ytm – terminal-based YouTube Music player

ytm is a terminal-based YouTube Music client offering both an interactive text interface and command-line controls. It lets users search for music, listen to tracks and manage playback without keeping a conventional web browser open.

The application combines ytmusicapi for accessing the YouTube Music catalogue, yt-dlp for resolving audio streams and mpv for playback. Its Textual interface brings together search results, playlists, the playback queue and information about the currently playing track.

Basic searching and listening do not require authentication. Signing into a YouTube Music account provides access to personal playlists, liked tracks, saved music and personalised mixes.

ytm is designed for keyboard-driven listening while retaining support for mouse interaction and individual commands that can be incorporated into terminal workflows.

This is free and open source software.

Key Features

• Interactive terminal interface with searchable music results, playback controls and queue management.
• Supports searching YouTube Music for songs and other publicly available content.
• mpv-powered audio playback with controls for pausing, seeking, skipping tracks and adjusting volume.
• Automatic radio playback that adds related songs to keep the listening queue populated.
• View song lyrics, including synchronised highlighting and scrolling when timed lyrics are available.
• Access liked songs, saved music, personal playlists and daily mixes through YouTube Music authentication.
• Create and manage local playlists alongside account-based playlists.
• Queue tracks, change their playback order, shuffle songs and view playback history.
• Optional offline track caching with configurable storage management.
• Display album artwork using Unicode blocks or supported terminal graphics protocols.
• Compact interface layout that adapts to smaller terminal windows.
• Separate command-line controls for searching, playing, queueing tracks and managing playback.
• Customisable keyboard shortcuts, themes, audio behaviour and playback settings.
• Cross-platform support – runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows.

Website: github.com/MaheshBhushan/yt-music-cli
Support:
Developer: Mahesh Koduri
License: MIT License

ytm is written in Python. Learn Python with our recommended free books and free tutorials.

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