How to download a lecture video you are allowed to keep

First: are you allowed to?

Many courses let you keep recordings for your own study. Some do not. Check your course's terms, or ask. This guide is for lectures you have the right to keep.

Some videos are protected by DRM. Those cannot be saved this way. StreamSnag detects them, says so, and does not try to get round the protection.

What you need

• A computer with Chrome, Edge or Brave.
• StreamSnag. The downloader is free, with no limits and no account.
• Optional: the helper, a small program on your computer. See below.

Save one lecture

1. Open the lecture and press play

   This is the step people miss. Many players only load the video once it starts, so a page that has not played has nothing to save yet. A few seconds is enough, and you can pause again.

2. Click the StreamSnag icon

   The lecture is at the top, under On this page: its title, and one line that says what it is, how long and how big, for example “Video · 27 min · 129 MB”. Under that is one button.

3. Check the quality and save

   The button says Download with the size, for example “Download · 129 MB”. For a stream it names the picture size instead, such as “Download 720p”, and the choices are listed above it in plain words: “1080p · best”, “720p · smaller”. 720p is usually plenty for slides and a talking head, and the file is much smaller. To set the quality StreamSnag picks first, open Settings, then Downloads. When it has finished, the popup says where the file went, for example “Saved to Downloads › StreamSnag”, with Show file beside it.

4. Take the slides and the captions too

   Files on this page lists the PDFs and PowerPoint files the lesson links to. Save transcript, under the lecture's name, saves the lecture's own captions as text you can read and search. There is a separate guide to transcripts.

Downloads carry on when the popup closes. Activity, at the bottom of the popup, shows what is running, with the speed and the time left.

A whole course at once

On a page with several lectures there is a second button, “Download all (6)”, or “Download the 21 missing…” on a long page, with the line “You review the list first.” It opens a checklist before anything is saved: the lectures in course order with the file name each will get, copies and previews left out unless you tick them, and anything that cannot be saved listed with the reason. That has its own guide: how to download all the lectures on a course page.

The helper, for one tidy file in any folder

The extension finds and saves videos on its own. Many lecture sites send the picture and the sound as separate streams, though, and a browser can only save into its Downloads folder. The optional helper is a small program that runs on your computer and only talks to StreamSnag. With it you get:

• Video and sound joined into one finished file.
• Saving into any folder on your computer.
• A check of your folders, so StreamSnag knows which lectures you already have.
• Another way to download a page the browser cannot handle on its own, offered as “Try another way” when a download fails.

Windows: in the StreamSnag folder, double-click Set up StreamSnag helper.cmd. macOS and Linux: run sh setup.sh in that folder. Restart the browser, then press Check helper on the welcome page or in Settings, under Local helper.

If nothing shows up

• Press play, then open StreamSnag again. This fixes most cases.
• Scan again. When nothing is listed the popup says “No video on this page.” and offers Scan again. It looks at the whole page again, and nothing reloads.
• Ask your AI to find it. This is offered beside Scan again once you have chosen an AI account in Settings. It “uses your own AI account, at your own cost”, and the first click sends nothing: a sheet shows what would be sent (the page's address and title, and the parts of its code that mention video) and to whom. If it finds the video, StreamSnag remembers how for that site, says so, and offers Undo.
• The wrong video is listed. Under the lecture, Not the right video? opens the same two choices.
• The video is protected. StreamSnag then says “This video is protected by the site, so it can't be saved.” That is deliberate.
• Still nothing? Write to support@streamsnag.app with the address of the page. Course sites differ, and reports are how they get fixed.

Keep the files in order

A folder of files called video (7).mp4 is not much use in exam week. StreamSnag names each file after the lecture as the page gives it. Pages are not always tidy, so read the name on the card before you save, and rename it there if it is wrong.

If you want your own scheme, Settings has a file name template, a subfolder, and rules for specific sites. A rule such as Courses/{course}/{number} - {name} turns “009: Hypothesis tests” into 009 - Hypothesis tests.mp4 inside the course's folder.

A finished download can also be converted: an MP3 of the sound for listening, or a smaller copy of the video.