4K Video Downloader 26.3.1 for Android

It saves video and audio from YouTube, TikTok, Twitch, Facebook and SoundCloud straight to your phone in resolutions up to 8K.

The free tier never expires, and the only paid option is a single 10-dollar lifetime licence.

Paste a video link into the app, choose a quality, and the file is on your phone in under a minute, ready to watch with the plane in flight mode.

The catch is that you will not find this one in the Play Store.

Version 26.3.1 landed on 17 August 2026, the same day as the desktop builds.

What It Actually Does

You copy a link, paste it in, and pick a resolution. The app downloads the video and audio, joins them, and writes a single file to your phone's storage.

Output is MP4 or MKV, and audio can be pulled out on its own as MP3, M4A or OGG. Resolutions run from 360p up to 8K where the source actually has it, though anything above 1080p on a phone screen mostly costs you storage rather than buying visible quality.

Playlists, whole YouTube channels, podcasts and recorded livestreams all download in one action rather than clip by clip. That last one matters more than it sounds, because recorded streams often disappear from the platform later.

Supported sources include YouTube, TikTok, Twitch, Facebook and SoundCloud.

Why It Is Not on Google Play

Google's developer policy prohibits apps that download content from YouTube. Every downloader in this category is therefore distributed outside the Play Store, and this one is no exception.

That is not a red flag on its own. It is the same reason TiviMate keeps vanishing from the Play Store and why a whole category of otherwise legitimate Android software lives on direct APKs.

What it does mean is that the usual Play Store safety net is gone, and you are responsible for checking what you install.

Installing the APK Safely

Three steps, in this order, and none of them are hard.

• First, check the file. Run the downloaded APK through our APK Checker to see its package name, signing certificate and requested permissions.
• Then allow installs from that one source. Android asks per-app rather than globally, so grant it to your browser or file manager and revoke it afterwards.
• Finally, expect a Play Protect warning and read it. Android flags any sideloaded app it has not seen before, which is the warning firing correctly rather than evidence of malware.

Our full guide to installing an APK safely walks the whole sequence with screenshots if any of that is unfamiliar.

Requirements and the Licence

The APK is 125 MB and needs Android 10 or newer. Older phones cannot run 26.3.1 and there is no maintained older build to fall back on.

The Starter tier is free permanently, with no trial clock and no card. It caps how many items you can download, and the vendor does not publish the exact number.

There is exactly one paid option on Android: Personal, at 10 dollars, once, forever. That is a much simpler deal than the desktop app's 15/25/45-dollar ladder, and the two are sold separately.

Same product on other platforms: 4K Video Downloader Plus for Windows and 4K Video Downloader for Mac.

Playing What You Downloaded

MP4 files play in whatever gallery or video app your phone shipped with. MKV often does not, and neither does anything with AC3, EAC3 or DTS audio, which is where most "the video plays but there is no sound" reports come from.

Any of these will handle the awkward files.

• VLC for Android - plays essentially everything with nothing else installed.
• MX Player - better gesture controls and subtitle handling.
• Kodi for Android - overkill for one file, ideal if you are building a library.

If MX Player specifically goes silent on a downloaded file, that is the licensing gap around Dolby audio rather than a broken download, and the EAC3 audio fix guide covers it.

The MX Player Custom Codec add-on is the usual answer, and there is a KMPlayer equivalent if that is your player.

Free Alternatives on Android

Nothing free replaces this outright, but a few tools cover part of the job.

Our browser-based Stream Extractor pulls a direct media URL out of a streaming page and works fine on a phone, with nothing to install. The YouTube Playlist to M3U tool turns a playlist into a file your player streams directly, which is often what people actually wanted instead of 200 saved videos eating storage.

For one-off audio conversions, the Online Audio Converter runs in the browser. The Playlist Builder turns what you have already saved into something playable in order.

If your problem is that the source is blocked in your country rather than that you need it offline, a downloader will not help. ProtonVPN for Android has a genuinely free tier and solves that directly.

Who Should Look Elsewhere

The tell is whether you want to keep the file or do something with it.

If you are grabbing footage to edit into something else, downloading and then re-encoding on a phone costs you quality twice. CapCut for Android edits and exports in one pass, and Blackmagic Camera is the tool if you are shooting rather than collecting.

If you only ever want the audio, a video downloader is a heavy way to get an MP3 and you are storing the video stream for nothing. The browser tools above are lighter.

And if sideloading genuinely worries you, that is a reasonable position and you should not talk yourself out of it. Stream through a player instead, or use the desktop version on a computer and move the files across by cable.

Quick questions

Download the 4K Video Downloader 26.3.1 APK and see how far the free tier gets you, or tell us how you got on if you have used it before.