This is a series where I hand-pick an open source Linux application each week that has not previously been covered on LinuxLinks. Each application must meet a very high standard.
OmniGet is a desktop application built with Tauri that lets you download media and other files from a broad range of online sources.
It supports downloads from sites including YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Reddit, Twitch, Vimeo, Bluesky, and Bilibili. It can also retrieve content from supported course platforms, handle torrents, and transfer files directly between devices using share codes.
This is free and open source software.
Installation
I evaluated OmniGet with CachyOS, an Arch-based distribution. There’s a package in the AUR. I installed the binary package.
The package (binary) installs with no issues.
On first run you’re taken through a five stage wizard:
- Choose your language and theme (system, light or dark).
- Set your download folder.
- Set up the required tools. These are yt-dlp and FFmpeg. If your system is missing either, the program can install them for you.
- Plugins – choose which features to install:
- Course downloader – Hotmart, Udemy, Kiwify, Teachable, Kajabi, MasterlClass, and 30+ more.
- Telegram Downloader – photos, videos, files from channels and groups.
- Media Converter – convert between video and audio formats with GPU acceleration.
- Set a global hotkey – this lets you copy any video URL by simply pressing the hotkey. By default it’s disabled.
Many GUI Linux apps would benefit from a similar wizard.
The 3 plugins can be installed at any time from the Marketplace section of the UI.
In action
The above images were taken without any of the plugins enabled. In the image below, I’ve enabled the media converter plugin. Note an additional entry, Convert, now appears in the left hand bar.
The software uses FFmpeg to perform the video conversion.
Key Features
- Supports downloads from 1,000+ sites through yt-dlp integration.
- Lets you paste a link, preview available formats, and choose download quality.
- Includes built-in torrent handling with support for magnet links and .torrent files.
- Offers peer-to-peer file transfers between devices using a four-word share code.
- Provides optional plugins for courses, Telegram media downloads, and format conversion.
- Includes a browser extension and global hotkey support for faster link capture.
- Handles yt-dlp and FFmpeg setup automatically and keeps them up to date.
- Ships with Linux builds and is also available as a Flatpak.
- Offers multiple colour themes (11 including Catppuccin, Dracula) and multilingual interface support.
- Cross-platform support – runs under Linux, macOS, and Windows. There are packages for both x86_64 and ARM architectures. For Linux users, a Flatpak and an AppImage are available.
Summary
OmniGet is still a relatively new project, but it’s already shaping up to be a useful tool. It’s attracting strong interest from the open source community, earning nearly 2,000 GitHub stars in just two months.
In addition to downloading videos from more than 1,000 sites through yt-dlp, OmniGet offers native support for Bilibili, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Kuaishou, Youku, and Tencent Video, a capability many similar tools lack.
Naturally, you should make sure your use of this tool complies with the copyright laws in your country.
Website: github.com/tonhowtf/omniget
Support:
Developer: Antonio
License: GNU General Public License v3.0
OmniGet is written in Rust. Learn Rust with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| YouTube Tools | |
|---|---|
| SpMp | YouTube music client with a focus on customization |
| FreeTube | Privacy-based YouTube app |
| Media Downloader | Frontend for youtube-dl, gallery-dl, Lux, you-get, svtplay-dl, aria2c, ... |
| pipe-viewer | Lightweight YouTube client without requiring an API key |
| Piped | Uses NewPipe Extractor, a library for extracting |
| AudioTube | Qt-based music streamer |
| ClipGrab | Downloader for YouTube and other sites |
| Minitube | Application for watching YouTube without using Flash |
| youtube-local | Browser-based YouTube client |
| SMTube | Search, play and download YouTube videos |
| MellowPlayer | Multi-platform cloud music integration |
| PlasmaTube | Designed to be integrated with KDE Plasma |
| Video Downloader | Tool which lets you download videos from YouTube and other websites |
| VacuumTube | Unofficial wrapper of YouTube Leanback |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
| Video Converters | |
|---|---|
| HandBrake | Multithreaded cross-platform media transcoding application |
| FFmpeg | Multimedia player, server and encoder |
| Shutter Encoder | Graphical frontend to FFmpeg with editing features |
| FastFlix | GUI for H.264, HEVC and AV1 hardware and software encoding |
| Videomass | Cross-platform GUI for FFmpeg and youtube-dl |
| avconv | Part of libav-tools; fork of FFmpeg |
| VLC | Vdeo player which also converts multimedia to different formats |
| mpv | Cross-platform media player with video encoding support |
| MEncoder | MEncoder is included in MPlayer |
| FFQueue | Graphical frontend to FFmpeg written in C++ |
| transcode | Utility to encode raw video/audio streams |
| MystiQ | GUI for FFmpeg, a powerful media converter |
| Ciano | Easy way to convert your multimedia files to the most popular formats |
| Constrict | Compress videos to target sizes |
Read our verdict in the software roundup.
 Explore our comprehensive directory of recommended free and open source software. Our carefully curated collection spans every major software category.This directory is part of our ongoing series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. It features hundreds of detailed reviews, along with open source alternatives to proprietary solutions from major corporations such as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. You’ll also find interesting projects to try, hardware coverage, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. Discovered a useful open source Linux program that we haven’t covered yet? Let us know by completing this form. |