The VideoLAN Forums

Posted: **31 Jan 2019 01:25**

Ever since late 2018 – probably around September – VLC has been opening Youtube videos at a much lower resolution than the video in the Youtube webpage. Something that plays 1080p on the Youtube website now plays 640x360 on VLC.

I've used VLC to download Youtube videos for years, by selecting the codec and pasting it into the browser, but now this method brings me to tiny 640x360 videos as well. I've been keeping VLC up to date, and I have the most recent Youtube.luac.

Is anyone else experiencing this?

Posted: **31 Jan 2019 09:13**

Try with this LUA file and report back, please:
https://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.ph ... 89#p485489

Posted: **31 Jan 2019 13:42**

Thanks! I gave it a shot - I copied the text from this file, and replaced the text in the current Youtube.luac file in the Playlist folder. I checked a handful of Youtube videos afterword - Unfortunately, they're still coming up low res.

Posted: **31 Jan 2019 20:24**

Hello Jaxxy,

I can confirm that the same Youtube-Video Adress in my Mozilla Firefox-Webbrowser select automatic 480p (854×480 Pixel) Quality and the VLC-Player 3.0.6 (64-Bit) show me in the Codec-Information the lower Video-Quality (640×270 Pixels).

Hope someone can change in the "youtube.luac"-Script the Selection of a higher Video-Quality.

Perhaps the Change is essential in the following Code-Example ("youtube.luac"):

Code: Select all

-- Pick the most suited format available
function get_fmt( fmt_list )
    local prefres = vlc.var.inherit(nil, "preferred-resolution")
    if prefres < 0 then
        return nil
    end

    local fmt = nil
    for itag,height in string.gmatch( fmt_list, "(%d+)/%d+x(%d+)[^,]*" ) do
        -- Apparently formats are listed in quality
        -- order, so we take the first one that works,
        -- or fallback to the lowest quality
        fmt = itag
        if tonumber(height) <= prefres then
            break
        end
    end
    return fmt
end

Posted: **01 Feb 2019 22:22**

I have the same problem

This youtube video is 720p

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1i7yev1nLw

However VLC insists on streaming it at only 360p despite the 'Preferred video resolution' being set to 'Best available'
I did upgrade the youtube.lua script to the latest one (January 19 on GitHub), however this problem still exists
I did reboot the PC just to be sure VLC would definately use the new youtube.lua script

VLC: v3.0.6 x64
PC: Windows 10 x64

Posted: **31 May 2019 16:35**

Im having the same issue, youtube videos opened are only playing 360 even if higher resolution is available on youtube. Is this something that can be resolved/is being resolved?

Thanks

Posted: **01 Jun 2019 17:48**

Hi,

The parsing of youtube pages seems wrong, I don't see other resolution detected by the script on some videos.

Posted: **12 Jun 2019 03:34**

hey folks Youtube changed its coding you must now pay them for the higher res in their pro plan, It may not be playable in VLC anymore. due to concern of being able to copy via VLC thus circumventing their forced donation pay scheme to use their pro downloader. service..

What I wonder is if VLC would use the download option in order to play the video on third party APP If so its been blocked. in order to force pay donations.

VLC is NOT the only one having issues I have tried about half a dozen other third party services and they can no longer see the vid file. so anything relying on seeing the vid file to work, won't.

Posted: **12 Jun 2019 18:50**

YouTube allows you to pay for YouTube “premium” which just removes AD’s from playing but HD and 4K quality is available for everyone and I can watch HD and 4K videos fine in chrome and I can select info on the video and see the quality I’m watching but VLC is not showing that stream, so I would say the issue is with VLC but yes it’s probably been caused by a change in the way YouTube streams content, I think your right in the sense that there is no longer a “file” that is available for higher resolutions but it’s getting streamed somehow. I’m hoping some devs might be able to resolve it eventually

Posted: **12 Jun 2019 21:46**

youtube-dl can list all available formats: https://trac.videolan.org/vlc/ticket/22373#comment:1

Posted: **13 Jun 2019 02:39**

spamtomas : the quote from google was removed I had quoted googles streaming method and other info it was removed by moderator, I believe. They definitely changed their coding. to block 3rd party apps

Posted: **13 Jun 2019 12:25**

Hi Corey

I wasn’t disagreeing with you about google changing the code, they have changed their coding, I was just saying you don’t have to pay for higher res like you suggested. HD, 4K is available for anybody to stream in a browser, mobile browser even TV apps. So there is a way to decode the stream, just not in VLC. I hope they can figure out how to add it back in, as it was really good feature!

The VideoLAN Forums

Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res

Re: Youtube Videos Playing at Low Res