Updated September 2026 · both apps the page names now carry their own dated catalogue figures, NewPipe's version was corrected from its F-Droid page, and the link about Premium prices was corrected
YouTube states its position on downloading in its Terms of Service, and it is not ambiguous. The United States version, dated 15 December 2023, opens the list of things a viewer may not do with "access, reproduce, download, distribute, transmit, broadcast, display, sell, license, alter, modify or otherwise use any part of the Service or any Content except: (a) as expressly authorized by the Service; or (b) with prior written permission from YouTube and, if applicable, the respective rights holders". The Service does expressly authorise one kind of download, and for most people it is the whole answer: a YouTube Premium membership turns on a Download button that saves videos and playlists for offline viewing inside the app, and in a long list of countries a limited version of it exists without a membership.
That restriction sits under Permissions and Restrictions, among the things a viewer may not do. A second item matters as much: you may not "circumvent, disable, fraudulently engage with, or otherwise interfere with any part of the Service", including "features that (a) prevent or restrict the copying or other use of Content".
The line usually quoted back the other way sits in the same section: you "may view or listen to Content for your personal, non-commercial use". That is permission to watch and to listen, not to keep.
Two things are in play. The terms are an agreement between you and YouTube, governed, it says, by California law. Copyright is separate and national. Breaking a term of service and infringing copyright are not the same event, though one act can be both, and nothing here is legal advice.
YouTube's description of the Premium benefit is short: download videos and playlists to watch offline when you are not connected to the internet, signed in to the Premium account.
The limits are on the same page. A download plays offline for up to 29 days, after which the phone must reconnect so the app can check the video is still available; in some countries the window is 48 hours. If it is no longer available, YouTube says the download is removed at the next sync.
It is not a file your phone can see. YouTube's offline FAQ says downloaded videos are stored encrypted on the device and can only be watched in the YouTube app, and that it is not possible to download audio, music or MP3 files from it at all.
Premium Lite downloads too, but not everything: its page says downloads cover most videos but not Shorts or music content. The guide to YouTube on Android and Android TV sets the two paid tiers side by side and says why the purchase screen in the app is the only honest place to read a price; the membership-free button below sits outside that comparison.
The Download button, with a Premium plan or in the countries YouTube lists
3.8 stars from 171,577,809 reviews · 10,000,000,000+ installs · free to install · in-app purchases $0.05 to $999.99 per item · updated on the store 1 September 2026 · by Google LLC · Contains ads: Yes · checked 5 September 2026
Google Play listing · 3.8 (171,577,809) · read 5 September 2026
This is the app the whole question runs through, and the one route the Terms of Service expressly authorise lives inside it: the Download button that a Premium plan turns on, or the limited free button in the countries YouTube lists. Its listing, read 5 September 2026, is free to install, carries the Contains ads label, and sells every paid plan as an in-app purchase somewhere in a $0.05 to $999.99 per item band, so no tier price can be quoted from it. The rating is 3.8 stars from 171,577,809 reviews on 10,000,000,000+ installs, and the data safety card says no data is shared with third parties, that the app may collect data, and that it carries the Independent security review line.
YouTube publishes a list of locations where its app offers a limited Download button without a membership. India, Indonesia, the Philippines, South Africa and Kenya are on it; the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia are not, so for most readers here it is not the route. YouTube adds one caveat on the same page: in South Africa and India some videos still require a Premium membership, and tapping Download on those asks you to sign up. Where YouTube Premium is sold, that free button does not exist, which is why guides written for those markets say plainly that offline downloads need a paid plan.
Where it exists the terms are tighter. Those downloads play for up to 48 hours before the device has to reconnect, with a note that non-music content runs to 29 days in some countries.
Not seeing the button is the normal outcome, not a fault. YouTube says that where a video is unavailable for offline playback, Download is unavailable too, and that below 5 percent of free storage nothing more can be downloaded. The download settings live under Settings, Background and downloads.
Start with your own uploads. YouTube's help page says you can download MP4 files of videos you uploaded, in 720p or 360p depending on size, from YouTube Studio on a computer, and that Google Takeout exports them all at once. The same page states the flip side plainly: you cannot download other users' videos.
Then there is openly licensed work. YouTube lets a creator mark an upload with the Creative Commons Attribution licence when it is their own work, material already under CC BY, or public domain content, and points at the Creative Commons search filter and a video's licence line as the ways to spot it. CC BY grants rights to share and adapt the material, even commercially, with credit.
One limit on that openly licensed work comes first. A Creative Commons licence is the rights holder's half of exception (b), not YouTube's written permission, and YouTube's licence page describes reuse without naming any download route. It settles what you may do with a work, not how you take it off the platform. Prefer a publisher that hands you the file. The torrent client guide lists where openly licensed material is actually published, and makes the same point that the legal line is set by the file rather than the tool.
Google's Intellectual Property policy for developers bars apps that induce or encourage copyright infringement, listing "streaming apps that allow users to download a local copy of copyrighted content without authorization". It governs Play distribution, not what you install from elsewhere.
Outside Google Play, whichever alternative store you use, one piece of paperwork goes missing. Google's note on the Data safety section says it applies only to apps distributed on Google Play, and it is a developer declaration anyway. Install an APK and there is no such declaration to read.
Play Protect survives. Google says it checks apps at install and periodically scans the device, and may offer to scan one from outside Google Play that has never been scanned; it recommends always keeping it on. Read what changes about installing apps from outside Play first: developer verification starts enforcement in four countries in September 2026.
These are apps that read YouTube's public pages and write a file to your storage. Using one on material you have no permission for breaches the agreement quoted at the top, and the clause about interfering with copy restrictions is aimed at the technique rather than the file. Whether it is also a copyright matter depends on the work and where you live.
The best documented example is NewPipe, which F-Droid lists as a lightweight YouTube frontend, version 0.29.1 added 21 August 2026 (read 5 September 2026), under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later. It is not on Google Play. F-Droid says it uses no Google framework libraries and no YouTube API, only parsing the website, and flags an anti-feature: it depends entirely on a non-free network service. Its site advertises offline saving.
F-Droid publishes a permission list in place of that declaration, and it is a useful yardstick: network access, foreground services, notifications, reading and modifying shared storage, running at startup and drawing over other apps. No contacts, no location, no microphone, no SMS. A downloader wanting any of those four has a question to answer; the permission manager guide shows where to check.
The documented third-party downloader, named here as an example rather than a recommendation
Not on Google Play: its store page returns not found · Version 0.29.1, added to F-Droid on 21 August 2026 · Licence GNU General Public License v3.0 or later · One Anti-Feature flagged, Non-Free Network Services, because the app depends on YouTube for its videos · No rating, no review count, no install count, no price and no Contains ads label are published, and there is no Data Safety section · F-Droid page, read 5 September 2026
F-Droid page · no rating is published there to quote · read 5 September 2026
NewPipe is the one third-party downloader this page names, and it is named because it is documented, not because it is recommended. Its F-Droid page, read on 5 September 2026, gives the licence, the current version, 0.29.1, added to the repository on 21 August 2026, one Anti-Feature flag, and a link to the source code at github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe. What it does not give is a rating, a review count, an install count, a price or a Contains ads label, because F-Droid publishes none of those for any app, and there is no Data Safety section to set beside the permission list quoted above. Using it on material you have no permission for breaches the agreement quoted at the top of this page, whatever the app's own quality.
Skip this one if: you want a published rating, price or ads label before you install anything, or you want to stay inside YouTube's terms, which for most readers is the whole point of this page.
YouTube is clear about how the money reaches a channel. It shares ad revenue with creators when you watch ads, and where you are a Premium member and see none, it shares your membership fee instead. Watching a copy taken outside both routes fits neither description.
Four routes stay inside the rules and none needs an APK. Pay for the membership and use the button in the app, the whole answer for most readers. Check whether your country is on YouTube's list, where a free version of that button exists. Export your own uploads from YouTube Studio. For openly licensed or public domain work, read the licence and prefer a publisher that hands you the file; music has its own licensed offline routes, set out in the music downloader roundup. Anything outside those four is a decision about an agreement you accepted and, depending on the work, somebody's copyright.
YouTube's Terms of Service say a viewer may not download any part of the Service or its Content except as the Service expressly authorises, or with written permission from YouTube and the rights holders. Copyright law is separate and varies by country. The authorised route is YouTube's own Download button. This is not legal advice.
In some countries. YouTube publishes a list of locations where its app offers a limited Download button with no membership, including India, Indonesia, the Philippines and South Africa; the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia are not on that list. Anyone can download videos they uploaded themselves, from YouTube Studio on a computer.
Inside the YouTube app. YouTube's offline FAQ says downloaded videos are stored encrypted on the device and can only be watched in the YouTube app, so they never appear in the gallery. Such a download plays offline for up to 29 days before the phone must reconnect, and in some countries or regions the window is 48 hours.
Usually because nothing is wrong. Without a Premium membership that button appears only in the countries YouTube lists, and YouTube says that where a video is unavailable for offline playback, Download is unavailable too. It also says nothing more can be downloaded once free device storage falls below 5 percent.
There are two risks. An app installed from outside Google Play carries no Data safety section, which Google says covers only apps distributed on Google Play. Play Protect still scans apps and Google recommends keeping it on. Using one on material you have no permission for also breaks the YouTube terms you accepted.
Not as a file you can move, and no route outside YouTube is within its terms. YouTube's offline FAQ states that it is not possible to download audio, music or MP3 files from the YouTube app, and a Premium download stays inside that app rather than becoming a file in your storage. The offline mode in a separate music app is a different feature and is not what that sentence rules out. This is not legal advice.
Read on 5 September 2026, the Google Play listing is free to install, carries the Contains ads label, sells its paid plans as in-app purchases of $0.05 to $999.99 per item, and shows 3.8 stars from 171,577,809 reviews on 10,000,000,000+ installs. The Download button that Premium turns on is bought through that listing, and its data safety card says no data is shared with third parties.
No. Its Google Play page returns not found, and F-Droid is where it is published: version 0.29.1, added 21 August 2026, under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later, with one Anti-Feature flag, Non-Free Network Services, because it depends on YouTube for its videos. F-Droid publishes no rating, no install count, no price and no Contains ads label, so none can be quoted. Using it on material you have no permission for breaches the YouTube terms you accepted.
Checked 5 September 2026: the page named two apps and linked neither, quoted no catalogue figure, and had no table, no capsule and no dated line. YouTube now carries its own listing figures, read today: 3.8 stars from 171,577,809 reviews, 10,000,000,000+ installs, free to install, the Contains ads label, and in-app purchases of $0.05 to $999.99 per item, which is why no plan price is quoted anywhere on this page. NewPipe's F-Droid page was re-read and corrects the page: it said version 0.29.0 from 26 July 2026, and F-Droid now lists version 0.29.1, added 21 August 2026; Google Play returns not found for it, as the page already said. The sentence sending readers to the Android TV guide for the two paid tiers side by side with their prices was corrected, because that guide no longer prints a tier price and says the purchase screen in the app is the only honest place to read one. One FAQ question was moved to the second person: Can you download YouTube videos as MP3 files on Android. A repeated paragraph opener in the openly licensed section was reworded, the Terms of Service quotation at the top now links its source, and the page title now matches the headline.
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