Contenuti
Intro
YouTube is one of the most loved and used sites in the world precisely because of the huge amount of content, within it we find almost anything. We often find songs or videos with soundtracks so beautiful that we would like to listen to them again and have them on our PC or Smartphone. To meet this need, in this article we are going to look at many different methods to understand how to download music from YouTube. We will focus specifically on ways to do this for free, while also analyzing the risks associated with doing so
On the other hand, if you want to know how to download videos, you will find everything in our article: How to download videos from YouTube
YouTube since its founding in 2005, has experienced incredible growth that has allowed it to consistently be one of the most loved and visited sites in the world. This web platform is entirely based on sharing and displaying multimedia content of virtually every kind.
The main function of the site is to share videos, but in recent years it has also opened up to strictly music content. In each case it is possible to find video clips, trailers, music videos, short films, live streaming, film clips, TV series episodes, slideshows, songs of all kinds, and other content such as video blogs, original videos, instructional videos, and more.
YouTube is constantly evolving, allowing users to interact with content creators by voting, commenting, adding to favorites, and sometimes even bookmarking videos. The majority of videos are free and free to view, but in recent years, premium channels based on subscriptions, movie rentals, and even YouTube Premium and YouTube Music have sprung up, providing access to exclusive content.
YouTube Music offers an app and services dedicated to music fans, which also allow us to personalize our experience and offer us content from artists we don’t know, similar to those we already appreciate. It has very intuitive operation and is similar in style to other music content apps such as Spotify.
Is downloading music from YouTube for free legal?
Many people ask this question when they want to find a way to download free music from this site. Let’s start with the fairly obvious fact that there are plenty of methods to transfer YouTube videos and songs to our PC or phone for free, and it is legal to be able to do so, but only under certain circumstances.
Taking audio from a YouTube video and saving it to one’s hard disk is a quick and easy operation, we can extract the audio found on YouTube to obtain an mp3 file and if we want, listen to it in the car stereo or in our media player with headphones, while doing other activities. In such cases, we should know that it is permissible to download a video or song from YouTube even if it was not produced and published by us. This is also true in special cases, such as if we decide to download an official video clip from a very famous record company or a creative video from a user who wants to self-promote on the web, but always depending on the circumstances.
The circumstances under which downloading music or video files from the Internet is lawful depend on the use we make of the file we download; to make a long story short, this operation is lawful from the point of view of the law when the use is one’s own and has no commercial purpose.
However, we have to consider not only the point of view of the law, but also the contractual conditions of YouTube and the licenses to use the platform . All users upon registration must agree to these rules, and in these rules, however, we find that downloading is prohibited. There are also many protected videos that should not be downloaded, among them are videos that have special conditions contracted with YouTube, such as those of major record companies.
To see what we can do with the audio files in the videos, we need to take a look at the disclaimers that at sometimes come entered at the bottom of the video descriptions and check the type of license provided for individual audio tracks. Usually when a disclaimer is not present there should be no problem using a video, but if not, even violating such rules established by YouTube, you commit at most one tort and not a crime. If instead you download a video with disclaimers and after the download, the user somehow puts the downloaded file back on the network even by sharing it, can be considered a crime in some cases.
Disclaimers aside, however, the soundtracks and songs used within the videos may be Copyright protected, so reuse of the songs in personal productions is strongly discouraged.
To sum it up, we can simply say that it is legal to download music from YouTube and similar sites, at least as long as we do not use it for profit and repost or share it on the Web.
Methods of downloading music from YouTube
Now that we have taken away some doubts on the matter, let us see what possibilities we have to proceed with downloading the audio part of one or more videos from this very famous web platform.
We should know that there are a lot of online services and programs that give us the possibility to do this by saving Google-owned movies in different formats and resolutions, mainly we will be interested in those that allow downloading in formats such as wav, flac and mp3. Most of these solutions are completely free and allow us to listen to downloaded music at any time and on any device.
In fact, we can download music not only from PCs but also from smartphones, tablets and Smart TVs, and then listen to them on any device we want. By downloading only the audio part of the videos, we can save it in different formats. Lightweight, compressed formats such as MP3, allow us to listen to tracks wherever we like, usually great for mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones. If, on the other hand, we are looking for formats that can reproduce sounds faithfully and ensure high audio quality, we need to download music by resorting to lossless formats such as WAV, AIFF, and FLAC.
In this section we will look at most of the methods that can be used to make a download quickly and easily. The first method we will see will be the official YouTube method, while the other methods we will see will be completely free even though they go against some official agreements of Google’s media files site.
Listen and download music with Youtube Music
Let’s take a look at YouTube’s official method of downloading and listening to music, we are talking about Youtube Music, the music streaming service. If we are only looking for a method to listen to music from Youtube, instead of downloading audio files that will take up space, we can take advantage of the streaming service that this famous platform offers us.
YouTube Music is a subscription service costing €9.99 per month, which also provides access to the YouTube Music Premium music service. This service can be tried for free for one month with no obligation to renew, and allows us to listen to music conveniently and download it to listen wherever we like.
YouTube Music has very similar features to YouTube and Spotify. The user has access to songs and music videos as well as live performances and official albums of many artists. This is a service that can be used on the web platform or the official app by logging in to YouTube or a Google account.
The Home screen has a design and layout very similar to Spotify, offers recommendations based on genres and artists already listened to, and is able to suggest songs we may like. Suggestions are created through well-tested algorithms, and there are many different types of playlists, such as those made especially for the gym, parties, or house cleaning.
There is a section called “Hotlist” that contains all the most popular songs and videos of the moment, and a useful Collection section that contains all our favorite songs and artists, as well as a history of recently listened to songs. One of the most interesting functions is the intelligent search, which makes it possible to do a very broad search of songs. This search is really well done and allows us to find out the titles of songs we don’t know by writing parts of the lyrics of a song or describing it. For example, by searching for “song that starts whistling,” the search algorithm will find all songs that start with an artist whistling.
One of the most interesting features of the app for smartphones and tablets, it allows us to continue video playback in the background when the screen is locked, and in addition, it offers us offline downloading of music videos and songs.
Subscribing to this service is very simple, first we need to own a Youtube account or register if we don’t have one, next once in the home page of our channel from PC or other device, we need to click in the upper right corner to open the menu and select the Purchases and subscriptions item. Having done that, a page will open that will present us with the available offers with some information, only of Youtube Premium and Youtube Music that will provide us with a free month trial.
To activate one of these subscriptions, we need to click on more information and then on Start Trial, at which point we only need to enter our prepaid card information and the subscription will be active. After a free month a monthly payment will be triggered, which we can deactivate whenever we want, even before the end of the trial month.
Once we are subscribed to this service, downloading music becomes very easy. If we are from a PC, we will need to use a compatible web browser, such as Google Chrome and open the YouTube Music page. Whenever we are in front of a video or song that we want to download, we only need to press the Download button found below the playback player, after which we select the quality and format. Once the file is downloaded, we can find and manage it in the Downloads section, which we will find in a sidebar on the left side of the screen.
If we want to download music directly from smartphones or tablets, we need to make sure we have the YouTube Music app on the device, and if not, download it from the Play Store on Android devices or the App Store on Apple devices. Once we own the app, we need to open it and register if we do not have an account or log in if we already have one. After we subscribe to YouTube Premium or YouTube Music, we can download to any song or video clip we are interested in. While standing in front of a song or movie that we want to save to our device, we can tap on the Download button located below the player, select the quality and format of the file, and start the download by pressing the OK button.
Download music from Youtube for free with dedicated websites
On the web you can find a lot of services that allow us to quickly and freely download music and videos from YouTube, in this paragraph we will look at some of them.
These platforms allow us to download music directly by copying and pasting the URL of a video, but also to download video Shorts and Playlists of whole videos, obtaining the mp3 files. Almost all services even give us the option of converting files by switching between different audio formats.
Sites similar to these are also often taken down by Google after a certain period of time since they go against YouTube’s guidelines, but new ones are always popping up, and to find them on the web just search with a web browser for searches such as “online youtube downloader” or “video url download.”
Let’s take a look at some of the best such sites among those currently in existence.
Download4.cc
Let’s start with one of the most widely used platforms for downloading music from Youtube and a host of other sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, SoundCloud, Vimeo, ESPN, Dailymotion, NBC, etc. Download4 offers one of the best services of its kind, this is because it is completely free, is a very fast site for downloading an audio file from a video, and has no invasive advertisements. The site is very safe and reliable so it is absolutely recommended, in addition to music, it also allows you to download videos, images and subtitles from videos.
To use it for the purpose of downloading music, we need to copy the URL of the video we want to convert to MP3, and paste the link into the search box and then we need to click “Download” or press the Enter key on the keyboard.
At this point, the site will search for all downloadable formats and display them on the page. Once we have selected an audio format such as mp3, we can download it by clicking “Download.” An audio playback page will then open, where we will have to right-click on the music player and select “Save Audio As” to download it to our PC.
Many formats are available on the site, including video of different qualities. One of the most interesting things about this site is that it can also be used conveniently on mobile devices such as tablets and smartphones.
YouTubePlaylist.cc
One of the most beloved sites dedicated to those who like to download music from Youtube is YouTube Playlist, this site allows us to download music, videos and playlists from many media file platforms and social networks. This site works mostly on Google Chrome and Opera, while on other browsers it may not work properly.
The service offered by this site allows us to download individual videos and entire playlists from YouTube, so we can save them in different formats such as mp4 or mp3. Its use is completely free, but it has a limit of downloads per day for unregistered users. Registering gives you access to some additional features, and you can also rely on some paid plans that have a lot of very useful extra features.
To use it, we just need to copy the link of the YouTube video or playlist we want to download and paste it into the search bar provided on the site. Once this is done, we have to press the button with the download symbol, and at this point, we will have to choose from different formats, quality and size.
We can then download the video in audio formats such as mp3, flac and wav, but there are also video and even text formats . Clearly depending on the format and the quality of the images, the size of the files will be more or less heavy.
Once we have chosen and clicked on the file format and quality, a window will open that will allow us to view and listen to the file. We can download it by right-clicking and choosing the option “Save video as…” to put it in a folder on our PC or in the Download folder on our smartphone or tablet.
Youtube Playlist also allows you to back up videos, playlists, channels, and subtitles from YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, and other high-quality video sites. The ability to back up your channel or another channel and download video archiving makes it really interesting, as it allows you to save videos that might even be removed from YouTube in the future.
OnlineVideoConverter
Let’s now look at Online Video Converter, which seems to be currently the best site for downloading videos and music from YouTube for free. The reason why we think it is the best is the presence of a large number of options that allow users to choose between numerous formats, video and audio quality, and even the ability to download only an audio portion of the videos, choosing the start and end time of the clip.
In this web platform all we need is the URL of the YouTube video we are interested in, which is entered into the search bar. Once this is done, we can choose the format in which to download the file, among which we find MP3, AAC, OGG, M4A, FLAC, WAV and MP4. In audio formats we will have as many as 6 different options for sound quality: 64 kbps, 96 kbps, 128 kbps, 192 kbps, 256 kbps and 320 kbps. As for video formats, we will be able to choose from 6 different resolutions: 240p, 360p, 480p, HD 720p, HD 1080p and Automatic.
When we have decided what format and quality is right for us, if we are interested, we can choose a start and end point for the video, so that we download only an audio clip of a segment of video that we are interested in. To select a part of the video, we will have to enter the time when the clip starts in “Convert From:”, for example 00:02:00 if we want to start from the second minute, and then we will have to enter the time when we end the clip in “Convert To:”, for example 00:04:30 if we want the clip to end in the middle of the fourth minute.
Once we have set the settings to our liking, we only need to press the Start button and wait for the file download to begin.
Download music from Youtube for free through PC programs
After we have looked at the web platforms with which to download audio and video from YouTube, in this section we will look at software that gives us the ability to download music without going through a web browser.
Most of these programs, somewhat like sites, allow you to download videos in audio formats directly by copying and pasting the URL of a video, but also to download music from video Shorts and entire Playlists. Some services even give us the ability to convert files to different formats and download only the audio part without the video part of a movie or vice versa, or download subtitles and images from videos.
For each program, we will indicate the operating systems that support each of the software we are going to find; in addition, all the programs we will evaluate will have at least the basic version completely free.
Let’s take a look at the best free programs for downloading music among those that currently exist.
4K YouTube to MP3 (Windows/MacOs/Ubuntu)
The first program we’re going to look at is 4K YouTube to MP3, one of the best music downloaders for Windows, Mac, and Ubuntu, supports free downloading of audio from YouTube videos and many, many other sites.
This program allows us to download music in audio formats such as mp3, flac and wav while maintaining the highest possible quality. It has no length limits for movies and songs, so we can download audio from clips, movies, albums, TV shows, TV series, podcasts, audiobooks and more to the PC in minutes.
With this program we can download media files from YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Vimeo, Dailymotion, Twitch, Dailymotion, Flickr, Instagram, Soundcloud and many others. The list is constantly being updated, and we can find a list on the site that lets us know which platforms are supported.
We should know, however, that the program has several plans, some subscription-based and individually purchasable licenses that allow us to use the program forever with all the additional features. With the basic plan, we can still use the software to download up to 15 audio files per day.
To download this program to our PC, we need to connect to the official website of 4kdownload.com, click on the “Download” section and choose according to the operating system we use, Windows, macOS or Ubuntu. At this point it will start downloading the file that we need to install on our PC, during the installation on Windows we only need to accept the terms of service and finish the setup by pressing the Next and Finish buttons. On macOS, on the other hand, once the file is downloaded, we will have to drag theprogram icon to the “Applications” folder. As for Ubuntu, we can finish the installation from terminal or with graphical installation.
The operation of the program is very simple and intuitive, we only need to paste the link of an audio track or video we want to download into the application to find it on the computer in seconds. The interface is clean and well done, allowing us to download the songs we are interested in very quickly. We also have the ability to transfer the downloaded songs to our smartphone, tablet or flash drive to listen to them wherever we want.
Among other things, we can download entire playlists and complete YouTube channels in many different formats. With paid subscription plans or licenses, You can also download private YouTube content with access to original quality and even songs and videos from YouTube Premium.
Freemake Video Downloader (Windows/macOS)
Another popular program for PCs is Freemake Video Downloader, a software for Windows and Mac that allows free downloading of videos and audio from YouTube and many other platforms. The peculiarity of this program is the ability to maintain a really high video and audio quality, moreover, its use is very intuitive.
Freemake Video Downloader you can use it to download videos in many formats both video and audio such as: MP4, WebM, 3GP, Flash, FLV, WMV, 3GP, PSP, MKV etc. It features a lot of audio formats and has different types of quality to choose from, we can also get videos in resolutions such as 360p, 480p, HD 720p, Full HD 1080p and UHD 4K. It has no length limit for movies, so we can download any kind of video or song found in any online site.
We can use Freemake to download media files from YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, Dailymotion, Twitch, LiveLeak, Veoh, and even many adult sites. The list is constantly being updated, and we can find a list on the site that lets us know which platforms are supported.
To download this program to our PC, we need to connect to the official website of Freemake.com and press the download button according to the operating system we use, Windows or macOS. At this point it will start downloading the file that we will have to install on our PC, if we are on Windows we will just have to accept the terms of service and finish the setup by pressing the Next and Finish buttons. On macOS, on the other hand, once the file is downloaded, we will have to drag theprogram icon to the “Applications” folder.
Once we have completed the installation and started the program, the video downloader will show us the size of the video file before proceeding to download. We can also choose to download multiple videos simultaneously. Downloading a movie is very easy, as in the other programs we have seen, you just need to copy and paste the URL where the movie is and add it to the downloads.
Mediahuman YouTube to MP3 Converter (Windows/MacOS/Ubuntu)
The last program we are going to look at is one of the fastest software to download music from YouTube. This downloader gives us the ability to download music from YouTube, SoundCloud, Bandcamp and similar sites, and save it for offline playback.
Compared to the other programs, this one is the absolute fastest at downloading songs. Its operation detects the audio track in YouTube videos, avoiding downloading the video part. This greatly increases the download speed while still ensuring optimal audio quality. The software supports downloading all videos in a playlist or channel. It also presents an option to subscribe and have access to additional features.
The Mediahuman converter has many interesting features. One of the most useful allows us to keep track of updates to a playlist or channel, downloading new videos automatically as they are added to them. You can download files in many different formats; for audio files, the highest quality available is 320 kbps. It supports simultaneous downloading which makes it possible to download multiple songs at once, and the downloaded files can also be exported to iTunes, Music.app and similar programs.
To download this program to our PC, we need to connect to the official website of mediahuman.com, press the download button and download the program according to the operating system we use, Windows, macOS or Ubuntu. At this point it will start downloading the file that we need to install on our PC, on Windows we need to accept the terms of service and finish the setup by pressing the Next and Finish buttons. On macOS, on the other hand, once the file is downloaded, we will have to drag theprogram icon to the “Applications” folder. If we use Ubuntu, we can finish the installation from terminal or with graphical installation.
Once we have completed the installation and started the program, the video downloader will open and we can enter the urls of the videos in order to download them in different formats from the “Paste link” button. We can change the settings by clicking on the gear icon at the bottom left and choosing Preferences from the menu that appears. In the “Audio Output” tab we have the option to choose the output format we want, after which we need to choose a folder on the PC where we will save the downloaded files.
Download music from Youtube for free through Android or iOS smartphone app
Now that we know the software that gives us the ability to perform music downloads through PC programs, let’s look at the apps that allow us to perform the same task from our phone or tablet.
Many of these programs, allow us to download audio files directly by copying and pasting the URL of a video, but also to download video Shorts and Playlists of whole videos. Some services even give us the ability to convert files to different formats according to our needs.
In this section we will look at some Android apps and some iOS apps so, in addition, all the software we will evaluate will have at least the basic version completely free.
Let’s see what are the most valuable free music download apps in the Play Store and App Store.
Fildo (Android)
This app called Fildo is one of the most useful for anyone who wants to download music to their Android smartphone. Fildo is an mp3 search engine that allows us to perform audio file downloads from many different platforms. This mp3 file downloader is an application that also allows you to play high-quality audio files from around the Web. Fildo does not use its own collection of audio files, but obtains files from various sources by enclosing them in a single archive.
However, we should know that this app is not on the Play Store, so to install it we need to enable permissions to third-party apps from Android settings. Doing it is very simple, we have to go into our phone’s settings and open the App item and then select advanced settings. At this point we choose the option “Special access for apps” and tap on “Install unknown apps.” Sometimes the path may be slightly different and instead of from the App entry you have to look in the Privacy and Management section to activate these permissions.
Once we have activated them, to download this app we need to open a web browser and connect to the fildo.net website. We press on the Download item at the bottom of the page, after which we will be asked which app to download with, and we will have to choose the browser we are using. The download will begin, and once finished we can install and start the app.
This app is very convenient and easy to use, the homepage contains many albums and the most popular hits of the moment. We can use the search button at the top right to search for songs we are interested in, play them, and download them.
Documents (iOS)
Since we have seen an Android-only app, let’s look at an iOS-only app. Documents is a very complex and feature-packed file manager, it is one of the most interesting and useful apps for managing and downloading any kind of files using its built-in web browser.
This Readdle app allows us to read, listen, view and annotate files such as documents, books and other media files, and it is also a great program for downloading video and audio from any website and web platform.
To download this app we need to open the App Store, search for the app called Documents and click on Install to proceed with the download. Once installed we can immediately start downloading the videos we are most interested in and saving them in some audio and video formats.
When we first start up, we will be asked some questions and prompts to set up the settings; in addition, there will be a short tutorial on the operation and features of the program. When we are asked what we want to use the app for, we should select the option “Download files from the web,” so that the app is prepared for this type of use.
Now that the app is ready for use, go to the home page and tap the blue compass icon in the lower right to open the browser built into Documents. We now open the page from which we want to download music or video and click the link or button to download the file we are interested in. We can rename the file and select the folder where to save it. Basically, Documents saves files in a dedicated Downloads folder; when a download starts, we can open the download manager at the bottom to manage all active downloads.
After the song or video is saved, we will find it in the Downloads folder or in a folder we choose or create, we can share the downloaded files with other apps and move them to other folders or programs. Documents is also a media player, this allows us to play any type of file we have downloaded, we can also create playlists, watch videos with subtitles and change the playback speed.
Amerigo (Android/iOS)
Unlike its predecessors, this app is available for both Android and Apple devices, is one of the most popular of its kind, and is used by millions of people worldwide.
Amerigo is an advanced web browser that has a File Manager and supports a lot of cloud services such as Google Drive and DropBox. This browser is integrated with major cloud providers, which allows us to save lots of files in the cloud to free up space on the device and to access files in any situation.
Key features include.: a multitab browser, the ability to view downloaded files without the use of Wi-Fi, the presence of a browser history and favorites, support for file transfers to and from cloud services, support for multiple cloud accounts from the same provider, universal search among all cloud services and local files, and a file manager with multiple layouts and advanced sorting capabilities.
To download this app we need to open the store included with our phone, Play Store for Android devices and App Store for iPhones and iPads, search for the app called Amerigo and click on Install to proceed with the download.
As for how to use it, once the application is opened, you will need to click the menu in the top left corner and then tap on Browser. Now that we are within the browser, we will need to search for the platform or site on which the video we want to download is located. Once we are on the video page, let’s start playback, at which point, a notice will appear asking if we want to download the video and we press on the button with the tick or down arrow. Now an app window will open asking us for a name and destination where to save the file. We can find all the files we have downloaded in the local archive folder, we can also decide to change their format or move them to a cloud.
