Youtube "trick"

Many maybe know this but i notice many dont as well.

A lot of videos doesnt have the option to play in high quality at youtube, but you can get it in high anyway. The trick is to add &fmt=18 at the end of the webadress. It will boost video and sound quality a lot.

This video for example doesnt have the option to play in higher quality as you will see in the first link (check bottom right under the screen where the option should be). Then check the second link wich is to the same video, but with the added line in the end.

Low quality (the normal link to the video):

http://se.youtube.com/watch?v=fnjEAF4yfo8

High quality (added &fmt=18 at the end)

http://se.youtube.com/watch?v=fnjEAF4yfo8&fmt=18

Well hope it helps someone around here. ;)

EDIT: And sorry for the weird thread title. Should have mentioned it was about quality. Ah well, cant get it right everytime.

There's also keepvid.com service giving you 2 download links for selected youtube video. 1st link goes for low quality flv file, 2nd - higher quality mp4 file, which is equal to "high definition" option on youtube. Been using it for years :)

Thanks guys. Cool tricks!

Interesting trick, good find.

If Maximus is correct I am assuming they are the ones the iPhones use, if so for some reason not every single video appears to be available in mp4 format. Worth just bearing in mind.

And for HD version of the link how do you write the link? :helpsmilie: :D

like for this little movie of mine:

:pilotfly:

Like this

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=rWx5t3h1D3A&fmt=18

And for HD version of the link how do you write the link? :helpsmilie: :D

 

like for this little movie of mine:

 

 

:pilotfly:

You cant do anything to the adress to get it in HD as far as i know. And there shouldnt be a reason for it either as a video that is uploaded to work in HD always have the option to click. The "trick" i mentioned will take a video from low/normal quality that dont have the option "watch in high quality" to just that. HD movies will (should) always have the option available.

I think it was nice to find this out though as i watched a lot of videos on youtube where the movies have lacked the option. Especially older military clips etc.

Thanx flash, aparently adding "&fmt=18" to the link switches the movie to high quality although the options are normal and HD... now they are 3 options...

thank you.

I have found what to add to the normal link so it will play in HD mode:

"&fmt=22"

without quotations marks.

like here:

:D

info from here:

http://blog.theevilpc.com/2008/12/youtube-hd-high-definition-video.html

...not every single video appears to be available in mp4 format.

That's true.

There's also keepvid.com service giving you 2 download links for selected youtube video. 1st link goes for low quality flv file, 2nd - higher quality mp4 file, which is equal to "high definition" option on youtube. Been using it for years :)

I have to correct this statement: 2nd link goes for a higher quality MP4 file, but that's not "HD" file.

In order to download HD, we can take 2nd link and change "fmt" value at the end of the line from 18 to 22.

For example, we take this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_za3KfMFKLk

Then use Keepvid.com (also notice the keepvid bookmarklet feature, quite handy), and it gives us 2 download links:

http://keepvid.com/save-video.flv?http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fget_video%3Fvideo_id%3D_za3KfMFKLk%26t%3DOEgsToPDskIjosz3ugfyCpoc0UaEu8Gx

- this is usual quality *.flv file which we watch on Youtube.

http://keepvid.com/save-video.mp4?http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fget_video%3Fvideo_id%3D_za3KfMFKLk%26t%3DOEgsToPDskIjosz3ugfyCpoc0UaEu8Gx%26fmt%3D18

- this is higher quality*.mp4 file which Youtube makes from the source file uploaded by the user.

Notice the only difference in youtube links is the "&fmt=18" at the end of the line. Now if we change the value to 22, we can try downloading HD quality file:

http://keepvid.com/save-video.mp4?http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fget_video%3Fvideo_id%3D_za3KfMFKLk%26t%3DOEgsToPDskIjosz3ugfyCpoc0UaEu8Gx%26fmt%3D22

Also notice that only 1st file can be downloaded with guarantee. Youtube can restrict download of the 2 other versions. For example, we shouldn't be able to download HD version of the video in this post because Youtube just hadn't this feature when the video was uploaded.