Stuart usually downloads his classical music vids on You Tube (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tu9mwRyXJRo&list=RDtu9mwRyXJRo&start_radio=1) in 1080p or 4K quality.
However, at the moment when he clicks on the download button in the top RH corner of the video, it doesn’t give you any option other than to download it in 360p.
You can watch it OK in 4K but you can’t download it in that quality.
Does anyone know of a fix for this please.
Hmmm, I don’t ever remember seeing a download button on YT
You might find https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp helpful.
I to am confused, heavy compression on YT so dont believe I have every watched or listened to something in 4K.
Not all YT vids are in 4k but a fair few are - certainly the one referenced by @Rachel05 can be displayed in 4k as seen from the settings
Well you lean something new everyday 
Hello Rachel, not sure which downloader Stuart is using, but if you use 4K Video Downloader you are able to download in 1080p or 4K quality, at least when using the paid for version. At the moment it is €43 for a lifetime membership. They also offer a free version, which I think that they restrict downloads to 10 per day, which seems reasonable for a free version. Not sure if you can download in 1080p or 4K with the free version.
[ redacted - Google the product if you want ]
YouTube keep changing things to try and prevent people downloading videos in anything other than 360p (boo), but the good guys at 4K Video Downloader find a way round it (hooray). Just this week they have had to issue two updates to get around what YouTube have done.
Hope this helps.
@Rachel05 I wonder if your OH is using some sort of downloader browser plugin that’s playing up? As @billybutcher said I don’t think downloading videos to a separate file is standard - there is a download button under the video but that just caches the video so you can play it in the browser without an internet connection.
If I want to download videos I have to use the Video DownloadHelper plugin.
Or is this in the YouTube phone app?
4K can actually be OK on YouTube, depending on the quality of the original upload, and on your connection speed - streaming sites like YT tend to adapt the bit rate to your connection speed. But yes it is way more compressed than a 4K BluRay.
There’s also a higher bitrate version of 1080p available to YouTube Premium subscribers.
Yes, I wondered if it might be a browser extension.
<moderator-mode>
@Merlot - your post was flagged, I have allowed it but removed the link because it is a commercial product when there are other free or less restricted alternatives. It’s easy enough for interested parties to find the product using Google.
I would remind everyone that downloading YT content will be a copyright violation whichever tool is used.
</moderator-mode>
There is an exception - if you are a YouTube Premium member they do allow you to download for offline personal viewing.
However, even in the absence of a YT Premium sub, as with making copies of CDs or albums for personal use you are very unlikely to be sued by anybody!
If you pay to watch YT then they don’t push ads at you - at which point watching is the same downloading from a copyright/legal perspective because you make a temporary copy of each frame before it is displayed on your computer screen (might sound a bit daft to view watching as copying but it’s how they often get mere viewers of illegal material and charge them with “making copies”).
Watching “free” YT requires that you agree to view the ads and the download tools strip them.
Though personally I think YT has the balance wrong - the premium service is way too expensive - if it were maybe £5 a month I might actually consider it and the way they push adds on the standard platform is too agressive and offputting.
American tv is dominated by adverts so they believe we are all same. Content gets taken down by YT if its considered too edgy yet lying adverts are allowed all the time.
It’s more than 20 years since I was last in the 'States (and have no plans to revisit) but I don’t remember it being as bad as YT back then - though very intrusive by UK standards. Perhaps it has got worse.
However YT ads get stuffed in more or less at random whereas TV shows are normally edited with ad breaks in mind which makes YT ads much more intrusive.
Depends how much you watch - it’s £11.99 a month for an individual plan.
YT is the main thing I watch (I have the attention span of a gnat so shortish videos suit me), so it’s good value for me not to have any ads interrupting.
In the past I have subscribed to Disney Plus and Apple TV, but found I really didn’t watch them enough to be worth carrying on.
And Disney inserts ads on its cheapest paid plan as well.
I do have Amazon but that’s mainly because I make use of the free shipping with Prime; again there’s not a lot on the video channels that I want to see.
I’ll be ditching Prime as they’ve started adding adverts too and I’m not paying extra to remove them. I’ll trying to buy locally, as far as I can so Amazon has become the supplier of last resort and I no longer get much value from the “free” shipping.
I was last in Chicago December 2020 or 21 - ads were extremely intrusive, to the point where they felt like being on about 25% of the time you might spend watching. I quickly gave up TV since I had a laptop with me.
I wound up paying the extra but cancelled the accidental Amazon Music subscription that I somehow acquired and did not renew the French Prime (I can always do so if I need expedited or “free” delivery at some point). So overall they lost revenue from me.
£12.99, first month free - that’s just under £156 a year.
Add that to all the other pay services on TV and it soon mounts up.
I don’t have Sky, or Netflix, or Disney, or Apple TV, so for me it’s fairly economical. 
I watch YT vids without ads with Brave browser
https://brave.com/
If YT click on that I’m watching I just clear the cache & all ok again for a few more months.
