if there is no such video
1626 $ yt-dlp -f "((bv*[fps>30]/bv*)[height<=720]/(wv*[fps>30]/wv*)) + ba / (b[fps>30]/b)[height<=720]/(w[fps>30]/w)"
1628 # Download the video with the largest resolution no better than 720p,
1629 # or the video with the smallest resolution available if there is no such video,
1630 # preferring larger framerate for formats with the same resolution
1631 $ yt-dlp -S "res:720,fps"
1635 # Download the video with smallest resolution no worse than 480p,
1636 # or the video with the largest resolution available if there is no such video,
1637 # preferring better codec and then larger total bitrate for the same resolution
1638 $ yt-dlp -S "+res:480,codec,br"
1641 # MODIFYING METADATA
1643 The metadata obtained by the extractors can be modified by using `--parse-metadata
` and `--replace-in-metadata
`
1645 `--replace-in-metadata FIELDS REGEX REPLACE
` is used to replace text in any metadata field using [python regular expression](https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax). [Backreferences](https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html?highlight=backreferences#re.sub) can be used in the replace string for advanced use.
1647 The general syntax of `--parse-metadata FROM:TO
` is to give the name of a field or an [output template](#output-template) to extract data from, and the format to interpret it as, separated by a colon `:`. Either a [python regular expression](https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html#regular-expression-syntax) with named capture groups, a single field name, or a similar syntax to the [output template](#output-template) (only `%(field)s
` formatting is supported) can be used for `TO
`. The option can be used multiple times to parse and modify various fields.
1649 Note that these options preserve their relative order, allowing replacements to be made in parsed fields and viceversa. Also, any field thus created can be used in the [output template](#output-template) and will also affect the media file's metadata added when using `--embed-metadata
`.
1651 This option also has a few special uses:
1653 * You can download an additional URL based on the metadata of the currently downloaded video. To do this, set the field `additional_urls
` to the URL that you want to download. E.g. `--parse-metadata "description:(?P<additional_urls>https?://www\.vimeo\.com/\d+)
` will download the first vimeo video found in the description
1655 * You can use this to change the metadata that is embedded in the media file. To do this, set the value of the corresponding field with a `meta_
` prefix. For example, any value you set to `meta_description
` field will be added to the `description
` field in the file - you can use this to set a different "description" and "synopsis". To modify the metadata of individual streams, use the `meta<n>_
` prefix (e.g. `meta1_language
`). Any value set to the `meta_
` field will overwrite all default values.
1657 **Note**: Metadata modification happens before format selection, post-extraction and other post-processing operations. Some fields may be added or changed during these steps, overriding your changes.
1659 For reference, these are the fields yt-dlp adds by default to the file metadata:
1661 Metadata fields | From
1662 :--------------------------|:------------------------------------------------
1663 `title
` | `track
` or `title
`
1664 `date
` | `upload_date
`
1665 `description
`, `synopsis
` | `description
`
1666 `purl
`, `comment
` | `webpage_url
`
1667 `track
` | `track_number
`
1668 `artist
` | `artist
`, `creator
`, `uploader
` or `uploader_id
`
1671 `album_artist
` | `album_artist
`
1672 `disc
` | `disc_number
`
1674 `season_number
` | `season_number
`
1675 `episode_id
` | `episode
` or `episode_id
`
1676 `episode_sort
` | `episode_number
`
1677 `language
` of each stream | the format's `language
`
1679 **Note**: The file format may not support some of these fields
1682 ## Modifying metadata examples
1685 # Interpret the title as "Artist - Title"
1686 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "title:%(artist)s - %(title)s"
1689 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "description:Artist - (?P<artist>.+)"
1691 # Set title as "Series name S01E05"
1692 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "%(series)s S%(season_number)02dE%(episode_number)02d:%(title)s"
1694 # Prioritize uploader as the "artist" field in video metadata
1695 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "%(uploader|)s:%(meta_artist)s" --embed-metadata
1697 # Set "comment" field in video metadata using description instead of webpage_url,
1698 # handling multiple lines correctly
1699 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "description:(?s)(?P<meta_comment>.+)" --embed-metadata
1701 # Do not set any "synopsis" in the video metadata
1702 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata ":(?P<meta_synopsis>)"
1704 # Remove "formats" field from the infojson by setting it to an empty string
1705 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata ":(?P<formats>)" -j
1707 # Replace all spaces and "_" in title and uploader with a `-`
1708 $ yt-dlp --replace-in-metadata "title,uploader" "[ _]" "-"
1712 # EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS
1714 Some extractors accept additional arguments which can be passed using `--extractor-args KEY:ARGS
`. `ARGS
` is a `;
` (semicolon) separated string of `ARG=VAL1,VAL2
`. E.g. `--extractor-args "youtube:player-client=android_embedded,web;include_live_dash" --extractor-args "funimation:version=uncut"
`
1716 The following extractors use this feature:
1719 * `lang
`: Language code to prefer translated metadata of this language (case-sensitive). By default, the video primary language metadata is preferred, with a fallback to `en
` translated. See [youtube.py](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/c26f9b991a0681fd3ea548d535919cec1fbbd430/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py#L381-L390) for list of supported content language codes
1720 * `skip
`: One or more of `hls
`, `dash
` or `translated_subs
` to skip extraction of the m3u8 manifests, dash manifests and [auto-translated subtitles](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/4090#issuecomment-1158102032) respectively
1721 * `player_client
`: Clients to extract video data from. The main clients are `web
`, `android
` and `ios
` with variants `_music
`, `_embedded
`, `_embedscreen
`, `_creator
` (e.g. `web_embedded
`); and `mweb
` and `tv_embedded
` (agegate bypass) with no variants. By default, `android,web
` is used, but `tv_embedded
` and `creator
` variants are added as required for age-gated videos. Similarly, the music variants are added for `music.youtube.com
` urls. You can use `all
` to use all the clients, and `default
` for the default clients.
1722 * `player_skip
`: Skip some network requests that are generally needed for robust extraction. One or more of `configs
` (skip client configs), `webpage
` (skip initial webpage), `js
` (skip js player). While these options can help reduce the number of requests needed or avoid some rate-limiting, they could cause some issues. See [#860](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/pull/860) for more details
1723 * `comment_sort
`: `top
` or `new
` (default) - choose comment sorting mode (on YouTube's side)
1724 * `max_comments
`: Limit the amount of comments to gather. Comma-separated list of integers representing `max-comments,max-parents,max-replies,max-replies-per-thread
`. Default is `all,all,all,all
`
1725 * E.g. `all,all,
1000,
10` will get a maximum of 1000 replies total, with up to 10 replies per thread. `1000,all,
100` will get a maximum of 1000 comments, with a maximum of 100 replies total
1726 * `include_incomplete_formats
`: Extract formats that cannot be downloaded completely (live dash and post-live m3u8)
1727 * `innertube_host
`: Innertube API host to use for all API requests; e.g. `studio.youtube.com
`, `youtubei.googleapis.com
`. Note that cookies exported from one subdomain will not work on others
1728 * `innertube_key
`: Innertube API key to use for all API requests
1730 #### youtubetab (YouTube playlists, channels, feeds, etc.)
1731 * `skip
`: One or more of `webpage
` (skip initial webpage download), `authcheck
` (allow the download of playlists requiring authentication when no initial webpage is downloaded. This may cause unwanted behavior, see [#1122](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/pull/1122) for more details)
1732 * `approximate_date
`: Extract approximate `upload_date
` and `timestamp
` in flat-playlist. This may cause date-based filters to be slightly off
1735 * `language
`: Audio languages to extract, e.g. `funimation:language=english,japanese
`
1736 * `version
`: The video version to extract - `uncut
` or `simulcast
`
1738 #### crunchyrollbeta (Crunchyroll)
1739 * `format
`: Which stream type(s) to extract (default: `adaptive_hls
`). Potentially useful values include `adaptive_hls
`, `adaptive_dash
`, `vo_adaptive_hls
`, `vo_adaptive_dash
`, `download_hls
`, `download_dash
`, `multitrack_adaptive_hls_v2
`
1740 * `hardsub
`: Preference order for which hardsub versions to extract, or `all
` (default: `None
` = no hardsubs), e.g. `crunchyrollbeta:hardsub=en-US,None
`
1743 * `video_types
`: Types of videos to download - one or more of `episodes
`, `movies
`, `clips
`, `trailers
`
1746 * `segment_duration
`: Segment duration in milliseconds for HLS-DMC formats. Use it at your own risk since this feature **may result in your account termination.**
1748 #### youtubewebarchive
1749 * `check_all
`: Try to check more at the cost of more requests. One or more of `thumbnails
`, `captures
`
1752 * `comment_sort
`: `hot
` (default), `you
` (cookies needed), `top
`, `new
` - choose comment sorting mode (on GameJolt's side)
1755 * `res
`: resolution to ignore - one or more of `sd
`, `hd
`, `fhd
`
1756 * `vcodec
`: vcodec to ignore - one or more of `h264
`, `h265
`, `dvh265
`
1757 * `dr
`: dynamic range to ignore - one or more of `sdr
`, `hdr10
`, `dv
`
1760 * `app_version
`: App version to call mobile APIs with - should be set along with `manifest_app_version
`, e.g. `20.2.1`
1761 * `manifest_app_version
`: Numeric app version to call mobile APIs with, e.g. `221`
1764 * `tab
`: Which tab to download - one of `new
`, `top
`, `videos
`, `podcasts
`, `streams
`, `stacks
`
1767 * `force_graphql
`: Force usage of the GraphQL API. By default it will only be used if login cookies are provided
1769 NOTE: These options may be changed/removed in the future without concern for backward compatibility
1771 <!-- MANPAGE: MOVE "INSTALLATION" SECTION HERE -->
1776 Plugins are loaded from `<root-dir>/ytdlp_plugins/<type>/__init__.py
`; where `<root-dir>
` is the directory of the binary (`<root-dir>/yt-dlp
`), or the root directory of the module if you are running directly from source-code (`<root dir>/yt_dlp/__main__.py
`). Plugins are currently not supported for the `pip
` version
1778 Plugins can be of `<type>
`s `extractor
` or `postprocessor
`. Extractor plugins do not need to be enabled from the CLI and are automatically invoked when the input URL is suitable for it. Postprocessor plugins can be invoked using `--use-postprocessor NAME
`.
1780 See [ytdlp_plugins](ytdlp_plugins) for example plugins.
1782 Note that **all** plugins are imported even if not invoked, and that **there are no checks** performed on plugin code. Use plugins at your own risk and only if you trust the code
1784 If you are a plugin author, add [ytdlp-plugins](https://github.com/topics/ytdlp-plugins) as a topic to your repository for discoverability
1786 See the [wiki for some known plugins](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Plugins)
1792 yt-dlp makes the best effort to be a good command-line program, and thus should be callable from any programming language.
1794 Your program should avoid parsing the normal stdout since they may change in future versions. Instead they should use options such as `-J
`, `--print
`, `--progress-template
`, `--exec
` etc to create console output that you can reliably reproduce and parse.
1796 From a Python program, you can embed yt-dlp in a more powerful fashion, like this:
1799 from yt_dlp import YoutubeDL
1801 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1802 with YoutubeDL() as ydl:
1806 Most likely, you'll want to use various options. For a list of options available, have a look at [`yt_dlp/YoutubeDL.py
`](yt_dlp/YoutubeDL.py#L180).
1808 **Tip**: If you are porting your code from youtube-dl to yt-dlp, one important point to look out for is that we do not guarantee the return value of `YoutubeDL.extract_info
` to be json serializable, or even be a dictionary. It will be dictionary-like, but if you want to ensure it is a serializable dictionary, pass it through `YoutubeDL.sanitize_info
` as shown in the [example below](#extracting-information)
1810 ## Embedding examples
1812 #### Extracting information
1818 URL = 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc'
1820 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.YoutubeDL) for a list of available options and public functions
1822 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1823 info = ydl.extract_info(URL, download=False)
1825 # ℹ️ ydl.sanitize_info makes the info json-serializable
1826 print(json.dumps(ydl.sanitize_info(info)))
1828 #### Download using an info-json
1833 INFO_FILE = 'path/to/video.info.json'
1835 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL() as ydl:
1836 error_code = ydl.download_with_info_file(INFO_FILE)
1838 print('Some videos failed to download' if error_code
1839 else 'All videos successfully downloaded')
1847 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1850 'format': 'm4a/bestaudio/best',
1851 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.postprocessor) for a list of available Postprocessors and their arguments
1852 'postprocessors': [{ # Extract audio using ffmpeg
1853 'key': 'FFmpegExtractAudio',
1854 'preferredcodec': 'm4a',
1858 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1859 error_code = ydl.download(URLS)
1867 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1869 def longer_than_a_minute(info, *, incomplete):
1870 """Download only videos longer than a minute (or with unknown duration)"""
1871 duration = info.get('duration')
1872 if duration and duration < 60:
1873 return 'The video is too short'
1876 'match_filter': longer_than_a_minute,
1879 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1880 error_code = ydl.download(URLS)
1883 #### Adding logger and progress hook
1888 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1891 def debug(self, msg):
1892 # For compatibility with youtube-dl, both debug and info are passed into debug
1893 # You can distinguish them by the prefix '[debug] '
1894 if msg.startswith('[debug] '):
1899 def info(self, msg):
1902 def warning(self, msg):
1905 def error(self, msg):
1909 # ℹ️ See "progress_hooks" in help(yt_dlp.YoutubeDL)
1911 if d['status'] == 'finished':
1912 print('Done downloading, now post-processing ...')
1916 'logger': MyLogger(),
1917 'progress_hooks': [my_hook],
1920 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1924 #### Add a custom PostProcessor
1929 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1931 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.postprocessor.PostProcessor)
1932 class MyCustomPP(yt_dlp.postprocessor.PostProcessor):
1933 def run(self, info):
1934 self.to_screen('Doing stuff')
1938 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL() as ydl:
1939 # ℹ️ "when" can take any value in yt_dlp.utils.POSTPROCESS_WHEN
1940 ydl.add_post_processor(MyCustomPP(), when='pre_process')
1945 #### Use a custom format selector
1950 URL = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1952 def format_selector(ctx):
1953 """ Select the best video and the best audio that won't result in an mkv.
1954 NOTE: This is just an example and does not handle all cases """
1956 # formats are already sorted worst to best
1957 formats = ctx.get('formats')[::-1]
1959 # acodec='none' means there is no audio
1960 best_video = next(f for f in formats
1961 if f['vcodec'] != 'none' and f['acodec'] == 'none')
1963 # find compatible audio extension
1964 audio_ext = {'mp4': 'm4a', 'webm': 'webm'}[best_video['ext']]
1965 # vcodec='none' means there is no video
1966 best_audio = next(f for f in formats if (
1967 f['acodec'] != 'none' and f['vcodec'] == 'none' and f['ext'] == audio_ext))
1969 # These are the minimum required fields for a merged format
1971 'format_id': f'{best_video["format_id"]}+{best_audio["format_id"]}',
1972 'ext': best_video['ext'],
1973 'requested_formats': [best_video, best_audio],
1974 # Must be + separated list of protocols
1975 'protocol': f'{best_video["protocol"]}+{best_audio["protocol"]}'
1980 'format': format_selector,
1983 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1987 <!-- MANPAGE: MOVE "NEW FEATURES" SECTION HERE -->
1989 # DEPRECATED OPTIONS
1991 These are all the deprecated options and the current alternative to achieve the same effect
1993 #### Almost redundant options
1994 While these options are almost the same as their new counterparts, there are some differences that prevents them being redundant
1996 -j, --dump-json --print "%()j"
1997 -F, --list-formats --print formats_table
1998 --list-thumbnails --print thumbnails_table --print playlist:thumbnails_table
1999 --list-subs --print automatic_captions_table --print subtitles_table
2001 #### Redundant options
2002 While these options are redundant, they are still expected to be used due to their ease of use
2004 --get-description --print description
2005 --get-duration --print duration_string
2006 --get-filename --print filename
2007 --get-format --print format
2009 --get-thumbnail --print thumbnail
2010 -e, --get-title --print title
2011 -g, --get-url --print urls
2012 --match-title REGEX --match-filter "title ~= (?i)REGEX"
2013 --reject-title REGEX --match-filter "title !~= (?i)REGEX"
2014 --min-views COUNT --match-filter "view_count >=? COUNT"
2015 --max-views COUNT --match-filter "view_count <=? COUNT"
2016 --user-agent UA --add-header "User-Agent:UA"
2017 --referer URL --add-header "Referer:URL"
2018 --playlist-start NUMBER -I NUMBER:
2019 --playlist-end NUMBER -I :NUMBER
2020 --playlist-reverse -I ::-1
2021 --no-playlist-reverse Default
2024 #### Not recommended
2025 While these options still work, their use is not recommended since there are other alternatives to achieve the same
2027 --force-generic-extractor --ies generic,default
2028 --exec-before-download CMD --exec "before_dl:CMD"
2029 --no-exec-before-download --no-exec
2030 --all-formats -f all
2031 --all-subs --sub-langs all --write-subs
2032 --print-json -j --no-simulate
2033 --autonumber-size NUMBER Use string formatting, e.g. %(autonumber)03d
2034 --autonumber-start NUMBER Use internal field formatting like %(autonumber+NUMBER)s
2035 --id -o "%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2036 --metadata-from-title FORMAT --parse-metadata "%(title)s:FORMAT"
2037 --hls-prefer-native --downloader "m3u8:native"
2038 --hls-prefer-ffmpeg --downloader "m3u8:ffmpeg"
2039 --list-formats-old --compat-options list-formats (Alias: --no-list-formats-as-table)
2040 --list-formats-as-table --compat-options -list-formats [Default] (Alias: --no-list-formats-old)
2041 --youtube-skip-dash-manifest --extractor-args "youtube:skip=dash" (Alias: --no-youtube-include-dash-manifest)
2042 --youtube-skip-hls-manifest --extractor-args "youtube:skip=hls" (Alias: --no-youtube-include-hls-manifest)
2043 --youtube-include-dash-manifest Default (Alias: --no-youtube-skip-dash-manifest)
2044 --youtube-include-hls-manifest Default (Alias: --no-youtube-skip-hls-manifest)
2047 #### Developer options
2048 These options are not intended to be used by the end-user
2050 --test Download only part of video for testing extractors
2051 --load-pages Load pages dumped by --write-pages
2052 --youtube-print-sig-code For testing youtube signatures
2053 --allow-unplayable-formats List unplayable formats also
2054 --no-allow-unplayable-formats Default
2058 These are aliases that are no longer documented for various reasons
2060 --avconv-location --ffmpeg-location
2061 --clean-infojson --clean-info-json
2062 --cn-verification-proxy URL --geo-verification-proxy URL
2063 --dump-headers --print-traffic
2064 --dump-intermediate-pages --dump-pages
2065 --force-write-download-archive --force-write-archive
2066 --load-info --load-info-json
2067 --no-clean-infojson --no-clean-info-json
2068 --no-split-tracks --no-split-chapters
2069 --no-write-srt --no-write-subs
2070 --prefer-unsecure --prefer-insecure
2071 --rate-limit RATE --limit-rate RATE
2072 --split-tracks --split-chapters
2073 --srt-lang LANGS --sub-langs LANGS
2074 --trim-file-names LENGTH --trim-filenames LENGTH
2075 --write-srt --write-subs
2076 --yes-overwrites --force-overwrites
2078 #### Sponskrub Options
2079 Support for [SponSkrub](https://github.com/faissaloo/SponSkrub) has been deprecated in favor of the `--sponsorblock
` options
2081 --sponskrub --sponsorblock-mark all
2082 --no-sponskrub --no-sponsorblock
2083 --sponskrub-cut --sponsorblock-remove all
2084 --no-sponskrub-cut --sponsorblock-remove -all
2085 --sponskrub-force Not applicable
2086 --no-sponskrub-force Not applicable
2087 --sponskrub-location Not applicable
2088 --sponskrub-args Not applicable
2090 #### No longer supported
2091 These options may no longer work as intended
2093 --prefer-avconv avconv is not officially supported by yt-dlp (Alias: --no-prefer-ffmpeg)
2094 --prefer-ffmpeg Default (Alias: --no-prefer-avconv)
2095 -C, --call-home Not implemented
2096 --no-call-home Default
2097 --include-ads No longer supported
2098 --no-include-ads Default
2099 --write-annotations No supported site has annotations now
2100 --no-write-annotations Default
2101 --compat-options seperate-video-versions No longer needed
2104 These options were deprecated since 2014 and have now been entirely removed
2106 -A, --auto-number -o "%(autonumber)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2107 -t, -l, --title, --literal -o "%(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2110 See [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md#contributing-to-yt-dlp) for instructions on [Opening an Issue](CONTRIBUTING.md#opening-an-issue) and [Contributing code to the project](CONTRIBUTING.md#developer-instructions)
2113 See the [Wiki](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki) for more information
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