Parabolic (Video Downloader) Rewritten in C++, Adjusts UI

There are plenty of ways to download videos from well-known video streaming sites on Ubuntu but I find Parabolic the easiest, least hassle option out there.

For those yet to hear about it, Parabolic is a GTK4/libadwaita app for Linux (or a Qt one for Windows) that offers what it describes as a ‘basic frontend’ to yt-dlp. All sites supported by yt-dlp are supported in this app. Paste in a URL, validate, and download.

Parabolic lets you download multiple videos simultaneously and save them to popular video or audio formats; sign-in with account details (if needed) and see the credentials to an in-app keyring; set download speed limits; split chapters, and a lot, lot more.

This week a brand new version of the Parabolic (which changed its name from Tube Converter last year) was released. As the first major update this year (there was a small bug fix update in May) it’s loaded with notable changes.

First up, Parabolic has been rewritten in C++ to provide a faster and more stable downloading experience. The app had been previously rewritten in C#.

There are also a number of big changes to the user-interface in order to “make it easier to find the Parabolic features you love and want to use”, according to developer Nick Logozzo.

“We have also refined and improved the options available when configuring individual downloads, playlists, and Parabolic as a whole. Besides new things, we have fixed tons of bugs throughout the downloading backend that users have been waiting for.”

Parabolic v2024.10 changes include:

• Rewritten keyring module (existing keyrings need to be reconfigured)
• Audio languages with audio description now detected correctly
• Audio download quality options now list audio bitrates
• Playlist downloads now save to a subdirectory within the save location
• Download history length can be changed in Preferences
• Option to set preferred video codec when downloading videos
• Option to allow for immediate download after URL validation
• Newer version of yt-dlp

In short, a solid update for a nifty tool that makes it very easy to download things you’ve got permission for (I used it to backup a bunch of videos from my much-maligned OMG! Ubuntu YouTube channel before setting them as private).

Want to install Parabolic on Ubuntu?

It’s easy enough!

You can get Parabolic on Flathub (that build should work on most modern Linux distros out there), or you can also install the official Parabolic snap from the Canonical Snap Store. If you want the Qt Windows version, download the .exe from the Parabolic GitHub page.