How to download file with pytube in maximum available resolution?

Question

url = message.text
file = YouTube(url)
stream = file.streams.get_by_resolution(360)
stream.download(filename='qwe.mp4')

I know only two possible ways to download stream. I can get it by itag or by resolution(here its 360). But there is a problem, because sometimes the video I want to download do not have 360, maximum 240 or 120.

My question is: how can I download a file in its maximum available resolution, but not higher than 1080. Is it possible?

If its not, can i download the video by its first existing itag?

Answer 1

Yes it's possible you can just use the filter functionality to loop through all the possible resolution and pick the highest excluding those above 1080.

You can find the documentation on filters here: https://pytube.io/en/latest/user/streams.html#filtering-for-mp4-streams

Answer 2

Try this:

from pytube import YouTube

file = YouTube('<url>')

# little utility to parse out the resolution from a stream description like 1440p
def get_resolution(s):
    return int(s.resolution[:-1])


stream = max(
    filter(lambda s: get_resolution(s) <= 1080,  # filter out sub-1080p streams
           filter(lambda s: s.type == 'video', file.fmt_streams)), # filter out the video streams
    key=get_resolution  # maximum resolution among those streams
)
print(stream)

Which gives us the stream that we want. Then we can download with the download method:

stream.download('file.mp4')

Answer 3

When using pytube, your variable file is a youtube object, an object type specific to the pytube package. You can use this to get the resolution of the video before downloading it via:

print(file.streams.get_highest_resolution().resolution)

Then just assign this to a variable and use that to set the resolution of the download:

res = file.streams.get_highest_resolution().resolution
if int(res.replace("p", "")) > 1080:
    res = 1080

the replace part ist just so that the p is removed from the resolution string e.g. 720p and can be compared as an int for the condition. This way you download at a max of 1080p

Answer 4

Although I find @rdas 's solution to likely be more elegant, a simple solution is as follows:

yt = YouTube(url)

# selects for highest resolution stream not > set resolution ceiling from an ordered resolution list
def select_best_res(yt):
    stream_list = yt.streams.filter(type="video", mime_type="video/mp4").order_by(
    "resolution"
    )
    res_ceiling = 1080  # maximum acceptable resolution (e.g. 2160, 1440, 1080, 720, 480, 360, 240)

    # selector for last stream (and therefore should be highest resolution) in ordered resolution list
    downward_moving_resolution_selector = -1
    while int(
        stream_list[downward_moving_resolution_selector].resolution.rstrip("p")
    ) > int(res_ceiling):
            downward_moving_resolution_selector -= 1
    best_res_stream = stream_list[downward_moving_resolution_selector]
    # print(
    #     f"The highest resolution stream that is not greater than {res_ceiling}p for {best_res_stream.title} is: 
",
    #     best_res_stream,
    # )
    return best_res_stream

select_best_res(yt)