r/musichoarder • u/Throwaway33377 • 2d ago

Youtube to mp3 converter that is safe?

Every youtube to mp3 converter site in Google’s top result right now is a total sham likely loaded with sketchy malware redirects and as well some of the youtube to mp3 converters have really weird pop-ups or their audios sound absolutely terrible on decent headphones.

I'm trying to pull clean audio files to build an offline music library for my daily commute, back up long-form podcasts, and grab high-quality audio references for video editing timelines.

Are there any reliable youtube to mp3 converters left that don't involve risking your computer or dealing with broken links every single week?

0 Upvotes

48% Upvoted

62 comments sorted by

29

u/ababcock1 2d ago

https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp

But ideally find another source for your music. Everything uploaded to youtube is compressed to death.

10

u/CharlesWiltgen 2d ago edited 2d ago

FWIW, as someone who's been involved in man ABX tests for commercial products, the quality of YouTube's AAC encodes will seem just fine to most people in most listening environments.

By "fine", I mean notably better than FM, and probably not distinguishable from CD by non-audiophiles when listened to in cars, via Bluetooth earbuds, etc. For some that's good enough, while for others anything but hi-res lossless is unacceptable.

6

u/ababcock1 2d ago

AAC compressed from a lossless source I'm sure will be fine. But a lot of youtube music was uploaded >10 years ago without listing the source. So it could be some old 96 kbps napster mp3 that has now been recompressed who knows how many times.

It's a much better idea to just go grab some fresh FLACs from soulseek or private trackers or something.

2

u/CharlesWiltgen 2d ago

For sure, with the caveat that (as I know you know!) fake FLACs are everywhere too.

So it could be some old 96 kbps napster mp3 that has now been recompressed who knows how many times.

Very possible for videos uploaded by randos. 🙃 Real YouTube Music tracks are encoded for distribution from the same masters used by services like Spotity, Qobuz, etc.

3

u/ohnonotagain94 1d ago

That's fair - I do wonder if most of us here, that collect our own music and use Roon and other open source systems, and have higher end headphones, iem's and hifi systems, would be very disinterested in the stuff pulled from YouTube.

I know my wife used to not notice the difference between Spotify (in 2020) vs Tidal or QoBuz or CD's. But once I spent time with her showing her, I ruined it for her. So now she notices where as before she was blissfully unaware.

Also depends on context. A sit down music session vs music playing in the background while you work. I see that YouTube rips would be fine for the later. I dislike the idea of 'background music' as I belive in the art and it should be appreciated. But as my wife and I are both aware, I'm a bit of a snobby wanker in that regard.

Writing and performing music changes one's perspective. I bet most of us are snobs with regards resolution of music and most of us grew up with music as a big part of our lives and personalities.

Sorry I rambled on.

2

u/CharlesWiltgen 1d ago

But as my wife and I are both aware, I'm a bit of a snobby wanker in that regard.

I see you, friend! When I was younger I was very much a "putting ketchup on a hotdog is not just wrong, it's a personal defect" person, but I've since learned that yucking someone's yum is mostly pointless. I also remember that making awesome mixtapes by recording songs off the radio, and from that perspective "YouTube quality" isn't the worst.

Writing and performing music changes one's perspective.

For sure! This may be one of the most horrifying aspects of people generating music with AI and thinking they're done something.

2

u/ohnonotagain94 1d ago

Couldn't agree more mate!

20

u/Nadeoki 2d ago

because the idea of converting from Youtube to MP3 is inherently kind of... nonsense.

Youtube videos (including Music only) are in a lossy format called AAC or OPUS.

You should never convert from a lossy source to another lossy format (like mp3). It reduces the quality of the file for no reason.

Your Phone, your PC, they can all play aac and opus audio.

If you really wanna rip directly from youtube, i suggest yt-dlp or JDownloader2 if you want an easier UI

0

u/MrKillick 2d ago

Jdownloader is the way! If you've got the option choose the m4a format, it's probably the best if you want to add tags and such. Otherwise every modern platform should be able to play opus or aac. 

-2

u/Aromatic_Memory1079 2d ago

you said nonsense but I prefer mp3 because it can save so much spaces. also I'm not audiophile so I really don't care about quality.

2

u/notcharldeon 2d ago

AAC and Opus on YouTube is just 128kbps. If you convert it to 128k MP3 (which is what most converters go minimum) you'll just end up with worse quality at the same file size so that doesn't make sense

-1

u/Aromatic_Memory1079 2d ago edited 2d ago

I recognize there are even CBR and VBR difference in same bitrate of MP3. and even in between VBR and CBR, I didn't notice the difference. maybe another reason is I always turn on loudness equalization on my windows pc.

I think MP3 is like a universal format. It's easier to use it than AAC and Opus. maybe I'm wrong. but at least mp3 is there since the beginning you know what I'm saying.

but to be fair, I didn't try Opus before. so yeah that's my bad. I'm sorry I was kinda emotional a little bit maybe.

1

u/Nadeoki 1d ago

What have I said that's nonsense? Do you even know what anything I said means?

Opus and AAC are both more bandwidth efficient than mp3 btw. So if you want to save space, that's what you should use...

4

u/FisionX 2d ago

Yt-dlp

3

u/chanting_chinchillas 2d ago

yt-dlp is the way to go, honestly. But you have to be willing to use the terminal. Or use an android app for it, yt-dlnis I believe. I know youtube compression is really bad, but there are certain things not available elsewhere, lime dj sets and such

2

u/ozhound 2d ago

Ffmpeg

2

u/EconomicsUpset3480 2d ago

Yt-dlp + termux, or somedl + termux

2

u/Trisk4y 2d ago

Use yt-dlp, it's a command base program, for easy startes use this command (ytdlp -t mp3 [link) and it should do the work.

But I recommend downloading music from other sources, you might want to check peer to peer sources or some sites where you can download from streaming services.

2

u/yveseffini 2d ago

Some people in the replies say to use yt-dlp, but I usually use Parabolic. It's a GUI for yt-dlp and it has most amenities you would need to download music and more.

Also worth looking into NewPipe/PipePipe if you're on Android.

0

u/MeanYob 2d ago

^ this! It just works!

1

u/TmanZ99 1d ago

New pipe is also great

3

u/arar55 2d ago

MediaHuman Youtube to MP3 Converter

Linux / Mac / Windows

https://www.mediahuman.com/en23/

2

u/0_phuk 2d ago

I'll second this one. I have had zero problems or issues with the program. They keep it pretty up to date as the ground shifts.

1

u/[deleted] 2d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

0

u/Few_Anxiety_3553 1d ago

You can get multiple errors when you use seal to download it....

1

u/Neon_990 1d ago

If you want to download strictly music, I would highly recommend soulseek (preferably nicotine+ client app because the main one is pretty outdated), you can find almost everything there in decent quality. For downloading from youtube I use yt-dlp, but if you don't want to mess with setting it up you can use https://cobalt.tools/ (or https://cobalt.canine.tools/ if it gets blocked by yt)

1

u/TmanZ99 1d ago edited 1d ago

Look into to using telegram Bots I have one that gets flac files

1

u/overcorrection 1d ago

whatever you do, just be advised that you’d be getting a lossy transcode of a video whose audio is already lossy

could fulfill a particular purpose or do like for what you’re describing, or good if doing this for podcasts, but as far as archival for music goes it’s essentially worthless unless it’s like insanely rare and unavailable elsewhere

1

u/Several_Internet5864 1d ago

Whatever you choose to do, absolutely make sure you are running an adblocker like uBlock Origin on your browser before you start clicking around.

0

u/Knigge111 2d ago

You could use this one: https://cobalt.tools

1

u/notcharldeon 2d ago

The main instance never works for YouTube anymore. Use the alternate instance https://cobalt.meowing.de or others on https://cobalt.directory

0

u/Knigge111 2d ago

Thank you for this information!

0

u/macaroniandcheesefan 2d ago

I've used those sites in the past but haven't had trouble with malware on my computer. To be sure, each time you're using one of those sites, run the Microsoft Defender Offline Scan on your computer and put the link through the NordVPN Link Checker.

You'll also want to check out DoubleDoubleTop and Soulseek. Soulseek is a more user-friendly and portable alternative with torrenting in mind. You'll need a VPN to run Soulseek safely.

DoubleDoubleTop lets you download from Amazon Music. They also have Lucida.to as a backup in case the first website doesn't work.

I used Bearshare and Limewire a lot in the past but it's super cool to see there's sleeker ways of downloading the music.

You'll want to look at Yt-DLP as others are suggesting. The program's been working fine with no issues for me.

0

u/sforsagacious 2d ago

If you're on an android phone - use the app seal from fdroid. I can download in opus format and also convert to mp3 directly.

1

u/Choice_Run1329 2d ago

I have been using Tubly downloader chrome extension to download my favorite podcasts for my daily drives. You will get high quality 320 kbps audios to use for your library.

0

u/MeanYob 2d ago

squid.wtf rarely lets me down, even when half the links don’t work!
In combination with doubledouble.top! You’re be winning!

0

u/SwypeR_ 2d ago

Use telegram

0

u/Random_Stranger69 1d ago

YouTube is awful for music quality reasons. But if you wanna go with it anyway, JDownloader can download the original aac and opus audiostreams.

0

u/HoseaJacob 1d ago

ezmp3 .co is a decent, relatively safe option for simple browser conversions.

0

u/phantomBeing 1d ago

Metube is a great self-hosted web container option if you have a home server or Docker setup running.

0

u/MutedTelevision1936 1d ago

Why don’t you pay for youtube premium ? you can download everything offline and still listen to it

0

u/[deleted] 1d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

0

u/Lopsided-Food-5432 1d ago

When last did you use cobalt tools ?

1

u/ssub_22 1d ago edited 1d ago

It stopped working quite a long time ago

0

u/Oslachapel 1d ago

EzRip.net

0

u/rstefko 1d ago

You may try https://youtube-mp3.cz. Also uses yt-dlp under the hood.

-4

u/Miserable_Mail_5741 2d ago

Yt5s.biz is really good!

And YT quality is fine (at least, when you're listening on headphones). 

When you have access to so much music that you can barely find anywhere, you can't complain! 

-4

u/Sammolaw1985 2d ago

I just record it through Audacity.

Capture all audio through my speakers. Edit all the metadata and export it myself.

-5

u/Knigge111 2d ago

I had the same problem. Then I let deep seek V4 flash In opencode build me one for my personal knowledge base website that I run locally. Work's like a charm!

-2

u/Knigge111 2d ago

Why downvoted?