4 youtube-dl [options] url [url...]
 
   7 **youtube-dl** is a small command-line program to download videos from
 
   8 YouTube.com and a few more sites. It requires the Python interpreter, version
 
   9 2.x (x being at least 6), and it is not platform specific. It should work in
 
  10 your Unix box, in Windows or in Mac OS X. It is released to the public domain,
 
  11 which means you can modify it, redistribute it or use it however you like.
 
  14     -h, --help               print this help text and exit
 
  15     --version                print program version and exit
 
  16     -U, --update             update this program to latest version
 
  17     -i, --ignore-errors      continue on download errors
 
  18     -r, --rate-limit LIMIT   download rate limit (e.g. 50k or 44.6m)
 
  19     -R, --retries RETRIES    number of retries (default is 10)
 
  20     --dump-user-agent        display the current browser identification
 
  21     --list-extractors        List all supported extractors and the URLs they
 
  25     --playlist-start NUMBER  playlist video to start at (default is 1)
 
  26     --playlist-end NUMBER    playlist video to end at (default is last)
 
  27     --match-title REGEX      download only matching titles (regex or caseless
 
  29     --reject-title REGEX     skip download for matching titles (regex or
 
  31     --max-downloads NUMBER   Abort after downloading NUMBER files
 
  33 ### Filesystem Options:
 
  34     -t, --title              use title in file name
 
  35     -l, --literal            use literal title in file name
 
  36     -A, --auto-number        number downloaded files starting from 00000
 
  37     -o, --output TEMPLATE    output filename template. Use %(stitle)s to get the
 
  38                              title, %(uploader)s for the uploader name,
 
  39                              %(autonumber)s to get an automatically incremented
 
  40                              number, %(ext)s for the filename extension,
 
  41                              %(upload_date)s for the upload date (YYYYMMDD), and
 
  42                              %% for a literal percent. Use - to output to
 
  44     -a, --batch-file FILE    file containing URLs to download ('-' for stdin)
 
  45     -w, --no-overwrites      do not overwrite files
 
  46     -c, --continue           resume partially downloaded files
 
  47     --no-continue            do not resume partially downloaded files (restart
 
  49     --cookies FILE           file to read cookies from and dump cookie jar in
 
  50     --no-part                do not use .part files
 
  51     --no-mtime               do not use the Last-modified header to set the file
 
  53     --write-description      write video description to a .description file
 
  54     --write-info-json        write video metadata to a .info.json file
 
  56 ### Verbosity / Simulation Options:
 
  57     -q, --quiet              activates quiet mode
 
  58     -s, --simulate           do not download the video and do not write anything
 
  60     --skip-download          do not download the video
 
  61     -g, --get-url            simulate, quiet but print URL
 
  62     -e, --get-title          simulate, quiet but print title
 
  63     --get-thumbnail          simulate, quiet but print thumbnail URL
 
  64     --get-description        simulate, quiet but print video description
 
  65     --get-filename           simulate, quiet but print output filename
 
  66     --get-format             simulate, quiet but print output format
 
  67     --no-progress            do not print progress bar
 
  68     --console-title          display progress in console titlebar
 
  69     -v, --verbose            print various debugging information
 
  71 ### Video Format Options:
 
  72     -f, --format FORMAT      video format code
 
  73     --all-formats            download all available video formats
 
  74     --prefer-free-formats    prefer free video formats unless a specific one is
 
  76     --max-quality FORMAT     highest quality format to download
 
  77     -F, --list-formats       list all available formats (currently youtube only)
 
  78     --write-srt              write video closed captions to a .srt file
 
  79                              (currently youtube only)
 
  80     --srt-lang LANG          language of the closed captions to download
 
  81                              (optional) use IETF language tags like 'en'
 
  83 ### Authentication Options:
 
  84     -u, --username USERNAME  account username
 
  85     -p, --password PASSWORD  account password
 
  86     -n, --netrc              use .netrc authentication data
 
  88 ### Post-processing Options:
 
  89     --extract-audio          convert video files to audio-only files (requires
 
  90                              ffmpeg or avconv and ffprobe or avprobe)
 
  91     --audio-format FORMAT    "best", "aac", "vorbis", "mp3", "m4a", or "wav";
 
  93     --audio-quality QUALITY  ffmpeg/avconv audio bitrate specification, 128k by
 
  95     -k, --keep-video         keeps the video file on disk after the post-
 
  96                              processing; the video is erased by default
 
 100 ### Can you please put the -b option back?
 
 102 Most people asking this question are not aware that youtube-dl now defaults to downloading the highest available quality as reported by YouTube, which will be 1080p or 720p in some cases, so you no longer need the -b option. For some specific videos, maybe YouTube does not report them to be available in a specific high quality format you''re interested in. In that case, simply request it with the -f option and youtube-dl will try to download it.
 
 104 ### I get HTTP error 402 when trying to download a video. What's this?
 
 106 Apparently YouTube requires you to pass a CAPTCHA test if you download too much. We''re [considering to provide a way to let you solve the CAPTCHA](https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl/issues/154), but at the moment, your best course of action is pointing a webbrowser to the youtube URL, solving the CAPTCHA, and restart youtube-dl.
 
 108 ### I have downloaded a video but how can I play it?
 
 110 Once the video is fully downloaded, use any video player, such as [vlc](http://www.videolan.org) or [mplayer](http://www.mplayerhq.hu/).
 
 112 ### The links provided by youtube-dl -g are not working anymore
 
 114 The URLs youtube-dl outputs require the downloader to have the correct cookies. Use the `--cookies` option to write the required cookies into a file, and advise your downloader to read cookies from that file. Some sites also require a common user agent to be used, use `--dump-user-agent` to see the one in use by youtube-dl.
 
 116 ### ERROR: no fmt_url_map or conn information found in video info
 
 118 youtube has switched to a new video info format in July 2011 which is not supported by old versions of youtube-dl. You can update youtube-dl with `sudo youtube-dl --update`.
 
 122 youtube-dl is released into the public domain by the copyright holders.
 
 124 This README file was originally written by Daniel Bolton (<https://github.com/dbbolton>) and is likewise released into the public domain.
 
 128 Bugs and suggestions should be reported at: <https://github.com/rg3/youtube-dl/issues>
 
 132 * Your exact command line, like `youtube-dl -t "http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHlDtZ6Oc3s&feature=channel_video_title"`. A common mistake is not to escape the `&`. Putting URLs in quotes should solve this problem.
 
 133 * The output of `youtube-dl --version`
 
 134 * The output of `python --version`
 
 135 * The name and version of your Operating System ("Ubuntu 11.04 x64" or "Windows 7 x64" is usually enough).