I use Librewolf, alternatively, Floorp, so I wonder if there’s anything I can use on them to download videos with.
And I plan on using them on sites similar to hianime, but I’m tired of like, finding one stream and it dies, then having to go find another .etc
I want to save my favorite series so I can have something to watch reliably than something that is operating on uncertainty.
Any ideas?
My favorite is https://stacher.io/. This is what’s known as a GUI front-end for yt-dlp (that others have already mentioned). I’ve tried several other front-ends and Stacher is the best, IMO. A front-end basically puts an app face (graphical user interface or GUI) on yt-dlp, so you’re not having to type in command codes. I use this to download videos I want to watch later (and possibly save) from Youtube, Twitch, and many other sites.
It’s been a while since I installed it, but I believe yt-dlp is already built into Stacher, or Stacher will download and install yt-dlp for you, I can’t recall.
You also need something called ffmpeg, manual installation instructions here: https://ffmpeg.stacher.io/. Further reading on ffmpeg: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FFmpeg, or just do your own search for ffmpeg to learn more about it. It’s a very powerful tool that many video editing programs use, including HandBrake, Blender, VLC, Plex, Kodi, etc. Without it, I believe the yt-dlp download video quality will be worse (maybe 480p max?, can’t recall). Stacher may have an option to download and install this automatically too, again, can’t recall.
As long as you’ve already installed the other part/s needed, you can set Stacher up to tell you what video and audio formats and sizes are available for download, and then choose.
The only other program I’m familiar with is Jdownloader2: https://jdownloader.org/jdownloader2. This is more of a pain to get working properly, but if Stacher can’t get, I’ll try JD2. Do not download it from anywhere other than the official website though.
Otherwise, maybe something here will work for you: https://fmhy.net/social-media-tools#youtube-downloaders -or- https://fmhy.net/file-tools#download-managers.
I used to do this with a combination of yt-dlp and scraping the media links + wget, but it was quite the hassle. It’s much easier to just torrent it.
Then you can setup a plex or jellyfin server to organise the torrents and ditch those unreliable free streaming sites for good.
Personally I don’t bother with streaming them, I just have a sonarr instance for anime with qbittorrent with network restricted to VPN, and jellyfin for playback. Automatically grabs, so no having to do any manual setup aside from adding the series to the list, and auto-upgrade to the quality you want.
You may be able to use yt-dlp depending on the site though.
How does one use this yt-dlp I’ve heard about?
Because my assumption immediately was it was for YouTube, but I quickly searched it to find it can support ‘thousands’ of websites.
There are GUI tools, but I use the CLI.
https://www.ytdlp.org/ will give you the full docs, but the simplest and easiest command is just to download at the highest quality with:
yt-dlp "https://whateveryouwanttodownload.com/streamingurl"Whether it works with whatever streaming site you’re using I couldnt say, but its a great tool.
As others said, there are some good GUI if the command line is a bit too hard for you as it was for me. I use Parabolic and so far it’s working like a charm (i only do officials video sites though, don’t know for streaming services)
Why not just torrent them
I’m not a fan of torrenting and haven’t bothered with them in like, geez, I think 16 some odd years. I like DDLs and I like more convenient options. I don’t want to bother being an easy target, I don’t want to mess with protocols, timing and any other hassle just to torrent. I am done with those days.
I feel the exact opposite. Going back to torrents made everything so much easier. Especially for anime which has a very active torrent community.
I start the VPN, I start the torrent client, I go on the anime-cat website and a few minutes later I can watch the episode(s). And not even using any of the *arr tools.
The biggest hurdle is really just the VPN, because it costs money (but might even be optional depending on your jurisdiction).
Yeah, like I can almost understand the “torrenting is too hard” argument if you’re just going to pay for the official streams but once you want to download them just grab one of the copies that someone already did (and potentially improved)
The stream detector addon often makes it easy to grab the media.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hls-stream-detector/Start watching, turn on this extension, let it buffer the video, then save it.
Personally I recommend an Arr setup as well, then yt-dlp. If come across an anime streaming site that had a download button recently thqt actually seemed to work when I clicked on it forthelolz, I thight i was hianime, I can try to find it again, if you’re interested.
Theres also
