For most mainstream sites there are plenty of tools that work for downloading videos. So whether you need a Youtube or Vimeo video chances are the tools tend to support those sites because they have the largest audience.

When it comes to movies and series well those we have torrents.

Then come the more niche use cases, assuming you have paid for a course or even taken a free one but notice they host their own videos. or they use some service but the point is your little Youtube downloader cannot download the video for shit.

Video DownloadHelper

I have tried quite a few, and have simple requirements when testing each one:

• Be able to download my video
• Be FREE

Most failed at step one, and all the failures had stupid names like ULTIMATE failure of a tool, or we CUCK to Youtube by not downloading their links.

Although I did not want to download a Youtube vid, but the last one I dropped on principle.

Anyway, after inspecting the video service supplying my target I noticed that they are chunking the videos in itsy bitsy tiny little bits of data. This alone would mean the majority of video downloaders would not work since they tend to grab a full file and fetching that.

I imagine this is probably why not many are advertising they can download Netflix videos, because Netflix would also be streaming chunks and all the other fancy ways they try to optimize delivery but also not give people a file to click download on.

The specific site I was attempting to get videos from uses BrightCove to stream their course.

I think Vimeo might also fall into this type of category, where it is the platform's job to optimize, host, and stream video to the client ideally in a paywall able fashion.

So it goes without saying that it is not easy to download the course data from one of these. Now I would likely not even worry about downloading anything if the arseholes did not add expiry to my access.

In that case, fuck them.

So enter DownloadHelper.

It is a simple little extension as you would expect that sits and whenever it detects video it will light up and you can choose to start a download. For obvious reasons it helps to start playing the vid so it can pick up all the different bits and pieces.

I have actually not tested it by closing the tab with the video but guess y'all can do that test. I tend to just pause and since Brightcove does not buffer more than the chunk it is currently giving you I have not needed to concern myself with downloading "double".

It has quite a few settings and a gotcha that can feel a bit dodgy but I went the dodgy route and it all good so far. BE WARNED THOUGH

There are quite a few settings but the main one I think for more speciality sites like Brightcove video will require you to download and install the companion app.

This is because the videos on the streaming services are not single items and need to be combined. The browser from what I understand do not have the permissions to download , combine and convert these files so the companion application does this on the PC in the background.

I think for straight vid downloads like Youtube you can just stick to the standard download with no need to install the companion application.

A last note is that the FREE version only allows downloads every 2 hours but at $15 if you need to download very paid course you can then it is well worth the money.