July 19, 2026 · 6 min read
How to download YouTube videos and Shorts
YouTube offers official offline viewing through YouTube Premium, and for casual watching inside the app that's the simplest option. But Premium downloads stay locked inside the app — you can't edit them, move them to another device, archive them, or keep them after your subscription ends.
When you need an actual file — a lecture for a classroom without internet, your own uploads recovered from your channel, a clip for commentary or research — a web downloader gives you a standard MP4 that belongs to you. Here's how it works and what the quality options mean.
Step by step
Copy the video URL
From your browser's address bar, or via Share → Copy link in the YouTube app. Standard videos, Shorts, and youtu.be short links all work.
Paste it into the downloader
Open the YouTube video downloader, paste the URL, and press Download. The tool lists every available format for that video.
Pick a resolution — or audio only
Choose from the offered resolutions (480p up to 4K when the upload supports it). If you only need the sound — a lecture, podcast, or music you have rights to — pick the MP3 option instead; the file will be a fraction of the size.
Download the file
Long or high-resolution videos produce large files: a 10-minute 4K video can exceed 1 GB. On a slow connection, 1080p is usually the sweet spot between quality and size.
Understanding the quality options
YouTube stores each upload in multiple renditions. A downloader lists what actually exists for that specific video — if the creator uploaded in 720p, no tool can offer 4K. Very old uploads may top out at 360p or 480p.
File size scales steeply with resolution. As a rule of thumb per minute of video: roughly 5–10 MB at 480p, 15–30 MB at 1080p, and 80–150 MB at 4K, depending on how much motion the footage has.
Shorts work the same way
A Short is a regular YouTube video in a vertical format, so the same copy-link flow applies. Shorts are served up to 1080×1920. If you're a creator moving a Short to TikTok or Reels, download your own upload and you'll get the clean vertical file.
What about copyrighted content?
YouTube's Terms of Service only permit downloading where YouTube provides the feature (Premium offline) or the creator has authorized it. Downloading your own videos, Creative Commons-licensed videos (YouTube has a CC-BY filter in search), and public-domain material is straightforward; for everything else, treat downloads as personal-use archiving and don't re-upload or redistribute. The legality guide below covers this in more depth.
Frequently asked questions
Can I download an entire playlist at once?
Not in one click — paste each video's URL individually. For bulk archiving of your own channel, YouTube's own Google Takeout export is the better tool and returns your original upload files.
Why is the 4K option missing on some videos?
The option list mirrors what the creator uploaded and what YouTube has processed. New uploads can take hours before the highest resolutions appear, and many videos were never uploaded in 4K at all.
Can I download age-restricted or members-only videos?
No. Anything that requires a login to view — age-restricted, members-only, private, or unlisted-with-restrictions — is not accessible to an anonymous downloader.
Is MP3 extraction lossless?
The audio is converted from YouTube's AAC/Opus stream to MP3 at up to 320 kbps. For most listening it's indistinguishable from the source, but it is a re-encode — if you need the untouched stream, download the video file instead.
Published April 20, 2026 · Last updated July 19, 2026. This article is general information, not legal advice.