download videos from youtube youtube-dl is a small command-line program to download videos from YouTube.com and other sites that don't provide direct links to the videos served. youtube-dl allows the user, among other things, to choose a specific video quality to download (if available) or let the program automatically determine the best quality video to grab. It supports downloading entire playlists and all videos from a given user. Currently supported sites are video.google.com, youtube, photobucket, dailymotion, and metacafe.