📥 Reelsnag
A clean desktop GUI for yt-dlp. Back up your own videos — $24 once.
Online "downloader" services charge $10–15/month and proxy your video through their servers. Reelsnag wraps the open-source yt-dlp engine in a friendly dark-mode desktop app — a real download queue, format picker, trim, MP3 extraction and batch mode — built for personal archiving: your own uploads, CC/public-domain media, and content a platform's terms permit you to download.
Reelsnag screenshot is being captured — the app is shipped and real.
Features
Paste a URL → probe
Fetches title, thumbnail, duration, uploader and every available format via yt-dlp -J.
Format & quality picker
Grouped by resolution, audio-only option, "best" default, automatic video+audio merge via ffmpeg when needed.
Real download queue
Multiple jobs, 1–3 concurrent, live progress/speed/ETA, cancel, retry, remove, open-in-folder.
Trim per job
Optional start/end trim — fast stream-copy with an automatic accurate re-encode fallback.
Extract MP3
Audio-only downloads with a bitrate picker (128/192/320 kbps) — perfect for podcast backups of your own episodes.
Subtitles
Download available subs or auto-captions as .srt alongside the video.
Batch mode
Paste a list of URLs or load a .txt file (one URL per line) — back up a whole channel's worth at once.
Self-updating engine
One-click "Update yt-dlp" — extractors break and yt-dlp ships fixes weekly, so this button matters.
Reelsnag vs Downloader subscription sites
Downloader subscription sites at $10–15/mo runs roughly $144/year — $288 over two years. Reelsnag is $24, once.
| Reelsnag | Downloader subscription sites | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $24 once | $10–15/month ($120–180/yr) |
| Runs locally | Yes — nothing leaves your machine | No — video proxied through their servers |
| Format/quality control | Full yt-dlp format list | Usually locked to a few presets |
| Batch downloads | Yes — queue or .txt file | Often a paid tier |
| Trim / MP3 / subtitles | Built in | Rare, or paywalled |
| Engine updates | One-click "Update yt-dlp" | Depends on their backend |
| Account required | No | Yes |
| Source code | MIT, on GitHub | Closed |
Pays for itself in under 2 months versus a $12/mo converter subscription — everything after that is free.
Three steps, no subscription
Buy once on Whop
One-time $24 for the packaged Windows installer with lifetime updates. No account, no ads.
First run fetches the engine
yt-dlp comes from the official GitHub releases and ffmpeg is bundled — both with a visible progress bar, one time only.
Paste, pick, queue
Probe a URL, choose quality or audio-only, set trim/subtitles if you want them, and watch the queue work.
Honest answers
Is it really free on GitHub?
Yes — the full source is MIT at github.com/bensblueprints/reelsnag and always will be. $24 buys the packaged Windows installer and lifetime updates instead of running npm start yourself.
Is this legal to use?
Reelsnag is built for personal use: backing up your own uploads, content you have rights to, Creative Commons / public-domain media, and material a platform's terms permit you to download. Respect each platform's Terms of Service and copyright law — it is not a tool for redistributing or pirating other people's content, and that's on you to avoid.
What happens when a site changes and downloads break?
That's why the "Update yt-dlp" button exists. The engine is the actively-maintained yt-dlp project, which ships extractor fixes weekly — one click pulls the latest release from GitHub.
Does anything get uploaded or tracked?
No telemetry, no analytics, no accounts. The only network calls are the one-time yt-dlp binary download and whatever URL you explicitly paste in — both clearly surfaced in the UI.
Why not just use yt-dlp in a terminal?
You absolutely can — it's free and excellent. Reelsnag adds what the command line doesn't: a persistent queue with live progress, a visual format picker, per-job trim/MP3/subtitles, batch import and history. If you're happy typing flags, keep the terminal.
Own Reelsnag forever
$24 once. Signed installer, 1-click setup, updates included. No renewal, no account with us, no meter. Or build it yourself from the MIT source — it's the same app.