Developer builds yt-dlp GUI to preserve YouTube playlist metadata locally

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A developer has released an open-source desktop app built on Electron that wraps yt-dlp, aimed at locally backing up YouTube videos along with their metadata. The project was motivated by a long-standing frustration with YouTube hiding removed or privatized videos in playlists, showing only a vague 'hidden videos' count with no identifying details. The author found existing tools either too complex — requiring self-hosted, containerized setups — or too limited in features like metadata embedding and subtitle downloads. Unable to find a solution that preserved playlist data at the level he wanted, he built the app himself in 2025 after studying yt-dlp's documentation. He chose Electron as the UI framework over Python-native desktop libraries, citing better cross-platform flexibility and room for future design expansion.

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