yt-dlp

yt-dlp is the most actively maintained fork of youtube-dl. It downloads video and audio from YouTube and 1000+ other sites, supports full playlists, chapters, subtitles, metadata embedding, and SponsorBlock integration. Works best with FFmpeg installed alongside it.

winget install yt-dlp.yt-dlp

• Downloads from YouTube, Vimeo, Twitter/X, TikTok, and 1,000+ other sites
• Full playlist & channel downloads with configurable output templates
• SponsorBlock integration — automatically skip or cut sponsor segments
• Embeds metadata, thumbnails, and subtitles into the downloaded file

Common Commands

# Download best quality (auto-merges video + audio)
yt-dlp URL

# Best quality capped at 1080p
yt-dlp -f "bestvideo[height<=1080]+bestaudio" URL

# Audio only — save as MP3
yt-dlp -x --audio-format mp3 URL

# Download entire playlist
yt-dlp --yes-playlist "PLAYLIST_URL"

# List all available formats/resolutions
yt-dlp -F URL

# Embed English subtitles into the file
yt-dlp --write-subs --sub-lang en --embed-subs URL

# Throttle download speed (e.g. 2 MB/s)
yt-dlp --rate-limit 2M URL