Paste a link. It figures out how.
A fully interactive CLI that routes any URL to the right download engine — videos, playlists, live streams, torrents, and direct files.
Download from almost any URL — fully interactive, no flags needed. Paste a link and it figures out how to fetch it: a video site, a live stream, a direct file, an FTP path, or a torrent.
It works like a mini ghost-downloader: instead of one engine, it's a router that dispatches each URL to the best tool for it.
pip install yt-dlp # one-time (auto-installs on first run anyway)
brew install ffmpeg aria2 # macOS; ffmpeg required, aria2 recommended
python anydl.py # then follow the promptsThen:
- Paste URLs — any site, one per line; type
donewhen finished. FCP compatible output? [y/n]—yre-encodes video to H.264/AAC.mp4for Final Cut Pro / QuickTime;nkeeps the original (best quality). Only affects video.- It downloads each URL, auto-picking the right engine (video site, live stream, direct file, FTP, or torrent). Press Ctrl-C to skip the current item and continue the queue.
Files land in the current directory (playlists get their own subfolder). That's it — everything below is detail.
| URL type | Engine used |
|---|---|
| Video sites / playlists (YouTube, Vimeo, X, TikTok, Reddit, Twitch VODs, +1,700 more) | yt-dlp |
Pages with embedded video, HLS/DASH manifests (.m3u8 / .mpd) |
yt-dlp (generic) |
| Live streams (and yt-dlp failures) | streamlink |
Direct files over HTTP/S — .mp4, .zip, .pdf, images, installers, anything |
aria2c (multi-connection) or built-in |
| FTP | aria2c or built-in |
| Torrents / magnet links | aria2c (BitTorrent) |
Formerly "YouTube Downloader" — YouTube still works exactly as before; it's now just one of hundreds of supported sources.
There is no such thing as literally any URL (login walls, DRM, and JS-gated players will always resist), but this covers the overwhelming majority of "I just want to save this" cases.
For each URL, in order:
magnet:/.torrent→ aria2c BitTorrent (--seed-time=0, auto-stops).ftp://→ aria2c, or the built-in stdlib downloader.- A known video site (matched against yt-dlp's ~1,800 extractors) → yt-dlp video path.
- Otherwise, one ranged
GETprobe (neverHEAD— it 403s on presigned GitHub/S3 links), then classify by sniffing the first bytes → content-disposition → content-type → extension:- Manifest (
#EXTM3U,.m3u8,.mpd) → yt-dlp. - File (binary content-type / known extension) → direct download.
- Page → yt-dlp video extraction → streamlink → give up cleanly (never saves the HTML).
- Manifest (
Each queue item is independent — Ctrl-C skips the current download and moves to the next.
- Python 3.8+
- FFmpeg — merging video+audio, FCP remuxing (
brew install ffmpeg) - aria2 (optional but recommended) — unlocks torrents/magnets, FTP, and fast multi-connection file downloads. Without it, HTTP/FTP files still download via a built-in stdlib downloader, and torrents print an install hint.
# macOS
brew install ffmpeg aria2
# Ubuntu / Debian
sudo apt install ffmpeg aria2pip install yt-dlp # streamlink installs on demand, only if a live/unsupported URL needs it
yt-dlp(andstreamlink, when first required) auto-install on first run if missing. The direct HTTP/FTP downloader uses only the Python standard library — no extra packages.
git clone https://github.com/AdinathChaudhari/anydl.git
cd anydl
python anydl.pypython anydl.pyYou'll be prompted for URLs (one per line, done to finish), then whether to make video
FCP/QuickTime-compatible. Then it just goes.
Detected a known video site → yt-dlp
Title: Some Talk
Available qualities:
[1] 1080p (video — audio merged automatically)
[2] 720p (video+audio)
[3] best available (auto-selects the best video+audio)
Select quality [1-3]: 1
Downloading 1080p [FCP-compatible (H.264/AAC)]...
Done!
URL 1 (or 'done'): https://github.com/owner/repo/releases/download/v1/app.dmg
...
Detected direct file: app.dmg
Downloading app.dmg (84.2 MB)...
✓ Saved: ./app.dmg
URL 1 (or 'done'): magnet:?xt=urn:btih:...
Downloading torrent/magnet via aria2c (Ctrl-C to abort)...
✓ Done
URL 1 (or 'done'): https://www.twitch.tv/somechannel
yt-dlp can't grab this directly (live stream); using streamlink...
For a live stream, press Ctrl-C to stop recording.
✓ Saved (remuxed to .mp4): somechannel.mp4
Playlists download into their own named folder. You can mix any of the above in one queue.
Answer y to force video into H.264 + AAC + .mp4 for native Final Cut Pro / QuickTime
playback:
Normal (n) |
FCP (y) |
|
|---|---|---|
| Video codec | AV1 / VP9 (best quality) | H.264 (AVC) |
| Audio codec | Opus (best quality) | AAC |
| Container | site's native | .mp4 |
FCP mode also applies to direct-downloaded video files: if the file is already H.264/HEVC + AAC
in a non-.mp4 container, it's losslessly remuxed to .mp4; other codecs are left as-is with a
note (it never silently transcodes). Torrents / archives / FTP ignore FCP mode.
Which URLs work? Anything yt-dlp supports, plus unknown pages via its generic extractor, plus any direct HTTP/FTP file, plus torrents/magnets (with aria2), plus live streams (via streamlink).
Do I need aria2? Only for torrents/magnets. Everything else works without it — aria2 just makes HTTP/FTP downloads faster (multi-connection) and resumable.
Why did it save a .part file?
An interrupted or incomplete download. Direct downloads write to name.part and only rename to the
final name once complete (and aria2 resumes its own partials), so you never get a truncated file
masquerading as finished.
Can I download private / paywalled content?
Yes, if you're logged into the site in a browser. anydl tries each URL without cookies first (so
normal downloads pay no cost). Only when a site returns a sign-in / bot-check ("confirm you're not a
bot") does it ask once which browser you're logged in on — Safari, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Brave,
or Opera — then retries with that browser's cookies and reuses the choice for the rest of the session.
Pick 0 to skip. (macOS may prompt your keychain the first time it reads the cookies.)
A site didn't work — what now?
Update yt-dlp (pip install -U yt-dlp); extractors change constantly.
MIT License — see LICENSE.
- yt-dlp — multi-site video engine
- aria2 — multi-connection HTTP / FTP / BitTorrent engine
- streamlink — live-stream capture
- FFmpeg — merging & remuxing
- Architecture inspired by ghost-downloader-3