5 Free Web-based Services to Download Youtube Videos [Updated]

Lately, I have looked at ways to download YouTube videos to get local copies of your favorite videos. For those of you new to this whole concept of downloading videos off video sharing sites, here’s a small info for you all. Many of these sites works by simply grabbing YouTube videos in their native Flash format (FLV). To watch these files on your desktop, you’ll either need to get yourself a FLV player or convert the files into another format, so that you can watch the video in your favorite media player (or on your iPod/iPhone, cell phone, etc.). Some of the listed sites offer functions to convert the videos on the fly along with the video download functions.

Now, on with the list!

WARNING: Downloading copies of YouTube videos violates YouTube Terms of Service, use any of the above services at your own risk.

You shall not download any Content unless you see a “download” or similar link displayed by YouTube on the Service for that Content. You shall not copy, reproduce, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, or otherwise exploit any Content for any other purposes without the prior written consent of YouTube or the respective licensors of the Content. YouTube and its licensors reserve all rights not expressly granted in and to the Service and the Content..

YouTube

KeepVid — KeepVid is a simple and free site that comes with a pretty clean interface and is not slathered with ads as some in the free download sites have. Just paste the URL of the video (works with YouTube and several other video sharing sites) and you’ll get an option to download it in either FLV or MP4 formats – the extra MP4 format option helps users who don’t have FLV players installed.

keepvid

FetchVideo — FetchVideo (formerly Downloader9) is a plain and simple free site that lets you paste the video link from YouTube, DailyMotion, Metacafe or MySpace and then generates a download link for the FLV video file. After completing download you’ll have to rename the video.flv file to some-meaningful-filename.FLV so that you recognize the video file later. You can then watch this downloaded video in your favorite FLV player.

downloader9

Vixy — Vixy offers YouTube downloads in the many formats (AVI (DivX + MP3), MOV, MP4, 3GP and MP3). It’s easy to use and not too much filled up with ads.

vixy

VideoDownloadX — Formerly YouTubeX is completely free to use. The downside is it’s so heavily ad-supported you have to tread carefully to avoid accidentally clicking on an ad. You have to manually rename the files with a .FLV extension. Then you will be able to view the downloaded video in your FLV player.

videodownloadx

SaveTube — SaveTube is another simple paste and download tool like Downloader9 or KeepVid. SaveTube works fine but like VideoDownloadX is full of ads.

savetube

IcyVideo – IcyVideo is a good addition to the above list. IcyVideo helps downloading YouTube videos in five different formats: 3GP (Low Quality, 176×144), FLV (Low Quality, 320×240), FLV (High Quality, 640×380), MP4 (High Quality, 480×360) and MP4 (High Definition, 1280×720). The wide range of formats will definitely make happy any YouTube video downloaders!

icyvideo

Thanks to jacobtres for sharing with us about IcyVideo.

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