YouTube Video Downloader

Download YouTube videos with full control over quality and format settings.

Quick Start

The simplest way to download a video:

python scripts/download_video.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIDEO_ID"

This downloads the video in best available quality as MP4 to /mnt/user-data/outputs/.

Options

Quality Settings

Use -q or --quality to specify video quality:

• best (default): Highest quality available
• 1080p: Full HD
• 720p: HD
• 480p: Standard definition
• 360p: Lower quality
• worst: Lowest quality available

Example:

python scripts/download_video.py "URL" -q 720p

Format Options

Use -f or --format to specify output format (video downloads only):

• mp4 (default): Most compatible
• webm: Modern format
• mkv: Matroska container

Example:

python scripts/download_video.py "URL" -f webm

Audio Only

Use -a or --audio-only to download only audio as MP3:

python scripts/download_video.py "URL" -a

Custom Output Directory

Use -o or --output to specify a different output directory:

python scripts/download_video.py "URL" -o /path/to/directory

Complete Examples

1. Download video in 1080p as MP4:

python scripts/download_video.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ" -q 1080p

2. Download audio only as MP3:

python scripts/download_video.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ" -a

3. Download in 720p as WebM to custom directory:

python scripts/download_video.py "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ" -q 720p -f webm -o /custom/path

How It Works

The skill uses yt-dlp, a robust YouTube downloader that:

• Automatically installs itself if not present
• Fetches video information before downloading
• Selects the best available streams matching your criteria
• Merges video and audio streams when needed
• Supports a wide range of YouTube video formats

Important Notes

• Downloads are saved to /mnt/user-data/outputs/ by default
• Video filename is automatically generated from the video title
• The script handles installation of yt-dlp automatically
• Only single videos are downloaded (playlists are skipped by default)
• Higher quality videos may take longer to download and use more disk space

Reusability

This skill is designed to be reusable by other skills:

Used by:

• youtube-to-xiaoyuzhou - Uses the audio-only download feature to get YouTube audio for podcast publishing