Overview
This one has been around long enough to have outlived most of its competitors, and it survives by doing one job with almost no interface in the way. Paste a link, pick whether you want video or audio and at what quality, and press the button. There is no library, no browser extension, no account and nothing to configure before it works.
The Premium tier removes the parts that made the free version tedious, the download speed throttle, the cap on how many items come out of a playlist, and the queue that processes conversions one at a time. This build has that tier applied, so it runs at full speed with unlimited items and parallel processing.
The basic workflow
The window is one field and a small set of buttons. Copy a link and it detects it from the clipboard automatically, which means a session of grabbing a dozen things is a dozen copies and nothing else. Output format and quality are chosen from a dropdown that remembers what you used last, and the destination folder is set once.
Video output covers the common container and codec combinations at every quality the source offers. Audio extraction writes proper files with the title, artist and cover art filled in where the source provides them, which makes it genuinely useful for building a local library rather than producing a folder of untitled files.
Playlists, batches and conversion
A playlist link brings the whole thing down with no cap on the Premium tier. The batch view shows each item with its own progress, and failures are retried rather than silently skipped, with a clear report of anything that could not be fetched at the end.
The conversion step runs after download for output formats the source does not provide directly. With the tier applied these run in parallel across available cores instead of one at a time, which on a large playlist is the difference between an hour and ten minutes. Hardware acceleration is used where the machine supports it.
Practical notes
Sites change their delivery mechanisms regularly, and a downloader that worked last month can fail this month for reasons entirely outside the program. That is why this category updates so often, and why keeping a current build matters more here than with most software. The version posted here is current as of this release.
For very large batches, set the destination to a drive with real space and check the parallel limit against your connection. Running eight simultaneous downloads on a modest line makes all eight slow rather than any of them fast, and three or four is usually the practical maximum.
What you get
- Automatic link detection from the clipboard
- Full speed downloads with the throttle removed
- Unlimited playlist and batch item counts
- Parallel conversion across available cores
- Audio extraction with title, artist and cover art metadata
- Every quality the source offers, including the higher resolutions
- Batch view with per item progress and retry on failure
- Hardware accelerated conversion where supported
- No account, no extension and nothing to configure before first use
Inside the archive
- Free YouTube Download installer, 32 and 64 bit
- Premium tier applied during setup
- Conversion component
- Language packs for the interface list shown above
System requirements
| Operating system | Windows 7 or newer, 32 or 64-bit |
|---|---|
| Processor | Any current x86 or x64 processor |
| Memory | 2 GB |
| Storage | 300 MB plus space for downloads |
| Display | 1024 by 768 or higher |
| Other | A network connection |
Installing it
- Run the installer as administrator.
- Decline any additional component the installer offers that you did not come for.
- Apply the tier step from the archive before the first launch.
- Open the program and confirm the settings show no speed or item limit.
- Set the destination folder and the parallel download count to suit your connection.
Mirrors
| Route | Region | Note | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Direct, primary | Europe | No wait, resumable | Online |
| Direct, secondary | North America | No wait, resumable | Online |
| Torrent magnet | Global | Not needed at this size | Online |
Release history
- Extraction updated for current site delivery changes
- Fixed metadata not being written on some audio outputs
- Parallel conversion limit now respects core count correctly
- Batch retry added for failed items
- Clipboard detection made less aggressive
- Hardware accelerated conversion enabled
Questions about this release
Is the speed throttle removed?
Yes. The Premium tier is applied, so downloads run at whatever your connection allows.
How many items can a playlist have?
No limit on this tier. Very large playlists are worth splitting anyway for practical reasons.
A link that worked before now fails. Why?
Sites change how they deliver video. That is what most releases in this category fix, so a current build is the answer.
Does it write metadata on audio files?
Yes, title, artist and cover art where the source provides them.
Comments
Parallel conversion turned a two hour playlist job into about fifteen minutes.
Clipboard detection means I never touch the window. Copy and it starts.
Comments are read before they appear. If a build stops working, say so here and it gets rebuilt rather than quietly left up.
Full speed, no item cap. Simple window, does exactly the one thing.