Skip to main content

fm-dlp — Download from YouTube, YTMusic, and 1000+ sites

Python PyPI License Platform Ruff

CLI tool for searching YouTube/YTMusic and downloading audio/video from 1000+ sites


📑 Table of Contents


🚀 Quick Start

pip install fm-dlp                    # Python 3.10+ & FFmpeg required
fm-dlp config ~/Music                 # Set download directory
fm-dlp search "artist"                # Search tracks
fm-dlp download "URL"                 # Download audio

⚙️ Requirements

  • Python 3.10+ - Asyncio support required
  • FFmpeg - Required for audio/video processing. Install via:
    • macOS: brew install ffmpeg
    • Linux: sudo apt install ffmpeg (Debian) or sudo dnf install ffmpeg (Fedora)
    • Windows: Download from ffmpeg.org and add to PATH

🌈 Color Output

By default, fm-dlp uses colored output for better readability. To disable colors globally, use the --no-color flag before the command:

fm-dlp --no-color search "artist"
fm-dlp --no-color download "URL"
fm-dlp --no-color config ~/Music

📋 Commands

search

Search for music tracks, albums, or videos on YouTube/YTMusic.

fm-dlp search <query> [--limit LIMIT] [--yt-video] [--album] [--raw] [--only-url]
Option Default Description
query Required Search query string
--limit N, -l 10 Maximum number of results to return
--yt-video, -v False Search for YouTube videos instead of music tracks
--album, -a False Search for albums instead of individual tracks
--raw, -r False Output results in raw format (Python dict representation)
--only-url, -u False Output only the URLs without any formatting

download

Download audio or video content from supported platforms (YouTube, YTMusic, and 1000+ sites).

fm-dlp download <urls> [--codec CODEC] [--kbps KBPS] [--quality QUALITY] [--jobs JOBS] [--quiet] [--no-metadata] [--keep] [--save] [--path PATH] [--only-video] [--cookies COOKIES]
Option Default Description
urls Required Single URL, comma/space-separated list, or path to text file with URLs (one per line, # for comments)
--codec, -c m4a (macOS)
opus (others)
Audio: mp3, aac, flac, m4a, opus, vorbis, wav, alac
Video: mp4, mov, mkv, webm, avi, flv
--kbps, -K 256 Audio bitrate in kbps (64–320). Higher = better quality, larger file
--quality, -Q best Video quality preset: best, worst, 2160p, 1440p, 1080p, 720p, 480p, 360p, 240p, 144p, or custom height (e.g., 720)
--jobs, -j 5 Maximum number of concurrent downloads for faster batch processing
--quiet, -q False Suppress yt-dlp output messages (errors still shown)
--no-metadata False Disable embedding metadata (title, artist, album) and thumbnail into audio files
--keep, -k False Keep the original downloaded file after conversion/post-processing
--save, -s False Save settings (except URL) to config file
--use-config, -u False Use saved parameters from config file as defaults
--path, -p Configured path Custom download directory (overrides default config)
--only-video, -v False Download video file without audio track
--cookies, -C None Browser name: brave, chrome, chromium, edge, opera, vivaldi, whale, firefox, safari
Or path to cookies file (.txt, .sqlite, .db, .cookies)

Audio Codec Details:

  • Lossy: mp3 (universal), aac (Apple), m4a (Apple), opus (modern web) - smaller files
  • Lossless: flac (high quality), wav (uncompressed), alac (Apple lossless) - larger files
  • Recommended: opus for best quality/size ratio, flac for archival

Video Container Details:

  • mp4 - Most compatible, uses m4a audio
  • mkv - Open format, uses opus audio
  • webm - Web optimized, uses opus audio
  • mov - Apple format, uses m4a audio
  • avi - Legacy Windows, uses mp3 audio
  • flv - Flash video, uses aac audio

config

Configure the default download directory path.

fm-dlp config <path>
Option Default Description
path Required Default directory path for downloads. Use absolute path for best results (e.g., /home/user/Music or C:\Music)

Config Location:

  • Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%/fm-dlp/config.json
  • macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/fm-dlp/config.json
  • Linux: ~/.config/fm-dlp/config.json

💡 Examples

Basic Download

Example of downloading a track from YouTube Music:

fm-dlp download https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=0KNxOBerr_8
📦 Example Output
Starting: https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=0KNxOBerr_8

[youtube] Extracting URL: https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=0KNxOBerr_8
[youtube] 0KNxOBerr_8: Downloading webpage
[youtube] 0KNxOBerr_8: Downloading android vr player API JSON
[info] 0KNxOBerr_8: Downloading 1 format(s): 251
[info] Downloading video thumbnail 41 ...
[info] Writing video thumbnail 41 to: /home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.webp
[download] Destination: /home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.webm
[download] 100% of    6.53MiB in 00:00:01 at 5.74MiB/s
[ExtractAudio] Destination: /home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.opus
Deleting original file /home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.webm (pass -k to keep)
[Metadata] Adding metadata to "/home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.opus"
[ThumbnailsConvertor] Converting thumbnail "/home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.webp" to png
[EmbedThumbnail] mutagen: Adding thumbnail to "/home/user/Music/Lexapro Delirium.opus"

Success: https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=0KNxOBerr_8

Search Examples

Search for tracks, albums, and videos:

# Search for tracks on YouTube Music
fm-dlp search "Sewerslvt" --limit 1

# Search for albums
fm-dlp search "Draining Love Story" --album -l 1

# Search for videos on YouTube
fm-dlp search "Sewerslvt goodbye" --yt-video -l 1

📊 Search Output Examples

Examples of formatting search results from different sources.

🎵 YTMusic (Track)

1. Mr. Kill Myself
    ├─ Sewerslvt
    ├─ Draining Love Story
    ├─ 13M │ 7:52
    └─ https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=y55fzyXZDSE
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

N. Title
    ├─ Artist
    ├─ Album
    ├─ Views │ Duration
    └─ URL
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

💿 YTMusic (Album)

1. Draining Love Story
    ├─ Sewerslvt
    ├─ 2020
    └─ https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_lwWVcID2Sw8o6Jfa9vz8-a2hqEFffKb-g
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

N. Title
    ├─ Artist
    ├─ Year
    └─ URL
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

▶️ YouTube (Video)

1. Sewerslvt - goodbye
    ├─ Sewerslvt
    ├─ 2,405,647 │ 17:01
    └─ https://youtu.be/ABBpsy6rlVU
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

N. Title
    ├─ Artist
    ├─ Views │ Duration
    └─ URL
       ──────────────────────────────────────────────────

🧩 Formatting Legend

Element Description
N. Sequential number of search result
Title Track, album, or video title
Artist Artist or channel name
├─└─│ Tree branch characters
Views │ Duration View count and length (MM:SS or HH:MM:SS)
URL Direct link to content
─── Visual separator line

📄 License & Acknowledgments

GPLv3 License — Built with:

Library Purpose
fm-dlp-core Main core

Author: Fkernel653

Project: GitHubPyPI

Download files

Download the file for your platform. If you're not sure which to choose, learn more about installing packages.

Source Distribution

fm_dlp-4.5.1.2.tar.gz (34.9 kB view details)

Uploaded Source

Built Distribution

If you're not sure about the file name format, learn more about wheel file names.

fm_dlp-4.5.1.2-py3-none-any.whl (23.6 kB view details)

Uploaded Python 3

File details

Details for the file fm_dlp-4.5.1.2.tar.gz.

File metadata

  • Download URL: fm_dlp-4.5.1.2.tar.gz
  • Upload date:
  • Size: 34.9 kB
  • Tags: Source
  • Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? No
  • Uploaded via: uv/0.12.5 {"installer":{"name":"uv","version":"0.12.5","subcommand":["publish"]},"python":null,"implementation":{"name":null,"version":null},"distro":{"name":"Ubuntu","version":"24.04","id":"noble","libc":null},"system":{"name":null,"release":null},"cpu":null,"openssl_version":null,"setuptools_version":null,"rustc_version":null,"ci":true}

File hashes

Hashes for fm_dlp-4.5.1.2.tar.gz
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 9601c395172818f17b27d61462aabacf7371565925c54b7ca089ee3de5cbe2fc
MD5 69cb56f9994c679469c6b0ee0ca74c44
BLAKE2b-256 53a02aafe429efdc7afa4d1db6f2a9a9fcdc0650b07e1b885f0cc17399630220

See more details on using hashes here.

File details

Details for the file fm_dlp-4.5.1.2-py3-none-any.whl.

File metadata

  • Download URL: fm_dlp-4.5.1.2-py3-none-any.whl
  • Upload date:
  • Size: 23.6 kB
  • Tags: Python 3
  • Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? No
  • Uploaded via: uv/0.12.5 {"installer":{"name":"uv","version":"0.12.5","subcommand":["publish"]},"python":null,"implementation":{"name":null,"version":null},"distro":{"name":"Ubuntu","version":"24.04","id":"noble","libc":null},"system":{"name":null,"release":null},"cpu":null,"openssl_version":null,"setuptools_version":null,"rustc_version":null,"ci":true}

File hashes

Hashes for fm_dlp-4.5.1.2-py3-none-any.whl
Algorithm Hash digest
SHA256 ffeb868970ec21b286220ad0d90d6a84fa0511ecdbee852b05cddb26fd46fd81
MD5 36134f00f2c33c1c86edb2b9210f4626
BLAKE2b-256 cb9847bf4d98a290d2a55b39fcdd6aae4bbf74f6540715b430ce1ad8a53567f0

See more details on using hashes here.

Release history Release notifications | RSS feed

4.6.0

2 files

4.5.9

2 files

4.5.8

2 files

4.5.7

2 files

4.5.6

2 files

4.5.5

2 files

4.5.4.3

2 files

4.5.4.2

2 files

4.5.4.1

2 files

4.5.4

2 files

4.5.3

2 files

4.5.2

2 files

4.5.1.4

2 files

4.5.1.3

2 files

This release

4.5.1.2 This release

2 files

4.5.1

2 files

Anthropic, PBC Visionary sponsor Bloomberg Visionary sponsor Hudson River Trading Visionary sponsor Meta Visionary sponsor NVIDIA Visionary sponsor Microsoft Sustainability sponsor Depot Continuous Integration AWS Cloud computing and Security Sponsor Datadog Monitoring Fastly CDN Google Download Analytics Sentry Error logging StatusPage Status page