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/pulse/monthly "Last activity")
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](#authentication-with-netrc)
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 * [Installing Plugins](#installing-plugins)
65 * [Developing Plugins](#developing-plugins)
66 * [EMBEDDING YT-DLP](#embedding-yt-dlp)
67 * [Embedding examples](#embedding-examples)
68 * [DEPRECATED OPTIONS](#deprecated-options)
69 * [CONTRIBUTING](CONTRIBUTING.md#contributing-to-yt-dlp)
70 * [Opening an Issue](CONTRIBUTING.md#opening-an-issue)
71 * [Developer Instructions](CONTRIBUTING.md#developer-instructions)
72 * [WIKI](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki)
73 * [FAQ](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/FAQ)
74 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
79 * Forked from
[**yt-dlc@f9401f2**](https://github.com/blackjack4494/yt-dlc/commit/f9401f2a91987068139c5f757b12fc711d4c0cee) and merged with
[**youtube-dl@66ab08**](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/commit/66ab0814c4baa2dc79c2dd5287bc0ad61a37c5b9) (
[exceptions](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/21))
81 * **
[SponsorBlock Integration](#sponsorblock-options)**: You can mark/remove sponsor sections in YouTube videos by utilizing the [SponsorBlock](https://sponsor.ajay.app) API
83 * **[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))
85 * **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 NicoNico livestreams are not available. See
[#31](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/pull/31) for details.
87 * **YouTube improvements**:
88 * Supports Clips, Stories (
`ytstories:<channel UCID>`), Search (including filters)**\***, YouTube Music Search, Channel-specific search, Search prefixes (
`ytsearch:`,
`ytsearchdate:`)**\***, Mixes, and Feeds (
`:ytfav`,
`:ytwatchlater`,
`:ytsubs`,
`:ythistory`,
`:ytrec`,
`:ytnotif`)
89 * Fix for
[n-sig based throttling](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/issues/29326) **\***
90 * Supports some (but not all) age-gated content without cookies
91 * Download livestreams from the start using
`--live-from-start` (*experimental*)
92 * Channel URLs download all uploads of the channel, including shorts and live
94 * **Cookies from browser**: Cookies can be automatically extracted from all major web browsers using
`--cookies-from-browser BROWSER[+KEYRING][:PROFILE][::CONTAINER]`
96 * **Download time range**: Videos can be downloaded partially based on either timestamps or chapters using
`--download-sections`
98 * **Split video by chapters**: Videos can be split into multiple files based on chapters using
`--split-chapters`
100 * **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
102 * **Aria2c with HLS/DASH**: You can use
`aria2c` as the external downloader for DASH(mpd) and HLS(m3u8) formats
104 * **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)
106 * **New MSOs**: Philo, Spectrum, SlingTV, Cablevision, RCN etc.
108 * **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
110 * **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`)
112 * **Portable Configuration**: Configuration files are automatically loaded from the home and root directories. See [CONFIGURATION](#configuration) for details
114 * **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`
116 * **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-match-filter` etc
118 * **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
120 * **Plugins**: Extractors and PostProcessors can be loaded from an external file. See [plugins](#plugins) for details
122 * **Self updater**: The releases can be updated using
`yt-dlp -U`, and downgraded using
`--update-to` if required
124 * **Automated builds**: [Nightly/master builds](#update-channels) can be used with
`--update-to nightly` and
`--update-to master`
126 See
[changelog](Changelog.md) or [commits](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commits) for the full list of changes
128 Features marked with a **\*** have been back-ported to youtube-dl
130 ### Differences in default behavior
132 Some of yt-dlp's default options are different from that of youtube-dl and youtube-dlc:
134 * yt-dlp supports only
[Python 3.7+](## "Windows 7"), and *may* remove support for more versions as they [become EOL](https://devguide.python.org/versions/#python-release-cycle); while
[youtube-dl still supports Python 2.6+ and 3.2+](https://github.com/ytdl-org/youtube-dl/issues/30568#issue-1118238743)
135 * The options
`--auto-number` (
`-A`),
`--title` (
`-t`) and
`--literal` (
`-l`), no longer work. See [removed options](#Removed) for details
136 * `avconv` is not supported as an alternative to
`ffmpeg`
137 * yt-dlp stores config files in slightly different locations to youtube-dl. See [CONFIGURATION](#configuration) for a list of correct locations
138 * 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`
139 * 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
140 * 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
141 * 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
142 * `--no-abort-on-error` is enabled by default. Use
`--abort-on-error` or
`--compat-options abort-on-error` to abort on errors instead
143 * 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
144 * `--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
145 * 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
146 * `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
147 * The output of
`-F` is listed in a new format. Use
`--compat-options list-formats` to revert this
148 * 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
149 * 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
150 * Unavailable videos are also listed for YouTube playlists. Use
`--compat-options no-youtube-unavailable-videos` to remove this
151 * 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.
152 * 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
153 * Thumbnail embedding in
`mp4` is done with mutagen if possible. Use
`--compat-options embed-thumbnail-atomicparsley` to force the use of AtomicParsley instead
154 * Some internal metadata such as filenames are removed by default from the infojson. Use
`--no-clean-infojson` or
`--compat-options no-clean-infojson` to revert this
155 * 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
156 * `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`
157 * 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
158 * yt-dlp tries to parse the external downloader outputs into the standard progress output if possible (Currently implemented:
[~~aria2c~~](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/5931)). You can use
`--compat-options no-external-downloader-progress` to get the downloader output as-is
159 * yt-dlp versions between
2021.09.01 and
2023.01.02 applies
`--match-filter` to nested playlists. This was an unintentional side-effect of
[8f18ac](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commit/8f18aca8717bb0dd49054555af8d386e5eda3a88) and is fixed in
[d7b460](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commit/d7b460d0e5fc710950582baed2e3fc616ed98a80). Use
`--compat-options playlist-match-filter` to revert this
160 * yt-dlp versions between
2021.11.10 and
2023.06.21 estimated
`filesize_approx` values for fragmented/manifest formats. This was added for convenience in
[f2fe69](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commit/f2fe69c7b0d208bdb1f6292b4ae92bc1e1a7444a), but was reverted in
[0dff8e](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/commit/0dff8e4d1e6e9fb938f4256ea9af7d81f42fd54f) due to the potentially extreme inaccuracy of the estimated values. Use
`--compat-options manifest-filesize-approx` to keep extracting the estimated values
161 * yt-dlp uses modern http client backends such as
`requests`. Use
`--compat-options prefer-legacy-http-handler` to prefer the legacy http handler (
`urllib`) to be used for standard http requests.
163 For ease of use, a few more compat options are available:
165 * `--compat-options all`: Use all compat options (Do NOT use)
166 * `--compat-options youtube-dl`: Same as
`--compat-options all,-multistreams,-playlist-match-filter,-manifest-filesize-approx`
167 * `--compat-options youtube-dlc`: Same as
`--compat-options all,-no-live-chat,-no-youtube-channel-redirect,-playlist-match-filter,-manifest-filesize-approx`
168 * `--compat-options 2021`: Same as
`--compat-options 2022,no-certifi,filename-sanitization,no-youtube-prefer-utc-upload-date`
169 * `--compat-options 2022`: Same as
`--compat-options playlist-match-filter,no-external-downloader-progress,prefer-legacy-http-handler,manifest-filesize-approx`. Use this to enable all future compat options
174 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
175 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.exe)
176 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp)
177 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos)
178 []
(https://pypi.org/project/yt-dlp)
179 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)
180 [](#release-files)
181 []
(https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases)
182 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
184 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
188 You can use
`yt-dlp -U` to update if you are using the [release binaries](#release-files)
190 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
192 For other third-party package managers, see
[the wiki](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Installation#third-party-package-managers) or refer their documentation
194 <a id="update-channels"/>
196 There are currently three release channels for binaries:
`stable`,
`nightly` and
`master`.
198 * `stable` is the default channel, and many of its changes have been tested by users of the
`nightly` and
`master` channels.
199 * The
`nightly` channel has releases scheduled to build every day around midnight UTC, for a snapshot of the project's new patches and changes. This is the **recommended channel for regular users** of yt-dlp. The
`nightly` releases are available from
[yt-dlp/yt-dlp-nightly-builds](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp-nightly-builds/releases) or as development releases of the
`yt-dlp` PyPI package (which can be installed with pip's
`--pre` flag).
200 * The
`master` channel features releases that are built after each push to the master branch, and these will have the very latest fixes and additions, but may also be more prone to regressions. They are available from
[yt-dlp/yt-dlp-master-builds](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp-master-builds/releases).
202 When using
`--update`/
`-U`, a release binary will only update to its current channel.
203 `--update-to CHANNEL` can be used to switch to a different channel when a newer version is available.
`--update-to [CHANNEL@]TAG` can also be used to upgrade or downgrade to specific tags from a channel.
205 You may also use
`--update-to <repository>` (
`<owner>/<repository>`) to update to a channel on a completely different repository. Be careful with what repository you are updating to though, there is no verification done for binaries from different repositories.
208 * `yt-dlp --update-to master` switch to the
`master` channel and update to its latest release
209 * `yt-dlp --update-to stable@2023.07.06` upgrade/downgrade to release to
`stable` channel tag
`2023.07.06`
210 * `yt-dlp --update-to 2023.10.07` upgrade/downgrade to tag
`2023.10.07` if it exists on the current channel
211 * `yt-dlp --update-to example/yt-dlp@2023.09.24` upgrade/downgrade to the release from the
`example/yt-dlp` repository, tag
`2023.09.24`
213 **Important**: Any user experiencing an issue with the
`stable` release should install or update to the
`nightly` release before submitting a bug report:
215 # To update to nightly from stable executable/binary:
216 yt-dlp --update-to nightly
218 # To install nightly with pip:
219 python -m pip install -U --pre yt-dlp
222 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
229 [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**)
230 [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**)
231 [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**)
237 [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
238 [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))
239 [yt-dlp_linux](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux)|Linux standalone x64 binary
240 [yt-dlp_linux.zip](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux.zip)|Unpackaged Linux executable (no auto-update)
241 [yt-dlp_linux_armv7l](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux_armv7l)|Linux standalone armv7l (
32-bit) binary
242 [yt-dlp_linux_aarch64](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_linux_aarch64)|Linux standalone aarch64 (
64-bit) binary
243 [yt-dlp_win.zip](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_win.zip)|Unpackaged Windows executable (no auto-update)
244 [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)
245 [yt-dlp_macos_legacy](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp_macos_legacy)|MacOS (
10.9+) standalone x64 executable
251 [yt-dlp.tar.gz](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)|Source tarball
252 [SHA2-512SUMS](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-512SUMS)|GNU-style SHA512 sums
253 [SHA2-512SUMS.sig](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-512SUMS.sig)|GPG signature file for SHA512 sums
254 [SHA2-256SUMS](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-256SUMS)|GNU-style SHA256 sums
255 [SHA2-256SUMS.sig](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/SHA2-256SUMS.sig)|GPG signature file for SHA256 sums
257 The public key that can be used to verify the GPG signatures is
[available here](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/master/public.key)
260 curl -L https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/raw/master/public.key | gpg --import
261 gpg --verify SHA2-256SUMS.sig SHA2-256SUMS
262 gpg --verify SHA2-512SUMS.sig SHA2-512SUMS
264 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
266 **Note**: The manpages, shell completion (autocomplete) files etc. are available inside the
[source tarball](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/releases/latest/download/yt-dlp.tar.gz)
269 Python versions
3.7+ (CPython and PyPy) are supported. Other versions and implementations may or may not work correctly.
271 <!-- Python
3.5+ uses VC++
14 and it is already embedded in the binary created
272 <!x-- https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=
26999 --x>
273 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.
276 While all the other dependencies are optional,
`ffmpeg` and
`ffprobe` are highly recommended
278 ### Strongly recommended
280 * [**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)
282 There are bugs in ffmpeg 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 some of 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
284 **Important**: What you need is ffmpeg *binary*, **NOT**
[the python package of the same name](https://pypi.org/project/ffmpeg)
287 * [**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)
288 * [**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>
289 * [**websockets**](https://github.com/aaugustin/websockets)\* - For downloading over websocket. Licensed under
[BSD-3-Clause](https://github.com/aaugustin/websockets/blob/main/LICENSE)
290 * [**requests**](https://github.com/psf/requests)\* - HTTP library. For HTTPS proxy and persistent connections support. Licensed under
[Apache-2.0](https://github.com/psf/requests/blob/main/LICENSE)
294 * [**mutagen**](https://github.com/quodlibet/mutagen)\* - For
`--embed-thumbnail` in certain formats. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](https://github.com/quodlibet/mutagen/blob/master/COPYING)
295 * [**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)
296 * [**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 **Mac** and **BSD**. 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
300 * [**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)
301 * [**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)
302 * [**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)
303 * Any external downloader that you want to use with
`--downloader`
307 * [**avconv** and **avprobe**](https://www.libav.org) - Now **deprecated** alternative to ffmpeg. License
[depends on the build](https://libav.org/legal)
308 * [**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)
309 * [**rtmpdump**](http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu) - For downloading
`rtmp` streams. ffmpeg can be used instead with
`--downloader ffmpeg`. Licensed under
[GPLv2+](http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu)
310 * [**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)
312 To use or redistribute the dependencies, you must agree to their respective licensing terms.
314 The standalone release binaries are built with the Python interpreter and the packages marked with **\*** included.
316 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
321 ### Standalone PyInstaller Builds
322 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.
324 python3 -m pip install -U pyinstaller -r requirements.txt
325 python3 devscripts/make_lazy_extractors.py
328 On some systems, you may need to use
`py` or
`python` instead of
`python3`.
330 `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).
332 **Note**: Pyinstaller 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.
334 **Important**: Running
`pyinstaller` directly **without** using
`pyinst.py` is **not** officially supported. This may or may not work correctly.
336 ### Platform-independent Binary (UNIX)
337 You will need the build tools
`python` (
3.7+),
`zip`,
`make` (GNU),
`pandoc`\* and
`pytest`\*.
339 After installing these, simply run
`make`.
341 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)
343 ### Standalone Py2Exe Builds (Windows)
345 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.
347 If you wish to build it anyway, install Python and py2exe, and then simply run
`setup.py py2exe`
349 py -m pip install -U py2exe -r requirements.txt
350 py devscripts/make_lazy_extractors.py
355 * **
`devscripts/update-version.py`** - Update the version number based on current date.
356 * **
`devscripts/set-variant.py`** - Set the build variant of the executable.
357 * **
`devscripts/make_changelog.py`** - Create a markdown changelog using short commit messages and update
`CONTRIBUTORS` file.
358 * **
`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.
360 Note: See their
`--help` for more info.
362 ### Forking the project
363 If you fork the project on GitHub, you can run your fork's [build workflow](.github/workflows/build.yml) to automatically build the selected version(s) as artifacts. Alternatively, you can run the [release workflow](.github/workflows/release.yml) or enable the [nightly workflow](.github/workflows/release-nightly.yml) to create full (pre-)releases.
367 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
368 yt-dlp [OPTIONS] [--] URL [URL...]
370 `Ctrl+F` is your friend :D
371 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
373 <!-- Auto generated -->
375 -h, --help Print this help text and exit
376 --version Print program version and exit
377 -U, --update Update this program to the latest version
378 --no-update Do not check for updates (default)
379 --update-to [CHANNEL]@[TAG] Upgrade/downgrade to a specific version.
380 CHANNEL can be a repository as well. CHANNEL
381 and TAG default to "stable" and "latest"
382 respectively if omitted; See "UPDATE" for
383 details. Supported channels: stable,
385 -i, --ignore-errors Ignore download and postprocessing errors.
386 The download will be considered successful
387 even if the postprocessing fails
388 --no-abort-on-error Continue with next video on download errors;
389 e.g. to skip unavailable videos in a
391 --abort-on-error Abort downloading of further videos if an
392 error occurs (Alias: --no-ignore-errors)
393 --dump-user-agent Display the current user-agent and exit
394 --list-extractors List all supported extractors and exit
395 --extractor-descriptions Output descriptions of all supported
397 --use-extractors NAMES Extractor names to use separated by commas.
398 You can also use regexes, "all", "default"
399 and "end" (end URL matching); e.g. --ies
400 "holodex.*,end,youtube". Prefix the name
401 with a "-" to exclude it, e.g. --ies
402 default,-generic. Use --list-extractors for
403 a list of extractor names. (Alias: --ies)
404 --default-search PREFIX Use this prefix for unqualified URLs. E.g.
405 "gvsearch2:python" downloads two videos from
406 google videos for the search term "python".
407 Use the value "auto" to let yt-dlp guess
408 ("auto_warning" to emit a warning when
409 guessing). "error" just throws an error. The
410 default value "fixup_error" repairs broken
411 URLs, but emits an error if this is not
412 possible instead of searching
413 --ignore-config Don't load any more configuration files
414 except those given by --config-locations.
415 For backward compatibility, if this option
416 is found inside the system configuration
417 file, the user configuration is not loaded.
419 --no-config-locations Do not load any custom configuration files
420 (default). When given inside a configuration
421 file, ignore all previous --config-locations
422 defined in the current file
423 --config-locations PATH Location of the main configuration file;
424 either the path to the config or its
425 containing directory ("-" for stdin). Can be
426 used multiple times and inside other
428 --flat-playlist Do not extract the videos of a playlist,
430 --no-flat-playlist Fully extract the videos of a playlist
432 --live-from-start Download livestreams from the start.
433 Currently only supported for YouTube
435 --no-live-from-start Download livestreams from the current time
437 --wait-for-video MIN[-MAX] Wait for scheduled streams to become
438 available. Pass the minimum number of
439 seconds (or range) to wait between retries
440 --no-wait-for-video Do not wait for scheduled streams (default)
441 --mark-watched Mark videos watched (even with --simulate)
442 --no-mark-watched Do not mark videos watched (default)
443 --color [STREAM:]POLICY Whether to emit color codes in output,
444 optionally prefixed by the STREAM (stdout or
445 stderr) to apply the setting to. Can be one
446 of "always", "auto" (default), "never", or
447 "no_color" (use non color terminal
448 sequences). Can be used multiple times
449 --compat-options OPTS Options that can help keep compatibility
450 with youtube-dl or youtube-dlc
451 configurations by reverting some of the
452 changes made in yt-dlp. See "Differences in
453 default behavior" for details
454 --alias ALIASES OPTIONS Create aliases for an option string. Unless
455 an alias starts with a dash "-", it is
456 prefixed with "--". Arguments are parsed
457 according to the Python string formatting
458 mini-language. E.g. --alias get-audio,-X
459 "-S=aext:{
0},abr -x --audio-format {
0}"
460 creates options "--get-audio" and "-X" that
461 takes an argument (ARG0) and expands to
462 "-S=aext:ARG0,abr -x --audio-format ARG0".
463 All defined aliases are listed in the --help
464 output. Alias options can trigger more
465 aliases; so be careful to avoid defining
466 recursive options. As a safety measure, each
467 alias may be triggered a maximum of
100
468 times. This option can be used multiple times
471 --proxy URL Use the specified HTTP/HTTPS/SOCKS proxy. To
472 enable SOCKS proxy, specify a proper scheme,
473 e.g. socks5://user:pass@
127.0.0.1:
1080/.
474 Pass in an empty string (--proxy "") for
476 --socket-timeout SECONDS Time to wait before giving up, in seconds
477 --source-address IP Client-side IP address to bind to
478 -4, --force-ipv4 Make all connections via IPv4
479 -6, --force-ipv6 Make all connections via IPv6
480 --enable-file-urls Enable file:// URLs. This is disabled by
481 default for security reasons.
484 --geo-verification-proxy URL Use this proxy to verify the IP address for
485 some geo-restricted sites. The default proxy
486 specified by --proxy (or none, if the option
487 is not present) is used for the actual
489 --xff VALUE How to fake X-Forwarded-For HTTP header to
490 try bypassing geographic restriction. One of
491 "default" (only when known to be useful),
492 "never", an IP block in CIDR notation, or a
493 two-letter ISO
3166-
2 country code
496 -I, --playlist-items ITEM_SPEC Comma separated playlist_index of the items
497 to download. You can specify a range using
498 "[START]:[STOP][:STEP]". For backward
499 compatibility, START-STOP is also supported.
500 Use negative indices to count from the right
501 and negative STEP to download in reverse
502 order. E.g. "-I
1:
3,
7,-
5::
2" used on a
503 playlist of size
15 will download the items
504 at index
1,
2,
3,
7,
11,
13,
15
505 --min-filesize SIZE Abort download if filesize is smaller than
506 SIZE, e.g.
50k or
44.6M
507 --max-filesize SIZE Abort download if filesize is larger than
508 SIZE, e.g.
50k or
44.6M
509 --date DATE Download only videos uploaded on this date.
510 The date can be "YYYYMMDD" or in the format
511 [now|today|yesterday][-N[day|week|month|year]].
512 E.g. "--date today-
2weeks" downloads only
513 videos uploaded on the same day two weeks ago
514 --datebefore DATE Download only videos uploaded on or before
515 this date. The date formats accepted is the
517 --dateafter DATE Download only videos uploaded on or after
518 this date. The date formats accepted is the
520 --match-filters FILTER Generic video filter. Any "OUTPUT TEMPLATE"
521 field can be compared with a number or a
522 string using the operators defined in
523 "Filtering Formats". You can also simply
524 specify a field to match if the field is
525 present, use "!field" to check if the field
526 is not present, and "&" to check multiple
527 conditions. Use a "
\" to escape "&" or
528 quotes if needed. If used multiple times,
529 the filter matches if atleast one of the
530 conditions are met. E.g. --match-filter
531 !is_live --match-filter "like_count>?
100 &
532 description~='(?i)
\bcats \& dogs
\b'" matches
533 only videos that are not live OR those that
534 have a like count more than
100 (or the like
535 field is not available) and also has a
536 description that contains the phrase "cats &
537 dogs" (caseless). Use "--match-filter -" to
538 interactively ask whether to download each
540 --no-match-filters Do not use any --match-filter (default)
541 --break-match-filters FILTER Same as "--match-filters" but stops the
542 download process when a video is rejected
543 --no-break-match-filters Do not use any --break-match-filters (default)
544 --no-playlist Download only the video, if the URL refers
545 to a video and a playlist
546 --yes-playlist Download the playlist, if the URL refers to
547 a video and a playlist
548 --age-limit YEARS Download only videos suitable for the given
550 --download-archive FILE Download only videos not listed in the
551 archive file. Record the IDs of all
552 downloaded videos in it
553 --no-download-archive Do not use archive file (default)
554 --max-downloads NUMBER Abort after downloading NUMBER files
555 --break-on-existing Stop the download process when encountering
556 a file that is in the archive
557 --break-per-input Alters --max-downloads, --break-on-existing,
558 --break-match-filter, and autonumber to
560 --no-break-per-input --break-on-existing and similar options
561 terminates the entire download queue
562 --skip-playlist-after-errors N Number of allowed failures until the rest of
563 the playlist is skipped
566 -N, --concurrent-fragments N Number of fragments of a dash/hlsnative
567 video that should be downloaded concurrently
569 -r, --limit-rate RATE Maximum download rate in bytes per second,
571 --throttled-rate RATE Minimum download rate in bytes per second
572 below which throttling is assumed and the
573 video data is re-extracted, e.g.
100K
574 -R, --retries RETRIES Number of retries (default is
10), or
576 --file-access-retries RETRIES Number of times to retry on file access
577 error (default is
3), or "infinite"
578 --fragment-retries RETRIES Number of retries for a fragment (default is
579 10), or "infinite" (DASH, hlsnative and ISM)
580 --retry-sleep [TYPE:]EXPR Time to sleep between retries in seconds
581 (optionally) prefixed by the type of retry
582 (http (default), fragment, file_access,
583 extractor) to apply the sleep to. EXPR can
584 be a number, linear=START[:END[:STEP=
1]] or
585 exp=START[:END[:BASE=
2]]. This option can be
586 used multiple times to set the sleep for the
587 different retry types, e.g. --retry-sleep
588 linear=
1::
2 --retry-sleep fragment:exp=
1:
20
589 --skip-unavailable-fragments Skip unavailable fragments for DASH,
590 hlsnative and ISM downloads (default)
591 (Alias: --no-abort-on-unavailable-fragments)
592 --abort-on-unavailable-fragments
593 Abort download if a fragment is unavailable
594 (Alias: --no-skip-unavailable-fragments)
595 --keep-fragments Keep downloaded fragments on disk after
596 downloading is finished
597 --no-keep-fragments Delete downloaded fragments after
598 downloading is finished (default)
599 --buffer-size SIZE Size of download buffer, e.g.
1024 or
16K
601 --resize-buffer The buffer size is automatically resized
602 from an initial value of --buffer-size
604 --no-resize-buffer Do not automatically adjust the buffer size
605 --http-chunk-size SIZE Size of a chunk for chunk-based HTTP
606 downloading, e.g.
10485760 or
10M (default
607 is disabled). May be useful for bypassing
608 bandwidth throttling imposed by a webserver
610 --playlist-random Download playlist videos in random order
611 --lazy-playlist Process entries in the playlist as they are
612 received. This disables n_entries,
613 --playlist-random and --playlist-reverse
614 --no-lazy-playlist Process videos in the playlist only after
615 the entire playlist is parsed (default)
616 --xattr-set-filesize Set file xattribute ytdl.filesize with
618 --hls-use-mpegts Use the mpegts container for HLS videos;
619 allowing some players to play the video
620 while downloading, and reducing the chance
621 of file corruption if download is
622 interrupted. This is enabled by default for
624 --no-hls-use-mpegts Do not use the mpegts container for HLS
625 videos. This is default when not downloading
627 --download-sections REGEX Download only chapters that match the
628 regular expression. A "*" prefix denotes
629 time-range instead of chapter. Negative
630 timestamps are calculated from the end.
631 "*from-url" can be used to download between
632 the "start_time" and "end_time" extracted
633 from the URL. Needs ffmpeg. This option can
634 be used multiple times to download multiple
635 sections, e.g. --download-sections
636 "*
10:
15-inf" --download-sections "intro"
637 --downloader [PROTO:]NAME Name or path of the external downloader to
638 use (optionally) prefixed by the protocols
639 (http, ftp, m3u8, dash, rstp, rtmp, mms) to
640 use it for. Currently supports native,
641 aria2c, avconv, axel, curl, ffmpeg, httpie,
642 wget. You can use this option multiple times
643 to set different downloaders for different
644 protocols. E.g. --downloader aria2c
645 --downloader "dash,m3u8:native" will use
646 aria2c for http/ftp downloads, and the
647 native downloader for dash/m3u8 downloads
648 (Alias: --external-downloader)
649 --downloader-args NAME:ARGS Give these arguments to the external
650 downloader. Specify the downloader name and
651 the arguments separated by a colon ":". For
652 ffmpeg, arguments can be passed to different
653 positions using the same syntax as
654 --postprocessor-args. You can use this
655 option multiple times to give different
656 arguments to different downloaders (Alias:
657 --external-downloader-args)
659 ## Filesystem Options:
660 -a, --batch-file FILE File containing URLs to download ("-" for
661 stdin), one URL per line. Lines starting
662 with "#", ";" or "]" are considered as
664 --no-batch-file Do not read URLs from batch file (default)
665 -P, --paths [TYPES:]PATH The paths where the files should be
666 downloaded. Specify the type of file and the
667 path separated by a colon ":". All the same
668 TYPES as --output are supported.
669 Additionally, you can also provide "home"
670 (default) and "temp" paths. All intermediary
671 files are first downloaded to the temp path
672 and then the final files are moved over to
673 the home path after download is finished.
674 This option is ignored if --output is an
676 -o, --output [TYPES:]TEMPLATE Output filename template; see "OUTPUT
677 TEMPLATE" for details
678 --output-na-placeholder TEXT Placeholder for unavailable fields in
679 "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" (default: "NA")
680 --restrict-filenames Restrict filenames to only ASCII characters,
681 and avoid "&" and spaces in filenames
682 --no-restrict-filenames Allow Unicode characters, "&" and spaces in
684 --windows-filenames Force filenames to be Windows-compatible
685 --no-windows-filenames Make filenames Windows-compatible only if
686 using Windows (default)
687 --trim-filenames LENGTH Limit the filename length (excluding
688 extension) to the specified number of
690 -w, --no-overwrites Do not overwrite any files
691 --force-overwrites Overwrite all video and metadata files. This
692 option includes --no-continue
693 --no-force-overwrites Do not overwrite the video, but overwrite
694 related files (default)
695 -c, --continue Resume partially downloaded files/fragments
697 --no-continue Do not resume partially downloaded
698 fragments. If the file is not fragmented,
699 restart download of the entire file
700 --part Use .part files instead of writing directly
701 into output file (default)
702 --no-part Do not use .part files - write directly into
704 --mtime Use the Last-modified header to set the file
705 modification time (default)
706 --no-mtime Do not use the Last-modified header to set
707 the file modification time
708 --write-description Write video description to a .description file
709 --no-write-description Do not write video description (default)
710 --write-info-json Write video metadata to a .info.json file
711 (this may contain personal information)
712 --no-write-info-json Do not write video metadata (default)
713 --write-playlist-metafiles Write playlist metadata in addition to the
714 video metadata when using --write-info-json,
715 --write-description etc. (default)
716 --no-write-playlist-metafiles Do not write playlist metadata when using
717 --write-info-json, --write-description etc.
718 --clean-info-json Remove some internal metadata such as
719 filenames from the infojson (default)
720 --no-clean-info-json Write all fields to the infojson
721 --write-comments Retrieve video comments to be placed in the
722 infojson. The comments are fetched even
723 without this option if the extraction is
724 known to be quick (Alias: --get-comments)
725 --no-write-comments Do not retrieve video comments unless the
726 extraction is known to be quick (Alias:
728 --load-info-json FILE JSON file containing the video information
729 (created with the "--write-info-json" option)
730 --cookies FILE Netscape formatted file to read cookies from
731 and dump cookie jar in
732 --no-cookies Do not read/dump cookies from/to file
734 --cookies-from-browser BROWSER[+KEYRING][:PROFILE][::CONTAINER]
735 The name of the browser to load cookies
736 from. Currently supported browsers are:
737 brave, chrome, chromium, edge, firefox,
738 opera, safari, vivaldi. Optionally, the
739 KEYRING used for decrypting Chromium cookies
740 on Linux, the name/path of the PROFILE to
741 load cookies from, and the CONTAINER name
742 (if Firefox) ("none" for no container) can
743 be given with their respective seperators.
744 By default, all containers of the most
745 recently accessed profile are used.
746 Currently supported keyrings are: basictext,
747 gnomekeyring, kwallet, kwallet5, kwallet6
748 --no-cookies-from-browser Do not load cookies from browser (default)
749 --cache-dir DIR Location in the filesystem where yt-dlp can
750 store some downloaded information (such as
751 client ids and signatures) permanently. By
752 default ${XDG_CACHE_HOME}/yt-dlp
753 --no-cache-dir Disable filesystem caching
754 --rm-cache-dir Delete all filesystem cache files
756 ## Thumbnail Options:
757 --write-thumbnail Write thumbnail image to disk
758 --no-write-thumbnail Do not write thumbnail image to disk (default)
759 --write-all-thumbnails Write all thumbnail image formats to disk
760 --list-thumbnails List available thumbnails of each video.
761 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
763 ## Internet Shortcut Options:
764 --write-link Write an internet shortcut file, depending
765 on the current platform (.url, .webloc or
766 .desktop). The URL may be cached by the OS
767 --write-url-link Write a .url Windows internet shortcut. The
768 OS caches the URL based on the file path
769 --write-webloc-link Write a .webloc macOS internet shortcut
770 --write-desktop-link Write a .desktop Linux internet shortcut
772 ## Verbosity and Simulation Options:
773 -q, --quiet Activate quiet mode. If used with --verbose,
774 print the log to stderr
775 --no-quiet Deactivate quiet mode. (Default)
776 --no-warnings Ignore warnings
777 -s, --simulate Do not download the video and do not write
779 --no-simulate Download the video even if printing/listing
781 --ignore-no-formats-error Ignore "No video formats" error. Useful for
782 extracting metadata even if the videos are
783 not actually available for download
785 --no-ignore-no-formats-error Throw error when no downloadable video
786 formats are found (default)
787 --skip-download Do not download the video but write all
788 related files (Alias: --no-download)
789 -O, --print [WHEN:]TEMPLATE Field name or output template to print to
790 screen, optionally prefixed with when to
791 print it, separated by a ":". Supported
792 values of "WHEN" are the same as that of
793 --use-postprocessor (default: video).
794 Implies --quiet. Implies --simulate unless
795 --no-simulate or later stages of WHEN are
796 used. This option can be used multiple times
797 --print-to-file [WHEN:]TEMPLATE FILE
798 Append given template to the file. The
799 values of WHEN and TEMPLATE are same as that
800 of --print. FILE uses the same syntax as the
801 output template. This option can be used
803 -j, --dump-json Quiet, but print JSON information for each
804 video. Simulate unless --no-simulate is
805 used. See "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for a
806 description of available keys
807 -J, --dump-single-json Quiet, but print JSON information for each
808 url or infojson passed. Simulate unless
809 --no-simulate is used. If the URL refers to
810 a playlist, the whole playlist information
811 is dumped in a single line
812 --force-write-archive Force download archive entries to be written
813 as far as no errors occur, even if -s or
814 another simulation option is used (Alias:
815 --force-download-archive)
816 --newline Output progress bar as new lines
817 --no-progress Do not print progress bar
818 --progress Show progress bar, even if in quiet mode
819 --console-title Display progress in console titlebar
820 --progress-template [TYPES:]TEMPLATE
821 Template for progress outputs, optionally
822 prefixed with one of "download:" (default),
823 "download-title:" (the console title),
824 "postprocess:", or "postprocess-title:".
825 The video's fields are accessible under the
826 "info" key and the progress attributes are
827 accessible under "progress" key. E.g.
828 --console-title --progress-template
829 "download-title:%(info.id)s-%(progress.eta)s"
830 -v, --verbose Print various debugging information
831 --dump-pages Print downloaded pages encoded using base64
832 to debug problems (very verbose)
833 --write-pages Write downloaded intermediary pages to files
834 in the current directory to debug problems
835 --print-traffic Display sent and read HTTP traffic
838 --encoding ENCODING Force the specified encoding (experimental)
839 --legacy-server-connect Explicitly allow HTTPS connection to servers
840 that do not support RFC
5746 secure
842 --no-check-certificates Suppress HTTPS certificate validation
843 --prefer-insecure Use an unencrypted connection to retrieve
844 information about the video (Currently
845 supported only for YouTube)
846 --add-headers FIELD:VALUE Specify a custom HTTP header and its value,
847 separated by a colon ":". You can use this
848 option multiple times
849 --bidi-workaround Work around terminals that lack
850 bidirectional text support. Requires bidiv
851 or fribidi executable in PATH
852 --sleep-requests SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep between requests
853 during data extraction
854 --sleep-interval SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep before each
855 download. This is the minimum time to sleep
856 when used along with --max-sleep-interval
857 (Alias: --min-sleep-interval)
858 --max-sleep-interval SECONDS Maximum number of seconds to sleep. Can only
859 be used along with --min-sleep-interval
860 --sleep-subtitles SECONDS Number of seconds to sleep before each
863 ## Video Format Options:
864 -f, --format FORMAT Video format code, see "FORMAT SELECTION"
866 -S, --format-sort SORTORDER Sort the formats by the fields given, see
867 "Sorting Formats" for more details
868 --format-sort-force Force user specified sort order to have
869 precedence over all fields, see "Sorting
870 Formats" for more details (Alias: --S-force)
871 --no-format-sort-force Some fields have precedence over the user
872 specified sort order (default)
873 --video-multistreams Allow multiple video streams to be merged
875 --no-video-multistreams Only one video stream is downloaded for each
876 output file (default)
877 --audio-multistreams Allow multiple audio streams to be merged
879 --no-audio-multistreams Only one audio stream is downloaded for each
880 output file (default)
881 --prefer-free-formats Prefer video formats with free containers
882 over non-free ones of same quality. Use with
883 "-S ext" to strictly prefer free containers
884 irrespective of quality
885 --no-prefer-free-formats Don't give any special preference to free
887 --check-formats Make sure formats are selected only from
888 those that are actually downloadable
889 --check-all-formats Check all formats for whether they are
890 actually downloadable
891 --no-check-formats Do not check that the formats are actually
893 -F, --list-formats List available formats of each video.
894 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
895 --merge-output-format FORMAT Containers that may be used when merging
896 formats, separated by "/", e.g. "mp4/mkv".
897 Ignored if no merge is required. (currently
898 supported: avi, flv, mkv, mov, mp4, webm)
901 --write-subs Write subtitle file
902 --no-write-subs Do not write subtitle file (default)
903 --write-auto-subs Write automatically generated subtitle file
904 (Alias: --write-automatic-subs)
905 --no-write-auto-subs Do not write auto-generated subtitles
906 (default) (Alias: --no-write-automatic-subs)
907 --list-subs List available subtitles of each video.
908 Simulate unless --no-simulate is used
909 --sub-format FORMAT Subtitle format; accepts formats preference,
910 e.g. "srt" or "ass/srt/best"
911 --sub-langs LANGS Languages of the subtitles to download (can
912 be regex) or "all" separated by commas, e.g.
913 --sub-langs "en.*,ja". You can prefix the
914 language code with a "-" to exclude it from
915 the requested languages, e.g. --sub-langs
916 all,-live_chat. Use --list-subs for a list
917 of available language tags
919 ## Authentication Options:
920 -u, --username USERNAME Login with this account ID
921 -p, --password PASSWORD Account password. If this option is left
922 out, yt-dlp will ask interactively
923 -2, --twofactor TWOFACTOR Two-factor authentication code
924 -n, --netrc Use .netrc authentication data
925 --netrc-location PATH Location of .netrc authentication data;
926 either the path or its containing directory.
928 --netrc-cmd NETRC_CMD Command to execute to get the credentials
930 --video-password PASSWORD Video-specific password
931 --ap-mso MSO Adobe Pass multiple-system operator (TV
932 provider) identifier, use --ap-list-mso for
933 a list of available MSOs
934 --ap-username USERNAME Multiple-system operator account login
935 --ap-password PASSWORD Multiple-system operator account password.
936 If this option is left out, yt-dlp will ask
938 --ap-list-mso List all supported multiple-system operators
939 --client-certificate CERTFILE Path to client certificate file in PEM
940 format. May include the private key
941 --client-certificate-key KEYFILE
942 Path to private key file for client
944 --client-certificate-password PASSWORD
945 Password for client certificate private key,
946 if encrypted. If not provided, and the key
947 is encrypted, yt-dlp will ask interactively
949 ## Post-Processing Options:
950 -x, --extract-audio Convert video files to audio-only files
951 (requires ffmpeg and ffprobe)
952 --audio-format FORMAT Format to convert the audio to when -x is
953 used. (currently supported: best (default),
954 aac, alac, flac, m4a, mp3, opus, vorbis,
955 wav). You can specify multiple rules using
956 similar syntax as --remux-video
957 --audio-quality QUALITY Specify ffmpeg audio quality to use when
958 converting the audio with -x. Insert a value
959 between
0 (best) and
10 (worst) for VBR or a
960 specific bitrate like
128K (default
5)
961 --remux-video FORMAT Remux the video into another container if
962 necessary (currently supported: avi, flv,
963 gif, mkv, mov, mp4, webm, aac, aiff, alac,
964 flac, m4a, mka, mp3, ogg, opus, vorbis,
965 wav). If target container does not support
966 the video/audio codec, remuxing will fail.
967 You can specify multiple rules; e.g.
968 "aac>m4a/mov>mp4/mkv" will remux aac to m4a,
969 mov to mp4 and anything else to mkv
970 --recode-video FORMAT Re-encode the video into another format if
971 necessary. The syntax and supported formats
972 are the same as --remux-video
973 --postprocessor-args NAME:ARGS Give these arguments to the postprocessors.
974 Specify the postprocessor/executable name
975 and the arguments separated by a colon ":"
976 to give the argument to the specified
977 postprocessor/executable. Supported PP are:
978 Merger, ModifyChapters, SplitChapters,
979 ExtractAudio, VideoRemuxer, VideoConvertor,
980 Metadata, EmbedSubtitle, EmbedThumbnail,
981 SubtitlesConvertor, ThumbnailsConvertor,
982 FixupStretched, FixupM4a, FixupM3u8,
983 FixupTimestamp and FixupDuration. The
984 supported executables are: AtomicParsley,
985 FFmpeg and FFprobe. You can also specify
986 "PP+EXE:ARGS" to give the arguments to the
987 specified executable only when being used by
988 the specified postprocessor. Additionally,
989 for ffmpeg/ffprobe, "_i"/"_o" can be
990 appended to the prefix optionally followed
991 by a number to pass the argument before the
992 specified input/output file, e.g. --ppa
993 "Merger+ffmpeg_i1:-v quiet". You can use
994 this option multiple times to give different
995 arguments to different postprocessors.
997 -k, --keep-video Keep the intermediate video file on disk
998 after post-processing
999 --no-keep-video Delete the intermediate video file after
1000 post-processing (default)
1001 --post-overwrites Overwrite post-processed files (default)
1002 --no-post-overwrites Do not overwrite post-processed files
1003 --embed-subs Embed subtitles in the video (only for mp4,
1004 webm and mkv videos)
1005 --no-embed-subs Do not embed subtitles (default)
1006 --embed-thumbnail Embed thumbnail in the video as cover art
1007 --no-embed-thumbnail Do not embed thumbnail (default)
1008 --embed-metadata Embed metadata to the video file. Also
1009 embeds chapters/infojson if present unless
1010 --no-embed-chapters/--no-embed-info-json are
1011 used (Alias: --add-metadata)
1012 --no-embed-metadata Do not add metadata to file (default)
1013 (Alias: --no-add-metadata)
1014 --embed-chapters Add chapter markers to the video file
1015 (Alias: --add-chapters)
1016 --no-embed-chapters Do not add chapter markers (default) (Alias:
1018 --embed-info-json Embed the infojson as an attachment to
1020 --no-embed-info-json Do not embed the infojson as an attachment
1022 --parse-metadata [WHEN:]FROM:TO
1023 Parse additional metadata like title/artist
1024 from other fields; see "MODIFYING METADATA"
1025 for details. Supported values of "WHEN" are
1026 the same as that of --use-postprocessor
1027 (default: pre_process)
1028 --replace-in-metadata [WHEN:]FIELDS REGEX REPLACE
1029 Replace text in a metadata field using the
1030 given regex. This option can be used
1031 multiple times. Supported values of "WHEN"
1032 are the same as that of --use-postprocessor
1033 (default: pre_process)
1034 --xattrs Write metadata to the video file's xattrs
1035 (using dublin core and xdg standards)
1036 --concat-playlist POLICY Concatenate videos in a playlist. One of
1037 "never", "always", or "multi_video"
1038 (default; only when the videos form a single
1039 show). All the video files must have same
1040 codecs and number of streams to be
1041 concatable. The "pl_video:" prefix can be
1042 used with "--paths" and "--output" to set
1043 the output filename for the concatenated
1044 files. See "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for details
1045 --fixup POLICY Automatically correct known faults of the
1046 file. One of never (do nothing), warn (only
1047 emit a warning), detect_or_warn (the
1048 default; fix file if we can, warn
1049 otherwise), force (try fixing even if file
1051 --ffmpeg-location PATH Location of the ffmpeg binary; either the
1052 path to the binary or its containing directory
1053 --exec [WHEN:]CMD Execute a command, optionally prefixed with
1054 when to execute it, separated by a ":".
1055 Supported values of "WHEN" are the same as
1056 that of --use-postprocessor (default:
1057 after_move). Same syntax as the output
1058 template can be used to pass any field as
1059 arguments to the command. If no fields are
1060 passed, %(filepath,_filename|)q is appended
1061 to the end of the command. This option can
1062 be used multiple times
1063 --no-exec Remove any previously defined --exec
1064 --convert-subs FORMAT Convert the subtitles to another format
1065 (currently supported: ass, lrc, srt, vtt)
1066 (Alias: --convert-subtitles)
1067 --convert-thumbnails FORMAT Convert the thumbnails to another format
1068 (currently supported: jpg, png, webp). You
1069 can specify multiple rules using similar
1070 syntax as --remux-video
1071 --split-chapters Split video into multiple files based on
1072 internal chapters. The "chapter:" prefix can
1073 be used with "--paths" and "--output" to set
1074 the output filename for the split files. See
1075 "OUTPUT TEMPLATE" for details
1076 --no-split-chapters Do not split video based on chapters (default)
1077 --remove-chapters REGEX Remove chapters whose title matches the
1078 given regular expression. The syntax is the
1079 same as --download-sections. This option can
1080 be used multiple times
1081 --no-remove-chapters Do not remove any chapters from the file
1083 --force-keyframes-at-cuts Force keyframes at cuts when
1084 downloading/splitting/removing sections.
1085 This is slow due to needing a re-encode, but
1086 the resulting video may have fewer artifacts
1088 --no-force-keyframes-at-cuts Do not force keyframes around the chapters
1089 when cutting/splitting (default)
1090 --use-postprocessor NAME[:ARGS]
1091 The (case sensitive) name of plugin
1092 postprocessors to be enabled, and
1093 (optionally) arguments to be passed to it,
1094 separated by a colon ":". ARGS are a
1095 semicolon ";" delimited list of NAME=VALUE.
1096 The "when" argument determines when the
1097 postprocessor is invoked. It can be one of
1098 "pre_process" (after video extraction),
1099 "after_filter" (after video passes filter),
1100 "video" (after --format; before
1101 --print/--output), "before_dl" (before each
1102 video download), "post_process" (after each
1103 video download; default), "after_move"
1104 (after moving video file to it's final
1105 locations), "after_video" (after downloading
1106 and processing all formats of a video), or
1107 "playlist" (at end of playlist). This option
1108 can be used multiple times to add different
1111 ## SponsorBlock Options:
1112 Make chapter entries for, or remove various segments (sponsor,
1113 introductions, etc.) from downloaded YouTube videos using the
1114 [SponsorBlock API](https://sponsor.ajay.app)
1116 --sponsorblock-mark CATS SponsorBlock categories to create chapters
1117 for, separated by commas. Available
1118 categories are sponsor, intro, outro,
1119 selfpromo, preview, filler, interaction,
1120 music_offtopic, poi_highlight, chapter, all
1121 and default (=all). You can prefix the
1122 category with a "-" to exclude it. See [
1]
1123 for description of the categories. E.g.
1124 --sponsorblock-mark all,-preview
1125 [
1] https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Segment_Categories
1126 --sponsorblock-remove CATS SponsorBlock categories to be removed from
1127 the video file, separated by commas. If a
1128 category is present in both mark and remove,
1129 remove takes precedence. The syntax and
1130 available categories are the same as for
1131 --sponsorblock-mark except that "default"
1132 refers to "all,-filler" and poi_highlight,
1133 chapter are not available
1134 --sponsorblock-chapter-title TEMPLATE
1135 An output template for the title of the
1136 SponsorBlock chapters created by
1137 --sponsorblock-mark. The only available
1138 fields are start_time, end_time, category,
1139 categories, name, category_names. Defaults
1140 to "[SponsorBlock]: %(category_names)l"
1141 --no-sponsorblock Disable both --sponsorblock-mark and
1142 --sponsorblock-remove
1143 --sponsorblock-api URL SponsorBlock API location, defaults to
1144 https://sponsor.ajay.app
1146 ## Extractor Options:
1147 --extractor-retries RETRIES Number of retries for known extractor errors
1148 (default is
3), or "infinite"
1149 --allow-dynamic-mpd Process dynamic DASH manifests (default)
1150 (Alias: --no-ignore-dynamic-mpd)
1151 --ignore-dynamic-mpd Do not process dynamic DASH manifests
1152 (Alias: --no-allow-dynamic-mpd)
1153 --hls-split-discontinuity Split HLS playlists to different formats at
1154 discontinuities such as ad breaks
1155 --no-hls-split-discontinuity Do not split HLS playlists to different
1156 formats at discontinuities such as ad breaks
1158 --extractor-args IE_KEY:ARGS Pass ARGS arguments to the IE_KEY extractor.
1159 See "EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS" for details. You
1160 can use this option multiple times to give
1161 arguments for different extractors
1165 You can configure yt-dlp by placing any supported command line option to a configuration file. The configuration is loaded from the following locations:
1167 1. **Main Configuration**:
1168 * The file given by
`--config-location`
1169 1. **Portable Configuration**: (Recommended for portable installations)
1170 * If using a binary,
`yt-dlp.conf` in the same directory as the binary
1171 * If running from source-code,
`yt-dlp.conf` in the parent directory of
`yt_dlp`
1172 1. **Home Configuration**:
1173 * `yt-dlp.conf` in the home path given by
`-P`
1174 * If
`-P` is not given, the current directory is searched
1175 1. **User Configuration**:
1176 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp.conf`
1177 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp/config` (recommended on Linux/macOS)
1178 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp/config.txt`
1179 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp.conf`
1180 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp/config` (recommended on Windows)
1181 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp/config.txt`
1183 * `~/yt-dlp.conf.txt`
1184 * `~/.yt-dlp/config`
1185 * `~/.yt-dlp/config.txt`
1187 See also: [Notes about environment variables](#notes-about-environment-variables)
1188 1. **System Configuration**:
1189 * `/etc/yt-dlp.conf`
1190 * `/etc/yt-dlp/config`
1191 * `/etc/yt-dlp/config.txt`
1193 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:
1195 # Lines starting with # are comments
1197 # Always extract audio
1200 # Do not copy the mtime
1204 --proxy 127.0.0.1:3128
1206 # Save all videos under YouTube directory in your home directory
1207 -o ~/YouTube/%(title)s.%(ext)s
1210 **Note**: 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.
1212 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.
1214 ### Configuration file encoding
1216 The configuration files are decoded according to the UTF BOM if present, and in the encoding from system locale otherwise.
1218 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.
1220 ### Authentication with netrc
1222 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:
1224 touch ${HOME}/.netrc
1225 chmod a-rwx,u+rw ${HOME}/.netrc
1227 After that you can add credentials for an extractor in the following format, where *extractor* is the name of the extractor in lowercase:
1229 machine <extractor> login <username> password <password>
1233 machine youtube login myaccount@gmail.com password my_youtube_password
1234 machine twitch login my_twitch_account_name password my_twitch_password
1236 To activate authentication with the
`.netrc` file you should pass
`--netrc` to yt-dlp or place it in the [configuration file](#configuration).
1238 The default location of the .netrc file is
`~` (see below).
1240 As an alternative to using the
`.netrc` file, which has the disadvantage of keeping your passwords in a plain text file, you can configure a custom shell command to provide the credentials for an extractor. This is done by providing the
`--netrc-cmd` parameter, it shall output the credentials in the netrc format and return
`0` on success, other values will be treated as an error.
`{}` in the command will be replaced by the name of the extractor to make it possible to select the credentials for the right extractor.
1242 E.g. To use an encrypted
`.netrc` file stored as
`.authinfo.gpg`
1244 yt-dlp --netrc-cmd 'gpg --decrypt ~/.authinfo.gpg' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc
1248 ### Notes about environment variables
1249 * Environment variables are normally specified as
`${VARIABLE}`/
`$VARIABLE` on UNIX and
`%VARIABLE%` on Windows; but is always shown as
`${VARIABLE}` in this documentation
1250 * yt-dlp also allow using UNIX-style variables on Windows for path-like options; e.g.
`--output`,
`--config-location`
1251 * If unset,
`${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}` defaults to
`~/.config` and
`${XDG_CACHE_HOME}` to
`~/.cache`
1252 * On Windows,
`~` points to
`${HOME}` if present; or,
`${USERPROFILE}` or
`${HOMEDRIVE}${HOMEPATH}` otherwise
1253 * On Windows,
`${USERPROFILE}` generally points to
`C:\Users\<user name>` and
`${APPDATA}` to
`${USERPROFILE}\AppData\Roaming`
1257 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.
1259 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1260 **tl;dr:** [navigate me to examples](#output-template-examples).
1261 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1263 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).
1265 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.
1267 The field names themselves (the part inside the parenthesis) can also have some special formatting:
1269 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
1271 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`
1273 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`
1275 1. **Alternatives**: Alternate fields can be specified separated with a
`,`. E.g.
`%(release_date>%Y,upload_date>%Y|Unknown)s`
1277 1. **Replacement**: A replacement value can be specified using a
`&` separator according to the
[`str.format` mini-language](https://docs.python.org/3/library/string.html#format-specification-mini-language). 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. E.g.
`%(chapters&has chapters|no chapters)s`,
`%(title&TITLE={:>20}|NO TITLE)s`
1279 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`
1281 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)
1283 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
1285 To summarize, the general syntax for a field is:
1287 %(name[.keys][addition][>strf][,alternate][&replacement][|default])[flags][width][.precision][length]type
1290 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.
1292 <a id="outtmpl-postprocess-note"/>
1294 **Note**: Due to post-processing (i.e. merging etc.), the actual output filename might differ. Use
`--print after_move:filepath` to get the name after all post-processing is complete.
1296 The available fields are:
1298 - `id` (string): Video identifier
1299 - `title` (string): Video title
1300 - `fulltitle` (string): Video title ignoring live timestamp and generic title
1301 - `ext` (string): Video filename extension
1302 - `alt_title` (string): A secondary title of the video
1303 - `description` (string): The description of the video
1304 - `display_id` (string): An alternative identifier for the video
1305 - `uploader` (string): Full name of the video uploader
1306 - `license` (string): License name the video is licensed under
1307 - `creator` (string): The creator of the video
1308 - `timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video became available
1309 - `upload_date` (string): Video upload date in UTC (YYYYMMDD)
1310 - `release_timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video was released
1311 - `release_date` (string): The date (YYYYMMDD) when the video was released in UTC
1312 - `modified_timestamp` (numeric): UNIX timestamp of the moment the video was last modified
1313 - `modified_date` (string): The date (YYYYMMDD) when the video was last modified in UTC
1314 - `uploader_id` (string): Nickname or id of the video uploader
1315 - `channel` (string): Full name of the channel the video is uploaded on
1316 - `channel_id` (string): Id of the channel
1317 - `channel_follower_count` (numeric): Number of followers of the channel
1318 - `channel_is_verified` (boolean): Whether the channel is verified on the platform
1319 - `location` (string): Physical location where the video was filmed
1320 - `duration` (numeric): Length of the video in seconds
1321 - `duration_string` (string): Length of the video (HH:mm:ss)
1322 - `view_count` (numeric): How many users have watched the video on the platform
1323 - `concurrent_view_count` (numeric): How many users are currently watching the video on the platform.
1324 - `like_count` (numeric): Number of positive ratings of the video
1325 - `dislike_count` (numeric): Number of negative ratings of the video
1326 - `repost_count` (numeric): Number of reposts of the video
1327 - `average_rating` (numeric): Average rating give by users, the scale used depends on the webpage
1328 - `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)
1329 - `age_limit` (numeric): Age restriction for the video (years)
1330 - `live_status` (string): One of "not_live", "is_live", "is_upcoming", "was_live", "post_live" (was live, but VOD is not yet processed)
1331 - `is_live` (boolean): Whether this video is a live stream or a fixed-length video
1332 - `was_live` (boolean): Whether this video was originally a live stream
1333 - `playable_in_embed` (string): Whether this video is allowed to play in embedded players on other sites
1334 - `availability` (string): Whether the video is "private", "premium_only", "subscriber_only", "needs_auth", "unlisted" or "public"
1335 - `start_time` (numeric): Time in seconds where the reproduction should start, as specified in the URL
1336 - `end_time` (numeric): Time in seconds where the reproduction should end, as specified in the URL
1337 - `extractor` (string): Name of the extractor
1338 - `extractor_key` (string): Key name of the extractor
1339 - `epoch` (numeric): Unix epoch of when the information extraction was completed
1340 - `autonumber` (numeric): Number that will be increased with each download, starting at
`--autonumber-start`, padded with leading zeros to
5 digits
1341 - `video_autonumber` (numeric): Number that will be increased with each video
1342 - `n_entries` (numeric): Total number of extracted items in the playlist
1343 - `playlist_id` (string): Identifier of the playlist that contains the video
1344 - `playlist_title` (string): Name of the playlist that contains the video
1345 - `playlist` (string):
`playlist_id` or
`playlist_title`
1346 - `playlist_count` (numeric): Total number of items in the playlist. May not be known if entire playlist is not extracted
1347 - `playlist_index` (numeric): Index of the video in the playlist padded with leading zeros according the final index
1348 - `playlist_autonumber` (numeric): Position of the video in the playlist download queue padded with leading zeros according to the total length of the playlist
1349 - `playlist_uploader` (string): Full name of the playlist uploader
1350 - `playlist_uploader_id` (string): Nickname or id of the playlist uploader
1351 - `webpage_url` (string): A URL to the video webpage which if given to yt-dlp should allow to get the same result again
1352 - `webpage_url_basename` (string): The basename of the webpage URL
1353 - `webpage_url_domain` (string): The domain of the webpage URL
1354 - `original_url` (string): The URL given by the user (or same as
`webpage_url` for playlist entries)
1356 All the fields in [Filtering Formats](#filtering-formats) can also be used
1358 Available for the video that belongs to some logical chapter or section:
1360 - `chapter` (string): Name or title of the chapter the video belongs to
1361 - `chapter_number` (numeric): Number of the chapter the video belongs to
1362 - `chapter_id` (string): Id of the chapter the video belongs to
1364 Available for the video that is an episode of some series or programme:
1366 - `series` (string): Title of the series or programme the video episode belongs to
1367 - `season` (string): Title of the season the video episode belongs to
1368 - `season_number` (numeric): Number of the season the video episode belongs to
1369 - `season_id` (string): Id of the season the video episode belongs to
1370 - `episode` (string): Title of the video episode
1371 - `episode_number` (numeric): Number of the video episode within a season
1372 - `episode_id` (string): Id of the video episode
1374 Available for the media that is a track or a part of a music album:
1376 - `track` (string): Title of the track
1377 - `track_number` (numeric): Number of the track within an album or a disc
1378 - `track_id` (string): Id of the track
1379 - `artist` (string): Artist(s) of the track
1380 - `genre` (string): Genre(s) of the track
1381 - `album` (string): Title of the album the track belongs to
1382 - `album_type` (string): Type of the album
1383 - `album_artist` (string): List of all artists appeared on the album
1384 - `disc_number` (numeric): Number of the disc or other physical medium the track belongs to
1385 - `release_year` (numeric): Year (YYYY) when the album was released
1387 Available only when using
`--download-sections` and for
`chapter:` prefix when using
`--split-chapters` for videos with internal chapters:
1389 - `section_title` (string): Title of the chapter
1390 - `section_number` (numeric): Number of the chapter within the file
1391 - `section_start` (numeric): Start time of the chapter in seconds
1392 - `section_end` (numeric): End time of the chapter in seconds
1394 Available only when used in
`--print`:
1396 - `urls` (string): The URLs of all requested formats, one in each line
1397 - `filename` (string): Name of the video file. Note that the [actual filename may differ](#outtmpl-postprocess-note)
1398 - `formats_table` (table): The video format table as printed by
`--list-formats`
1399 - `thumbnails_table` (table): The thumbnail format table as printed by
`--list-thumbnails`
1400 - `subtitles_table` (table): The subtitle format table as printed by
`--list-subs`
1401 - `automatic_captions_table` (table): The automatic subtitle format table as printed by
`--list-subs`
1403 Available only after the video is downloaded (
`post_process`/
`after_move`):
1405 - `filepath`: Actual path of downloaded video file
1407 Available only in
`--sponsorblock-chapter-title`:
1409 - `start_time` (numeric): Start time of the chapter in seconds
1410 - `end_time` (numeric): End time of the chapter in seconds
1411 - `categories` (list): The
[SponsorBlock categories](https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Types#Category) the chapter belongs to
1412 - `category` (string): The smallest SponsorBlock category the chapter belongs to
1413 - `category_names` (list): Friendly names of the categories
1414 - `name` (string): Friendly name of the smallest category
1415 - `type` (string): The
[SponsorBlock action type](https://wiki.sponsor.ajay.app/w/Types#Action_Type) of the chapter
1417 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.
1419 **Note**: 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).
1421 **Tip**: Look at the
`-j` output to identify which fields are available for the particular URL
1423 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`.
1425 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.
1427 To use percent literals in an output template use
`%%`. To output to stdout use
`-o -`.
1429 The current default template is
`%(title)s [%(id)s].%(ext)s`.
1431 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.
1433 #### Output template examples
1436 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "test video.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc
1437 test video.webm # Literal name with correct extension
1439 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc
1440 youtube-dl test video ''_ä↭𝕐.webm # All kinds of weird characters
1442 $ yt-dlp --print filename -o "%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc --restrict-filenames
1443 youtube-dl_test_video_.webm # Restricted file name
1445 # Download YouTube playlist videos in separate directory indexed by video order in a playlist
1446 $ yt-dlp -o "%(playlist)s/%(playlist_index)s - %(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwiyx1dc3P2JR9N8gQaQN_BCvlSlap7re"
1448 # Download YouTube playlist videos in separate directories according to their uploaded year
1449 $ yt-dlp -o "%(upload_date>%Y)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLwiyx1dc3P2JR9N8gQaQN_BCvlSlap7re"
1451 # Prefix playlist index with " - " separator, but only if it is available
1452 $ yt-dlp -o "%(playlist_index&{} - |)s%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenozKc "https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLinuxFoundation/playlists"
1454 # Download all playlists of YouTube channel/user keeping each playlist in separate directory:
1455 $ yt-dlp -o "%(uploader)s/%(playlist)s/%(playlist_index)s - %(title)s.%(ext)s" "https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLinuxFoundation/playlists"
1457 # Download Udemy course keeping each chapter in separate directory under MyVideos directory in your home
1458 $ 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"
1460 # Download entire series season keeping each series and each season in separate directory under C:/MyVideos
1461 $ 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"
1463 # Download video as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\title.ext", subtitles as "C:\MyVideos\subs\uploader\title.ext"
1464 # and put all temporary files in "C:\MyVideos\tmp"
1465 $ yt-dlp -P "C:/MyVideos" -P "temp:tmp" -P "subtitle:subs" -o "%(uploader)s/%(title)s.%(ext)s" BaW_jenoz --write-subs
1467 # Download video as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\title.ext" and subtitles as "C:\MyVideos\uploader\subs\title.ext"
1468 $ 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
1470 # Stream the video being downloaded to stdout
1471 $ yt-dlp -o - BaW_jenozKc
1476 By default, yt-dlp tries to download the best available quality if you **don't** pass any options.
1477 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`.
1479 **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.
1481 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.
1483 <!-- MANPAGE: BEGIN EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1484 **tl;dr:** [navigate me to examples](#format-selection-examples).
1485 <!-- MANPAGE: END EXCLUDED SECTION -->
1487 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.
1489 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.
1491 You can use
`-f -` to interactively provide the format selector *for each video*
1493 You can also use special names to select particular edge case formats:
1495 - `all`: Select **all formats** separately
1496 - `mergeall`: Select and **merge all formats** (Must be used with
`--audio-multistreams`,
`--video-multistreams` or both)
1497 - `b*`,
`best*`: Select the best quality format that **contains either** a video or an audio or both (ie;
`vcodec!=none or acodec!=none`)
1498 - `b`,
`best`: Select the best quality format that **contains both** video and audio. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec!=none][acodec!=none]`
1499 - `bv`,
`bestvideo`: Select the best quality **video-only** format. Equivalent to
`best*[acodec=none]`
1500 - `bv*`,
`bestvideo*`: Select the best quality format that **contains video**. It may also contain audio. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec!=none]`
1501 - `ba`,
`bestaudio`: Select the best quality **audio-only** format. Equivalent to
`best*[vcodec=none]`
1502 - `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))
1503 - `w*
`, `worst*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains either a video or an audio
1504 - `w
`, `worst
`: Select the worst quality format that contains both video and audio. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec!=none][acodec!=none]
`
1505 - `wv
`, `worstvideo
`: Select the worst quality video-only format. Equivalent to `worst*[acodec=none]
`
1506 - `wv*
`, `worstvideo*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains video. It may also contain audio. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec!=none]
`
1507 - `wa
`, `worstaudio
`: Select the worst quality audio-only format. Equivalent to `worst*[vcodec=none]
`
1508 - `wa*
`, `worstaudio*
`: Select the worst quality format that contains audio. It may also contain video. Equivalent to `worst*[acodec!=none]
`
1510 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.
1512 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.
1514 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.
1516 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
`.
1518 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.
1520 **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
1522 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
`.
1524 ## Filtering Formats
1526 You can also filter the video formats by putting a condition in brackets, as in `-f "best[height=
720]"
` (or `-f "[filesize>
10M]"
` since filters without a selector are interpreted as `best
`).
1528 The following numeric meta fields can be used with comparisons `<
`, `<=
`, `>
`, `>=
`, `=
` (equals), `!=
` (not equals):
1530 - `filesize
`: The number of bytes, if known in advance
1531 - `filesize_approx
`: An estimate for the number of bytes
1532 - `width
`: Width of the video, if known
1533 - `height
`: Height of the video, if known
1534 - `aspect_ratio
`: Aspect ratio of the video, if known
1535 - `tbr
`: Average bitrate of audio and video in KBit/s
1536 - `abr
`: Average audio bitrate in KBit/s
1537 - `vbr
`: Average video bitrate in KBit/s
1538 - `asr
`: Audio sampling rate in Hertz
1540 - `audio_channels
`: The number of audio channels
1541 - `stretched_ratio
`: `width:height
` of the video's pixels, if not square
1543 Also filtering work for comparisons `=
` (equals), `^=
` (starts with), `$=
` (ends with), `*=
` (contains), `~=
` (matches regex) and following string meta fields:
1546 - `ext
`: File extension
1547 - `acodec
`: Name of the audio codec in use
1548 - `vcodec
`: Name of the video codec in use
1549 - `container
`: Name of the container format
1550 - `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
`)
1551 - `language
`: Language code
1552 - `dynamic_range
`: The dynamic range of the video
1553 - `format_id
`: A short description of the format
1554 - `format
`: A human-readable description of the format
1555 - `format_note
`: Additional info about the format
1556 - `resolution
`: Textual description of width and height
1558 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 `._-
`.
1560 **Note**: 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.
1562 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 "bv[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.
1564 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.
1568 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...
`.
1570 The available fields are:
1572 - `hasvid
`: Gives priority to formats that have a video stream
1573 - `hasaud
`: Gives priority to formats that have an audio stream
1574 - `ie_pref
`: The format preference
1575 - `lang
`: The language preference
1576 - `quality
`: The quality of the format
1577 - `source
`: The preference of the source
1578 - `proto
`: Protocol used for download (`https
`/`ftps
` > `http
`/`ftp
` > `m3u8_native
`/`m3u8
` > `http_dash_segments
`> `websocket_frag
` > `mms
`/`rtsp
` > `f4f
`/`f4m
`)
1579 - `vcodec
`: Video Codec (`av01
` > `vp9.2
` > `vp9
` > `h265
` > `h264
` > `vp8
` > `h263
` > `theora
` > other)
1580 - `acodec
`: Audio Codec (`flac
`/`alac
` > `wav
`/`aiff
` > `opus
` > `vorbis
` > `aac
` > `mp4a
` > `mp3
` > `ac4
` > `eac3
` > `ac3
` > `dts
` > other)
1581 - `codec
`: Equivalent to `vcodec,acodec
`
1582 - `vext
`: Video Extension (`mp4
` > `mov
` > `webm
` > `flv
` > other). If `--prefer-free-formats
` is used, `webm
` is preferred.
1583 - `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
`
1584 - `ext
`: Equivalent to `vext,aext
`
1585 - `filesize
`: Exact filesize, if known in advance
1586 - `fs_approx
`: Approximate filesize
1587 - `size
`: Exact filesize if available, otherwise approximate filesize
1588 - `height
`: Height of video
1589 - `width
`: Width of video
1590 - `res
`: Video resolution, calculated as the smallest dimension.
1591 - `fps
`: Framerate of video
1592 - `hdr
`: The dynamic range of the video (`DV
` > `HDR12
` > `HDR10+
` > `HDR10
` > `HLG
` > `SDR
`)
1593 - `channels
`: The number of audio channels
1594 - `tbr
`: Total average bitrate in KBit/s
1595 - `vbr
`: Average video bitrate in KBit/s
1596 - `abr
`: Average audio bitrate in KBit/s
1597 - `br
`: Average bitrate in KBit/s, `tbr
`/`vbr
`/`abr
`
1598 - `asr
`: Audio sample rate in Hz
1600 **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.
1602 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.
1604 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.
1606 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.
1608 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
`.
1610 **Tip**: You can use the `-v -F
` to see how the formats have been sorted (worst to best).
1612 ## Format Selection examples
1615 # Download and merge the best video-only format and the best audio-only format,
1616 # or download the best combined format if video-only format is not available
1617 $ yt-dlp -f "bv+ba/b"
1619 # Download best format that contains video,
1620 # and if it doesn't already have an audio stream, merge it with best audio-only format
1621 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba/b"
1626 # Download the best video-only format and the best audio-only format without merging them
1627 # For this case, an output template should be used since
1628 # by default, bestvideo and bestaudio will have the same file name.
1629 $ yt-dlp -f "bv,ba" -o "%(title)s.f%(format_id)s.%(ext)s"
1631 # Download and merge the best format that has a video stream,
1632 # and all audio-only formats into one file
1633 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+mergeall[vcodec=none]" --audio-multistreams
1635 # Download and merge the best format that has a video stream,
1636 # and the best 2 audio-only formats into one file
1637 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba+ba.2" --audio-multistreams
1640 # The following examples show the old method (without -S) of format selection
1641 # and how to use -S to achieve a similar but (generally) better result
1643 # Download the worst video available (old method)
1644 $ yt-dlp -f "wv*+wa/w"
1646 # Download the best video available but with the smallest resolution
1649 # Download the smallest video available
1650 $ yt-dlp -S "+size,+br"
1654 # Download the best mp4 video available, or the best video if no mp4 available
1655 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*[ext=mp4]+ba[ext=m4a]/b[ext=mp4] / bv*+ba/b"
1657 # Download the best video with the best extension
1658 # (For video, mp4 > mov > webm > flv. For audio, m4a > aac > mp3 ...)
1663 # Download the best video available but no better than 480p,
1664 # or the worst video if there is no video under 480p
1665 $ yt-dlp -f "bv*[height<=480]+ba/b[height<=480] / wv*+ba/w"
1667 # Download the best video available with the largest height but no better than 480p,
1668 # or the best video with the smallest resolution if there is no video under 480p
1669 $ yt-dlp -S "height:480"
1671 # Download the best video available with the largest resolution but no better than 480p,
1672 # or the best video with the smallest resolution if there is no video under 480p
1673 # Resolution is determined by using the smallest dimension.
1674 # So this works correctly for vertical videos as well
1675 $ yt-dlp -S "res:480"
1679 # Download the best video (that also has audio) but no bigger than 50 MB,
1680 # or the worst video (that also has audio) if there is no video under 50 MB
1681 $ yt-dlp -f "b[filesize<50M] / w"
1683 # Download largest video (that also has audio) but no bigger than 50 MB,
1684 # or the smallest video (that also has audio) if there is no video under 50 MB
1685 $ yt-dlp -f "b" -S "filesize:50M"
1687 # Download best video (that also has audio) that is closest in size to 50 MB
1688 $ yt-dlp -f "b" -S "filesize~50M"
1692 # Download best video available via direct link over HTTP/HTTPS protocol,
1693 # or the best video available via any protocol if there is no such video
1694 $ yt-dlp -f "(bv*+ba/b)[protocol^=http][protocol!*=dash] / (bv*+ba/b)"
1696 # Download best video available via the best protocol
1697 # (https/ftps > http/ftp > m3u8_native > m3u8 > http_dash_segments ...)
1702 # Download the best video with either h264 or h265 codec,
1703 # or the best video if there is no such video
1704 $ yt-dlp -f "(bv*[vcodec~='^((he|a)vc|h26[45])']+ba) / (bv*+ba/b)"
1706 # Download the best video with best codec no better than h264,
1707 # or the best video with worst codec if there is no such video
1708 $ yt-dlp -S "codec:h264"
1710 # Download the best video with worst codec no worse than h264,
1711 # or the best video with best codec if there is no such video
1712 $ yt-dlp -S "+codec:h264"
1716 # More complex examples
1718 # Download the best video no better than 720p preferring framerate greater than 30,
1719 # or the worst video (still preferring framerate greater than 30) if there is no such video
1720 $ yt-dlp -f "((bv*[fps>30]/bv*)[height<=720]/(wv*[fps>30]/wv*)) + ba / (b[fps>30]/b)[height<=720]/(w[fps>30]/w)"
1722 # Download the video with the largest resolution no better than 720p,
1723 # or the video with the smallest resolution available if there is no such video,
1724 # preferring larger framerate for formats with the same resolution
1725 $ yt-dlp -S "res:720,fps"
1729 # Download the video with smallest resolution no worse than 480p,
1730 # or the video with the largest resolution available if there is no such video,
1731 # preferring better codec and then larger total bitrate for the same resolution
1732 $ yt-dlp -S "+res:480,codec,br"
1735 # MODIFYING METADATA
1737 The metadata obtained by the extractors can be modified by using `--parse-metadata
` and `--replace-in-metadata
`
1739 `--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.
1741 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.
1743 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
`.
1745 This option also has a few special uses:
1747 * 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
1749 * 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.
1751 **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.
1753 For reference, these are the fields yt-dlp adds by default to the file metadata:
1755 Metadata fields | From
1756 :--------------------------|:------------------------------------------------
1757 `title
` | `track
` or `title
`
1758 `date
` | `upload_date
`
1759 `description
`, `synopsis
` | `description
`
1760 `purl
`, `comment
` | `webpage_url
`
1761 `track
` | `track_number
`
1762 `artist
` | `artist
`, `creator
`, `uploader
` or `uploader_id
`
1765 `album_artist
` | `album_artist
`
1766 `disc
` | `disc_number
`
1768 `season_number
` | `season_number
`
1769 `episode_id
` | `episode
` or `episode_id
`
1770 `episode_sort
` | `episode_number
`
1771 `language
` of each stream | the format's `language
`
1773 **Note**: The file format may not support some of these fields
1776 ## Modifying metadata examples
1779 # Interpret the title as "Artist - Title"
1780 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "title:%(artist)s - %(title)s"
1783 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "description:Artist - (?P<artist>.+)"
1785 # Set title as "Series name S01E05"
1786 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "%(series)s S%(season_number)02dE%(episode_number)02d:%(title)s"
1788 # Prioritize uploader as the "artist" field in video metadata
1789 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "%(uploader|)s:%(meta_artist)s" --embed-metadata
1791 # Set "comment" field in video metadata using description instead of webpage_url,
1792 # handling multiple lines correctly
1793 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "description:(?s)(?P<meta_comment>.+)" --embed-metadata
1795 # Do not set any "synopsis" in the video metadata
1796 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata ":(?P<meta_synopsis>)"
1798 # Remove "formats" field from the infojson by setting it to an empty string
1799 $ yt-dlp --parse-metadata "video::(?P<formats>)" --write-info-json
1801 # Replace all spaces and "_" in title and uploader with a `-`
1802 $ yt-dlp --replace-in-metadata "title,uploader" "[ _]" "-"
1806 # EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS
1808 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"
`
1810 Note: In CLI, `ARG
` can use `-
` instead of `_
`; e.g. `youtube:player-client"
` becomes `youtube:player_client"
`
1812 The following extractors use this feature:
1815 * `lang
`: Prefer translated metadata (`title
`, `description
` etc) of this language code (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
1816 * `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
1817 * `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
`, `mweb_embedscreen
` and `tv_embedded
` (agegate bypass) with no variants. By default, `ios,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.
1818 * `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
1819 * `player_params
`: YouTube player parameters to use for player requests. Will overwrite any default ones set by yt-dlp.
1820 * `comment_sort
`: `top
` or `new
` (default) - choose comment sorting mode (on YouTube's side)
1821 * `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
`
1822 * 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
1823 * `formats
`: Change the types of formats to return. `dashy
` (convert HTTP to DASH), `duplicate
` (identical content but different URLs or protocol; includes `dashy
`), `incomplete
` (cannot be downloaded completely - live dash and post-live m3u8)
1824 * `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
1825 * `innertube_key
`: Innertube API key to use for all API requests
1826 * `raise_incomplete_data
`: `Incomplete Data Received
` raises an error instead of reporting a warning
1828 #### youtubetab (YouTube playlists, channels, feeds, etc.)
1829 * `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)
1830 * `approximate_date
`: Extract approximate `upload_date
` and `timestamp
` in flat-playlist. This may cause date-based filters to be slightly off
1833 * `fragment_query
`: Passthrough any query in mpd/m3u8 manifest URLs to their fragments if no value is provided, or else apply the query string given as `fragment_query=VALUE
`. Does not apply to ffmpeg
1834 * `variant_query
`: Passthrough the master m3u8 URL query to its variant playlist URLs if no value is provided, or else apply the query string given as `variant_query=VALUE
`
1835 * `hls_key
`: An HLS AES-128 key URI *or* key (as hex), and optionally the IV (as hex), in the form of `(URI|KEY)[,IV]
`; e.g. `generic:hls_key=ABCDEF1234567980,
0xFEDCBA0987654321`. Passing any of these values will force usage of the native HLS downloader and override the corresponding values found in the m3u8 playlist
1836 * `is_live
`: Bypass live HLS detection and manually set `live_status
` - a value of `false
` will set `not_live
`, any other value (or no value) will set `is_live
`
1839 * `language
`: Audio languages to extract, e.g. `funimation:language=english,japanese
`
1840 * `version
`: The video version to extract - `uncut
` or `simulcast
`
1842 #### crunchyrollbeta (Crunchyroll)
1843 * `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
`
1844 * `hardsub
`: Preference order for which hardsub versions to extract, or `all
` (default: `None
` = no hardsubs), e.g. `crunchyrollbeta:hardsub=en-US,None
`
1847 * `video_types
`: Types of videos to download - one or more of `episodes
`, `movies
`, `clips
`, `trailers
`
1850 * `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.**
1852 #### youtubewebarchive
1853 * `check_all
`: Try to check more at the cost of more requests. One or more of `thumbnails
`, `captures
`
1856 * `comment_sort
`: `hot
` (default), `you
` (cookies needed), `top
`, `new
` - choose comment sorting mode (on GameJolt's side)
1859 * `res
`: resolution to ignore - one or more of `sd
`, `hd
`, `fhd
`
1860 * `vcodec
`: vcodec to ignore - one or more of `h264
`, `h265
`, `dvh265
`
1861 * `dr
`: dynamic range to ignore - one or more of `sdr
`, `hdr10
`, `dv
`
1863 #### niconicochannelplus
1864 * `max_comments
`: Maximum number of comments to extract - default is `120`
1867 * `api_hostname
`: Hostname to use for mobile API requests, e.g. `api-h2.tiktokv.com
`
1868 * `app_version
`: App version to call mobile APIs with - should be set along with `manifest_app_version
`, e.g. `20.2.1`
1869 * `manifest_app_version
`: Numeric app version to call mobile APIs with, e.g. `221`
1872 * `tab
`: Which tab to download - one of `new
`, `top
`, `videos
`, `podcasts
`, `streams
`, `stacks
`
1875 * `api
`: Select one of `graphql
` (default), `legacy
` or `syndication
` as the API for tweet extraction. Has no effect if logged in
1877 #### stacommu, wrestleuniverse
1878 * `device_id
`: UUID value assigned by the website and used to enforce device limits for paid livestream content. Can be found in browser local storage
1881 * `client_id
`: Client ID value to be sent with GraphQL requests, e.g. `twitch:client_id=kimne78kx3ncx6brgo4mv6wki5h1ko
`
1883 #### nhkradirulive (NHK らじる★らじる LIVE)
1884 * `area
`: Which regional variation to extract. Valid areas are: `sapporo
`, `sendai
`, `tokyo
`, `nagoya
`, `osaka
`, `hiroshima
`, `matsuyama
`, `fukuoka
`. Defaults to `tokyo
`
1887 * `type
`: Type(s) of game replays to extract. Valid types are: `full_game
`, `full_game_spanish
`, `condensed_game
` and `all_22
`. You can use `all
` to extract all available replay types, which is the default
1889 **Note**: These options may be changed/removed in the future without concern for backward compatibility
1891 <!-- MANPAGE: MOVE "INSTALLATION" SECTION HERE -->
1896 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!**
1898 Plugins can be of `<type>
`s `extractor
` or `postprocessor
`.
1899 - Extractor plugins do not need to be enabled from the CLI and are automatically invoked when the input URL is suitable for it.
1900 - Extractor plugins take priority over builtin extractors.
1901 - Postprocessor plugins can be invoked using `--use-postprocessor NAME
`.
1904 Plugins are loaded from the namespace packages `yt_dlp_plugins.extractor
` and `yt_dlp_plugins.postprocessor
`.
1906 In other words, the file structure on the disk looks something like:
1914 yt-dlp looks for these `yt_dlp_plugins
` namespace folders in many locations (see below) and loads in plugins from **all** of them.
1916 See the [wiki for some known plugins](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Plugins)
1918 ## Installing Plugins
1920 Plugins can be installed using various methods and locations.
1922 1. **Configuration directories**:
1923 Plugin packages (containing a `yt_dlp_plugins
` namespace folder) can be dropped into the following standard [configuration locations](#configuration):
1925 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp/plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
` (recommended on Linux/macOS)
1926 * `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1927 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp/plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
` (recommended on Windows)
1928 * `${APPDATA}/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1929 * `~/.yt-dlp/plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1930 * `~/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1931 * **System Plugins**
1932 * `/etc/yt-dlp/plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1933 * `/etc/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1934 2. **Executable location**: Plugin packages can similarly be installed in a `yt-dlp-plugins
` directory under the executable location (recommended for portable installations):
1935 * Binary: where `<root-dir>/yt-dlp.exe
`, `<root-dir>/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1936 * Source: where `<root-dir>/yt_dlp/__main__.py
`, `<root-dir>/yt-dlp-plugins/<package name>/yt_dlp_plugins/
`
1938 3. **pip and other locations in `PYTHONPATH
`**
1939 * Plugin packages can be installed and managed using `pip
`. See [yt-dlp-sample-plugins](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp-sample-plugins) for an example.
1940 * Note: plugin files between plugin packages installed with pip must have unique filenames.
1941 * Any path in `PYTHONPATH
` is searched in for the `yt_dlp_plugins
` namespace folder.
1942 * Note: This does not apply for Pyinstaller/py2exe builds.
1945 `.zip
`, `.egg
` and `.whl
` archives containing a `yt_dlp_plugins
` namespace folder in their root are also supported as plugin packages.
1946 * e.g. `${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/yt-dlp/plugins/mypluginpkg.zip
` where `mypluginpkg.zip
` contains `yt_dlp_plugins/<type>/myplugin.py
`
1948 Run yt-dlp with `--verbose
` to check if the plugin has been loaded.
1950 ## Developing Plugins
1952 See the [yt-dlp-sample-plugins](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp-sample-plugins) repo for a template plugin package and the [Plugin Development](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki/Plugin-Development) section of the wiki for a plugin development guide.
1954 All public classes with a name ending in `IE
`/`PP
` are imported from each file for extractors and postprocessors repectively. This respects underscore prefix (e.g. `_MyBasePluginIE
` is private) and `__all__
`. Modules can similarly be excluded by prefixing the module name with an underscore (e.g. `_myplugin.py
`).
1956 To replace an existing extractor with a subclass of one, set the `plugin_name
` class keyword argument (e.g. `class MyPluginIE(ABuiltInIE, plugin_name='myplugin')
` will replace `ABuiltInIE
` with `MyPluginIE
`). Since the extractor replaces the parent, you should exclude the subclass extractor from being imported separately by making it private using one of the methods described above.
1958 If you are a plugin author, add [yt-dlp-plugins](https://github.com/topics/yt-dlp-plugins) as a topic to your repository for discoverability.
1960 See the [Developer Instructions](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md#developer-instructions) on how to write and test an extractor.
1964 yt-dlp makes the best effort to be a good command-line program, and thus should be callable from any programming language.
1966 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.
1968 From a Python program, you can embed yt-dlp in a more powerful fashion, like this:
1971 from yt_dlp import YoutubeDL
1973 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
1974 with YoutubeDL() as ydl:
1978 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#L183) or `help(yt_dlp.YoutubeDL)` in a Python shell. If you are already familiar with the CLI, you can use [`devscripts/cli_to_api.py`](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/master/devscripts/cli_to_api.py) to translate any CLI switches to `YoutubeDL
` params.
1980 **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)
1982 ## Embedding examples
1984 #### Extracting information
1990 URL = 'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc'
1992 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.YoutubeDL) for a list of available options and public functions
1994 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
1995 info = ydl.extract_info(URL, download=False)
1997 # ℹ️ ydl.sanitize_info makes the info json-serializable
1998 print(json.dumps(ydl.sanitize_info(info)))
2000 #### Download using an info-json
2005 INFO_FILE = 'path/to/video.info.json'
2007 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL() as ydl:
2008 error_code = ydl.download_with_info_file(INFO_FILE)
2010 print('Some videos failed to download' if error_code
2011 else 'All videos successfully downloaded')
2019 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
2022 'format': 'm4a/bestaudio/best',
2023 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.postprocessor) for a list of available Postprocessors and their arguments
2024 'postprocessors': [{ # Extract audio using ffmpeg
2025 'key': 'FFmpegExtractAudio',
2026 'preferredcodec': 'm4a',
2030 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
2031 error_code = ydl.download(URLS)
2039 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
2041 def longer_than_a_minute(info, *, incomplete):
2042 """Download only videos longer than a minute (or with unknown duration)"""
2043 duration = info.get('duration')
2044 if duration and duration < 60:
2045 return 'The video is too short'
2048 'match_filter': longer_than_a_minute,
2051 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
2052 error_code = ydl.download(URLS)
2055 #### Adding logger and progress hook
2060 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
2063 def debug(self, msg):
2064 # For compatibility with youtube-dl, both debug and info are passed into debug
2065 # You can distinguish them by the prefix '[debug] '
2066 if msg.startswith('[debug] '):
2071 def info(self, msg):
2074 def warning(self, msg):
2077 def error(self, msg):
2081 # ℹ️ See "progress_hooks" in help(yt_dlp.YoutubeDL)
2083 if d['status'] == 'finished':
2084 print('Done downloading, now post-processing ...')
2088 'logger': MyLogger(),
2089 'progress_hooks': [my_hook],
2092 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
2096 #### Add a custom PostProcessor
2101 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
2103 # ℹ️ See help(yt_dlp.postprocessor.PostProcessor)
2104 class MyCustomPP(yt_dlp.postprocessor.PostProcessor):
2105 def run(self, info):
2106 self.to_screen('Doing stuff')
2110 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL() as ydl:
2111 # ℹ️ "when" can take any value in yt_dlp.utils.POSTPROCESS_WHEN
2112 ydl.add_post_processor(MyCustomPP(), when='pre_process')
2117 #### Use a custom format selector
2122 URLS = ['https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaW_jenozKc']
2124 def format_selector(ctx):
2125 """ Select the best video and the best audio that won't result in an mkv.
2126 NOTE: This is just an example and does not handle all cases """
2128 # formats are already sorted worst to best
2129 formats = ctx.get('formats')[::-1]
2131 # acodec='none' means there is no audio
2132 best_video = next(f for f in formats
2133 if f['vcodec'] != 'none' and f['acodec'] == 'none')
2135 # find compatible audio extension
2136 audio_ext = {'mp4': 'm4a', 'webm': 'webm'}[best_video['ext']]
2137 # vcodec='none' means there is no video
2138 best_audio = next(f for f in formats if (
2139 f['acodec'] != 'none' and f['vcodec'] == 'none' and f['ext'] == audio_ext))
2141 # These are the minimum required fields for a merged format
2143 'format_id': f'{best_video["format_id"]}+{best_audio["format_id"]}',
2144 'ext': best_video['ext'],
2145 'requested_formats': [best_video, best_audio],
2146 # Must be + separated list of protocols
2147 'protocol': f'{best_video["protocol"]}+{best_audio["protocol"]}'
2152 'format': format_selector,
2155 with yt_dlp.YoutubeDL(ydl_opts) as ydl:
2159 <!-- MANPAGE: MOVE "NEW FEATURES" SECTION HERE -->
2161 # DEPRECATED OPTIONS
2163 These are all the deprecated options and the current alternative to achieve the same effect
2165 #### Almost redundant options
2166 While these options are almost the same as their new counterparts, there are some differences that prevents them being redundant
2168 -j, --dump-json --print "%()j"
2169 -F, --list-formats --print formats_table
2170 --list-thumbnails --print thumbnails_table --print playlist:thumbnails_table
2171 --list-subs --print automatic_captions_table --print subtitles_table
2173 #### Redundant options
2174 While these options are redundant, they are still expected to be used due to their ease of use
2176 --get-description --print description
2177 --get-duration --print duration_string
2178 --get-filename --print filename
2179 --get-format --print format
2181 --get-thumbnail --print thumbnail
2182 -e, --get-title --print title
2183 -g, --get-url --print urls
2184 --match-title REGEX --match-filter "title ~= (?i)REGEX"
2185 --reject-title REGEX --match-filter "title !~= (?i)REGEX"
2186 --min-views COUNT --match-filter "view_count >=? COUNT"
2187 --max-views COUNT --match-filter "view_count <=? COUNT"
2188 --break-on-reject Use --break-match-filter
2189 --user-agent UA --add-header "User-Agent:UA"
2190 --referer URL --add-header "Referer:URL"
2191 --playlist-start NUMBER -I NUMBER:
2192 --playlist-end NUMBER -I :NUMBER
2193 --playlist-reverse -I ::-1
2194 --no-playlist-reverse Default
2195 --no-colors --color no_color
2198 #### Not recommended
2199 While these options still work, their use is not recommended since there are other alternatives to achieve the same
2201 --force-generic-extractor --ies generic,default
2202 --exec-before-download CMD --exec "before_dl:CMD"
2203 --no-exec-before-download --no-exec
2204 --all-formats -f all
2205 --all-subs --sub-langs all --write-subs
2206 --print-json -j --no-simulate
2207 --autonumber-size NUMBER Use string formatting, e.g. %(autonumber)03d
2208 --autonumber-start NUMBER Use internal field formatting like %(autonumber+NUMBER)s
2209 --id -o "%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2210 --metadata-from-title FORMAT --parse-metadata "%(title)s:FORMAT"
2211 --hls-prefer-native --downloader "m3u8:native"
2212 --hls-prefer-ffmpeg --downloader "m3u8:ffmpeg"
2213 --list-formats-old --compat-options list-formats (Alias: --no-list-formats-as-table)
2214 --list-formats-as-table --compat-options -list-formats [Default] (Alias: --no-list-formats-old)
2215 --youtube-skip-dash-manifest --extractor-args "youtube:skip=dash" (Alias: --no-youtube-include-dash-manifest)
2216 --youtube-skip-hls-manifest --extractor-args "youtube:skip=hls" (Alias: --no-youtube-include-hls-manifest)
2217 --youtube-include-dash-manifest Default (Alias: --no-youtube-skip-dash-manifest)
2218 --youtube-include-hls-manifest Default (Alias: --no-youtube-skip-hls-manifest)
2219 --geo-bypass --xff "default"
2220 --no-geo-bypass --xff "never"
2221 --geo-bypass-country CODE --xff CODE
2222 --geo-bypass-ip-block IP_BLOCK --xff IP_BLOCK
2225 #### Developer options
2226 These options are not intended to be used by the end-user
2228 --test Download only part of video for testing extractors
2229 --load-pages Load pages dumped by --write-pages
2230 --youtube-print-sig-code For testing youtube signatures
2231 --allow-unplayable-formats List unplayable formats also
2232 --no-allow-unplayable-formats Default
2236 These are aliases that are no longer documented for various reasons
2238 --avconv-location --ffmpeg-location
2239 --clean-infojson --clean-info-json
2240 --cn-verification-proxy URL --geo-verification-proxy URL
2241 --dump-headers --print-traffic
2242 --dump-intermediate-pages --dump-pages
2243 --force-write-download-archive --force-write-archive
2244 --load-info --load-info-json
2245 --no-clean-infojson --no-clean-info-json
2246 --no-split-tracks --no-split-chapters
2247 --no-write-srt --no-write-subs
2248 --prefer-unsecure --prefer-insecure
2249 --rate-limit RATE --limit-rate RATE
2250 --split-tracks --split-chapters
2251 --srt-lang LANGS --sub-langs LANGS
2252 --trim-file-names LENGTH --trim-filenames LENGTH
2253 --write-srt --write-subs
2254 --yes-overwrites --force-overwrites
2256 #### Sponskrub Options
2257 Support for [SponSkrub](https://github.com/faissaloo/SponSkrub) has been deprecated in favor of the `--sponsorblock
` options
2259 --sponskrub --sponsorblock-mark all
2260 --no-sponskrub --no-sponsorblock
2261 --sponskrub-cut --sponsorblock-remove all
2262 --no-sponskrub-cut --sponsorblock-remove -all
2263 --sponskrub-force Not applicable
2264 --no-sponskrub-force Not applicable
2265 --sponskrub-location Not applicable
2266 --sponskrub-args Not applicable
2268 #### No longer supported
2269 These options may no longer work as intended
2271 --prefer-avconv avconv is not officially supported by yt-dlp (Alias: --no-prefer-ffmpeg)
2272 --prefer-ffmpeg Default (Alias: --no-prefer-avconv)
2273 -C, --call-home Not implemented
2274 --no-call-home Default
2275 --include-ads No longer supported
2276 --no-include-ads Default
2277 --write-annotations No supported site has annotations now
2278 --no-write-annotations Default
2279 --compat-options seperate-video-versions No longer needed
2282 These options were deprecated since 2014 and have now been entirely removed
2284 -A, --auto-number -o "%(autonumber)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2285 -t, -l, --title, --literal -o "%(title)s-%(id)s.%(ext)s"
2288 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)
2291 See the [Wiki](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/wiki) for more information
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