What do you use? I've used a few sites for it, but they're loaded with pop-ups. Maybe there are some gems out there that google isn't showing me?
Maybe something like yt-dl but for audio could be good.
I often need to get access to the WAV files of songs to use as reference songs when mixing or mastering.

 

I use IDM to download the vid and then convert the .Mp4 file with right click using File Converter (https://file-converter.org/) and done. No ads no bs. Less than 4-5 clicks.

 

yt-dl is for audio too.

Use "-f 251" with yt-dl(p) to download the highest audio quality possible from YouTube, then convert from Opus-in-WebM to WAV. Either manually or by adding "--recode-video wav" to the command line.

 

Youtube videos didn't use .wav

Youtube videos are operating on .opus format mainly.

Didn't expect more than 256 kbps bitrate.

 

Use MediaHuman's YouTube Downloader.
You decide if you want the DL as audio or video.
Quick and effective.

 

https://save.tube/download/video/ click on "audio" to switch tab

 

I'm lazy so I just download videos directly with JDownloader2 and then batch convert them to flac in Reaper

 

Last edited: Jul 25, 2023

Wave files are not embedded in yt stream, however with Jdownloader 2 you can choose the best possible stream (usually are aac, opus, etc.) to download and discard the rest (video, subtitles).
Then you can convert it to any format you like with other sw.

 

Just download video and import directly into DAW. If the daw is worth anything, it'll import and then you can export or save as wav or mp3. Reaper and Audition does this, so does iZotope RX Audio Editor and many other DAWS. Very easy.

 

...

 

Last edited: Dec 13, 2023

And can save the AAC audio in native m4a format (without re-encoding). Then you can convert m4a to WAV with some quality converter, like dBPoweramp for instance.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Jul 25, 2023

-> NoScript and uBlock.

YT doesn't provide wavs.

 

251 opus is more like 160kbps. Just sayin'.

 

You don't need any program. Just add pp do the address. For example,here is address to Pat Metheny Trio:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wG7Zg4UERI4

Change this address to:
https://www.youtubepp.com/watch?v=wG7Zg4UERI4

Then you have option to download Video or Audio:

 

Last edited: Jul 25, 2023

Or use
9x
before Youtubeadress...( for example www.9xyoutube....)

 

Yeah but 160 kbps opus is better than 256 kbps mp3. Like I put this number intentionally.

 

It is 160kbps at most ('HQ').

[Correction:
140 is 128 kbps AAC, 141 is 256 kbps AAC, and 251 is >=160 kbps VBR Opus. As of this instant, Youtube Music in the app is still "141" on High quality and "140" on Normal. High quality in the Youtube app is "251".

• Low: 48kbps AAC and OPUS (uses the least data)
• Normal: 128kbps AAC and OPUS (default settings)
• High: 256kbps AAC and OPUS (highest quality setting)
• Always high: 256 kbps AAC and OPUS (maintains this even when the connection is poor)]

 

Last edited by a moderator: Jul 25, 2023

I'm used to yt-dlp (https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp), easy to use when you're used to it (just copy a link to the command line and you're off).

• Good features: supports a lot of different sites on top of Youtube
• It picks the best video and audio streams takes better codecs into account, so you'll get the best quality, or you list the audio/video streams available and choose what you want
• Can use login cookies from your browser so you can download restricted/premium clips
• Supports shorts/music
• Can also automatically re-encode to your liking or keep the original format, or just decode to WAV for instance.
• Can mux multiple streams as multi-stream files
• Can download subtitles

I can't think of anything else that I's want.