Downie is the Simplest Way to Download YouTube Videos (and More) to Your Mac
It is difficult to find a good reliable application to download videos on the internet. It seems that each time I find one of these tools that I appreciate, there is a good chance that, soon, it will cease to work, either abandoned by its developers or be sold to a new shaded owner. An application that has never been faced with these problems is Downie for Mac. Downie is a video download in one click for hundreds of websites, including YouTube, Instagram, Reddit, Facebook, Vimeo and many others. It has been regularly updated for many years and has been delivered with a simple commercial model – a unique payment of $ 20. This is easily the best and most reliable option I can recommend, assuming you have a Mac.
How to use Downie to download videos
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Once you have installed Downie on your Mac, the easiest way to use it is to install its browser extension in the browser you use. There are options for Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Opera.
After that, just open any web page that has a video, press the Downie button in your browser toolbar and the application will manage the rest. It’s really as simple as that. The only problem you might encounter is if there are several videos on a page. For example, if you open your Instagram flow in a browser and press the Downie button, the application cannot just download each video from your flow. The trick is to open the specific publication you want to download in a new tab first, before pressing the Downie button.
If you have the URL of the video you want to download, you can also simply copy it and paste it directly in Downie, which allows you to jump to install all browser extensions. For the sites that Downie does not support, there is also an extraction mode guided by the user to help you download videos, although it is not infallible. I have not yet met a site where I needed to use it, but if you need it, you can consult the developer guide to use the functionality. Do not expect to exceed the protection of the copy with.
In my tests, Downie was able to download most of the videos I had to save. I tried Downie on a bunch of other social media and video platforms, and it worked very well, even on Instagram coils. The most notable exception was Instagram Stories, which he could not download with any degree of reliability, but you can use other websites to download them.
Downie settings configuration
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Although Downie seems simple to the surface, it is extremely configurable, so it is worth traveling its parameters to customize it. While Downie is open, click on the Downie button in the menu bar and select Parameters. Now go through each of the available tabs to see what the application has to offer. In the General Tab, you can select Download quality options, which is useful if you do not want to fill the storage of your Mac by downloading 4K videos.
THE Destination TAB allows you to configure where you want to store your downloaded videos and the format you want for video files. It also allows you to record video miniatures in the form of images. You can also extract audio from video files, which means that if you want to convert a YouTube video to MP3 file, Downie can do it for you. You can configure this feature in the Post-processing Tab in Downie settings, where it allows you to choose if you want to download the audio in the form of MP3, M4A or in original format.
What do you think so far?
THE Subtitles and audio The parameter section is also useful, especially if you are deadly to hear. It has a neat option that allows you to download all available subtitles, even in several languages. THE Proxy server TAB allows you to activate a feature where you can also download blocked videos in your region. Finally, there is the Supported sites Tab, where you can configure individual download settings for each supported site. There are a few pages of additional settings that you can follow if you want an even finer control, but you should be good with these bases.
Get downnie at a lower price
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Downie’s $ 20 price may seem a bit high for some, but maintaining an application like Downie is a lot of work. The websites continue to change their code all the time, which means that Downie must stay in advance on the game to make sure you can download videos from them. I have seen many cases where applications that are not updated are unnecessary, and that is why I appreciate having a reliable application where the business model is clear.
That said, Downie is available as part of SETAPP, which allows you to access more than 200 Mac applications for $ 10 / month. My colleague Justin Pot gave Setap as its own approval, and I must agree that it is a good deal. If you plan to use more than Downie, it could be a good way to save money overall.
