Ever wanted to download a YouTube video? Download multiple things from Archive.org without having to keep Chrome open? And I'm sure theres other things this software does that I don't bother to use?!?!? Anywho, terrible pitches aside, ever since I discovered it some years ago JDownloader 2 has been installed of every computer I've daily driven. It's one those great pieces of software that just works, on every system and platform (even headless via command line!) ### Download JDownloader2 https://jdownloader.org/jdownloader2 ### My main uses My most common use is to download YouTube videos. Unlike the basic ones you can find by Googling "youtube downloader," you can choose to download the video or audio, choose format, and choose quality. You can even have it load up every video from an entire playlist. (great for downloading mp3s for burning CDs) I've also used it to better manage downloads from Archive.org. I've also observed higher download speeds and better reliability when using this method. One does need to sign up for a (free) Archive.org account in order to use this feature. ### Downloading YouTube videos It's quite the easy process. Just copy the link from the video you're watching, either from the address bar or by right clicking and selecting `Copy video URL`. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.42.14 PM.png]] **Hit `Add New Links` in the bottom left-hand corner.** You might also see a popup in one of the corners of your screen with a handy (albeit confusing) message about finding a source for the link you just copied. Never really interacted with those popups before, it might be worth exploring if you're adventurous. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.43.35 PM.png]] In this little popup, if you already have the link copied, it'll be there. I'm not sure which platforms this is supported on, since I know some of the clipboard integration is a little more tight (looking at you gnome). **Paste your link in the big textarea and select continue.** ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.43.55 PM.png]] Now, back in the main window, direct your attention to the right-hand sidebar that has options for file types. Pretty self-explanatory here. One could select several different types, or just one. For the purpose of demonstration, I'll check the box for both `Audio File` & `Video File`. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.48.15 PM.png]] **To change the format and/or quality of the file types your downloading, expand the menu on the item you want to change by pressing `[+]` next to the name of the file.** This'll show the different files you'll be downloading for each source. Shown below you can see the audio & video downloads since I have those two file types selected. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.51.40 PM.png]] Actually changing the format/quality lies in the `Variant` column for each file. Click the dropdown for variant on the file, and a list of items will appear: ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.55.12 PM.png]] ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.55.16 PM.png]] As you can see, there's plenty of options to choose from. Since I don't want to change anything, I'll leave it how it is and continue to start the download. **Start the download process by pressing the play button in the top left corner** (highlighted pink). ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.50.37 PM.png]] Since this video I'm downloading isn't very large, it only takes a few seconds. **Once complete, the default place it'll dump your downloads is, you guessed it, your default downloads directory.** What's also nice (and configurable) is that if you download multiple files for one source, it'll throw it in a folder (seen below) ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 8.59.10 PM.png]] As mentioned earlier, downloading playlists is also really easy. To demonstrate, I'll download my old gaming mix I made when I was like 10. Start by finding the page for your playlist: ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 9.03.29 PM.png]] Copy the link by the method of your choosing, again, either the address bar or from the share function. Once copied, paste the link in the link analyzer popup, which appears when clicking `Add New Links`. After clicking continue, you should see a popup similar to this: ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 9.05.20 PM.png]] Since we do want to download the playlist, click `Playlist`. JDownloader will now crawl the links on the playlist. Depending on the size of the playlist, this could take a few minutes. It took about 20 seconds for it to get all 6 videos in this playlist. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 9.07.03 PM.png]] (optional) Since it's a playlist, I personally don't want it spitting all those files out into the downloads folder. It's possible to change where the files are places by changing the `Save to:` directory. Press the `Browse` button (highlighted pink) to show the file browser. ![[Articles/attachments/Screenshot 2025-07-10 at 9.10.10 PM.png]] Once all the links are present, you can start downloading by clicking that play button in the top left corner of the application.