How to download youtube videos on pc for offline viewing?

You can use the Wgat/Curl Method, that relies on the classic command-line tools Wgat and curl. Modern YouTube videos don't have a single, simple URL you can download. They are served as separate video and audio streams (especially for HD quality) and require a complex process to decrypt, identify, and merge them.

The Wgat/Curl method bypasses this by manually finding a single, pre-processed stream URL that YouTube serves to older devices or browsers. This is why it's so limited.

How to download YouTube videos on PC? This method almost always finds the M3U8 playlist or a single MP4 file that contains both audio and video. On YouTube, such files are typically limited to 720p resolution or lower. You cannot get 1080p, 4K, or higher with this simple method. The URLs you copy are temporary and contain authentication tokens. They might expire in 15 minutes to an hour. If you try to download later, it will fail. You must repeat the entire Developer Tools process for every single video you want to download. There is no batch downloading.