Twitter / X Video Downloader yt-dlp

How to download Twitter / X videos in 3 steps

1. Copy the link: On any tweet, tap Share → Copy link. Links look like x.com/user/status/1234567890… — old twitter.com links and t.co short links work too.
2. Analyze and choose: Paste it above. A video tweet shows its quality ladder with real bitrates; a GIF tweet offers MP4 or real .GIF; a multi-video tweet unpacks into a picker; a Space link shows its replay.
3. Download server-side: Our servers fetch the top rendition from X's CDN and hand you the file — no app, no login, no screen recording.

The hidden bitrate ladder: why "720p" is not one file on X

When a video is uploaded to X, it is re-encoded into a ladder of renditions — but unlike most platforms, X ladders by bitrate as much as by resolution. A typical tweet video exists at roughly 0.3, 0.8 and 2.2 Mbps, sometimes with two different bitrates at the same frame size. The player starts on a low rung and switches silently; on a phone screen you rarely notice, until you save the file and watch it on anything bigger.

That is why videos saved with screen recorders or player-scraping tools so often look soft: they inherit whatever rung the player happened to be streaming. The best file X stores for the tweet was never touched.

yt-dlp reads the whole ladder — every progressive MP4 variant plus the HLS renditions — and requests exactly the rung you ask for. This page shows the real bitrate next to each quality button and builds a selector that takes the best file at or below your chosen height:

-f "b[height<=720]/bv*[height<=720]+ba/b" --merge-output-format mp4

The result is the highest-bitrate MP4 X keeps for that resolution — not a re-compressed copy, not a screen capture, and never the data-saver rung.

Last Updated: September 2026

Twitter GIFs are not GIFs — here is how to get a real one

Every GIF posted to X is converted into a silent, looping MP4 the moment it is uploaded — the original .gif file is discarded. That is a sensible bandwidth decision (MP4 is roughly 10× smaller), but it means "Save GIF" tools that hand you an .mp4 file are not being lazy: the GIF genuinely no longer exists on X's servers.

This page detects GIF tweets automatically — they are stored differently from videos (a single MP4 variant, no streaming ladder, no duration) — and gives you both endings to that story:

If you just want to rewatch it, take the MP4. If you need a file that behaves like a GIF — auto-plays and loops in places that do not render video — take the .GIF conversion and accept the larger size. Either way you are working from X's original file, not a screen capture of it.

Downloading Twitter Space replays as MP3

X keeps a recording of a Space only when the host enables it — that is the replay you can play from the original tweet after the Space ends. X offers no download button for it, ever. This page accepts x.com/i/spaces/… links directly: paste one and we fetch the replay stream and convert it to a normal MP3 file (video Spaces are saved as MP4 instead).

The honest limits, stated up front: a Space that is still live cannot be captured here — recording ongoing audio is a different job (our Live Stream Recorder handles live broadcasts). A Space whose host disabled the recording has no replay to fetch, and no tool can conjure one. If the Space page shows a "Play recording" button, this page can turn it into an MP3.

Which Twitter / X links work — and which can't