How to download YouTube video in MacBook

Use a YouTube Premium account to watch videos offline

Table of Contents Show

Use a YouTube Premium account to watch videos offline
What to Know
How Do I Download YouTube Videos to My Mac Without Software?
YouTube Premium
Downloading YouTube videos on your Mac
How to watch downloaded YouTube videos
How do I download YouTube videos to my Mac without software?
How can I download videos on Mac?
How do I download a YouTube video to my Mac using Safari?

What to Know

The only legal way to download videos to your Mac is with a YouTube Premium subscription.
YouTube Premium: Click Download under any YouTube video. Downloaded videos can be accessed offline through the Downloads tab.

This article explains how to download YouTube videos on your Mac with a Premium subscription.

How Do I Download YouTube Videos to My Mac Without Software?

The best way to download YouTube videos to your Mac is through the platform itself. With a YouTube Premium subscription, every video has a download button below the video player which is used to download the video.

With an active Premium subscription, follow these steps to begin downloading videos:

Navigate to YouTube in your browser and open the video you’d like to download.
Select Download below the video player.
Once the video has finished downloading, click the menu icon (3 horizontal lines) in the top left of the screen and select Downloads.
Your video should now be available for offline viewing (you can test this by turning off your Mac’s Wi-Fi and checking if the video begins playback).
In some countries, while offline, you can still navigate to YouTube.com and access your downloaded videos for up to 48 hours.
To change download quality, click Downloads > Download Settings and select your preferred resolution.

FAQ

How do I download music from YouTube?
Your YouTube Premium account will also let you download tracks from the YouTube Music app. The same rules apply: Once you download a video or song, you can access it offline as long as you've accessed the site with your account within the past month. The background listening feature of YouTube Premium also means that you won't have to keep the app open to listen to playlists you create.
How do I download a YouTube video to an iPhone?
With your YouTube Premium account, you can also download videos through the iOS app. Once you've signed into your account on the YouTube app, go to the Watch page and then below the video select Download. Because YouTube links the videos and music you download to your account, you can view all of your downloaded items regardless of platform as long as you're signed in.

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A Macbook Air with the YouTube logo

(Image credit: Future)

YouTube is the place to go to watch video content from independent creators and huge media companies alike, but it's all about streaming. Watching YouTube videos is easy if you have the internet, but you're going to need to plan ahead if you want to go off the web-connected grid and keep watching. Thankfully, you can download YouTube videos to a Mac to be watched offline.

You might already know that you can download YouTube videos on your iPhone and iPad, perfect for those times when you might want to entertain a kid in the air or on a long journey. But you can also download videos on your Mac as well if a mobile device isn't handy, perfect for those times when you want to make sure you have access even without Wi-Fi. And it's a particularly good idea if you have to deal with data caps, too, or want a larger-screen viewing experience.

Downloading YouTube videos to watch offline on a Mac is easy and we're going to show you exactly how to do it.

YouTube Premium

If you want to download YouTube videos on your Mac, you're going to need to have YouTube Premium to do it. There are other ways and means of downloading YouTube videos, but they all have their problems — not least the fact that it's against YouTube's rules.

We're going to show you the official way to download videos for offline viewing, so you'll need YouTube Premium which starts at $11.99 per month. That not only gives you access to downloads but also the ability to watch your content ad-free across all devices, too.

To add a further wrinkle to proceedings, you're going to need to use Google Chrome, too. The download feature is only available via Chrome, so Safari users are out of luck. Thankfully, Chrome is one of the best Mac web browsers around — maybe give it a try for all your other stuff, too.

Downloading YouTube videos on your Mac

1. Open the YouTube website in Chrome and find the video that you want to download for offline viewing. May sure that you're signed in, too, and have your Premium account active.

2. Click the Download button beneath the video you want to download.

Download button on YouTube

(Image credit: Oliver Haslam)

How to watch downloaded YouTube videos

1. Open the YouTube website in Chrome on your Mac.

2. Click the menu button on the left side of the screen and click Downloads. You'll find your offline videos ready to be watched there.

YouTube menu with downloads button

(Image credit: Oliver Haslam)

Now that you know how to download and watch YouTube videos you'll never find yourself without entertainment the next time your airplane's Wi-Fi isn't working.

Want to delete a downloaded video? Just click the Download button again and it'll be gone for good. Or until you download it again, that is.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too.

Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.

How do I download YouTube videos to my Mac without software?

Type 'https://ddownr.com' into the search tool of your web browser. Paste the video URL into Ddownr. Click DOWNLOAD to specify the video resolution from the playlist (there are up to 250). Once ready, the video downloads in a ZIP file on your computer.