[dspillett]

> yt-dlp can no longer download itag 22 and itag 18 is now throttled. This means yt-dlp has to download an audio file and a video file and use ffmpeg to merge the two.

I found yt-dlp did that more often than not anyway, if left to its own devices on choosing which formats to pick. Though I had noticed it doing that pretty much always recently.

> Perhaps the accessibility of videos on YouTube is going to get even worse.

I think that has started to happen. I've had a few occurrences recently where it tries to get a particular format and fails, so I've had to manually request something else.

They also seem to have started screening non-residential/office/similar connections more aggressively too, two external hosts of mine now get a message to the effect "login to prove you aren't a bot" when yt-dlp tries to pick something up, and I've seen people note that they have trouble with YouTube proper (without logging in) over some VPN services.

[_0ffh]

>I found yt-dlp did that more often than not anyway

Yes, the default setting is to d/l and mux the highest available quality video and audio.