Free forever · Open source · iOS 17+

The free YouTube client
for iPhone and iPad

Watch YouTube without ads on iPhone and iPad
Sign in with your YouTube account, sync subscriptions and history
Download videos from YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, X, Vimeo and 2,000+ more sites
Background audio, AirPlay, Picture-in-Picture, offline playback. No Google API key, no telemetry, no paid tier

No ads
No tracking
No API key
Offline downloads

Everything the official app does, plus what it doesn't.

Vidacity replicates the YouTube mobile app surface but removes the ads, the tracking, and the App-Store-only restrictions. Then it adds a universal downloader on top.

Watch

Home feed, trending, search with autocomplete, channel pages, playlists, recommendations, comments, likes, dislikes, replies, translations.

Sign in & sync

Sign in with your YouTube account via a real in-app browser. Subscriptions, watch history, your playlists, liked videos and Watch Later all sync.

Download

Offline copies of any video you play. Plus a dedicated Link tab for ~2,000 yt-dlp-supported sites: Instagram, TikTok, X, Vimeo, SoundCloud.

Background audio

Lock-screen controls, AirPlay, Picture-in-Picture, system Now Playing. Music keeps playing when you switch apps or turn off the screen.

Private by design

No telemetry, no remote logging, no third-party SDKs. Cookies live only in the iOS Keychain. Stream URLs are in-memory and expire in 30 minutes.

Localized

Fully translated in English, Spanish, Russian, German, and French via Apple's String Catalog. Dark mode only, because the whole app is designed for it.

A look inside the app.

Screenshots from iPhone 17 Pro on iOS 26. The app is dark-only by design.

Vidacity Search tab with recent queries and a video result — **Search** · recents pinned above the home feed

Search results list showing dance music videos — **Results** · videos, playlists, channels

Native AVPlayer transport controls overlaid on a music video — **System controls** · scrubber, PiP, AirPlay

Player showing yt-dlp download progress at 7% — **Live download** · yt-dlp progress before playback

Library tab signed in showing playlists and liked videos — **Library** · history, playlists, liked, Watch Later

List of videos saved on device for offline playback — **Downloads** · offline-playable saved videos

Active download transfer queue with progress bar — **Transfer queue** · live progress and cancel

Format picker for an Instagram reel with video and audio options — **Universal downloader** · pick format + transcode

Install on your iPhone or iPad.

No App Store. No paid Apple Developer account required. You'll need a Mac with Xcode and a free Apple ID.

1Install Xcode

Download Xcode 16 or 26 from the Mac App Store. The first launch takes a while, because it installs the iOS SDK in the background.
2Add your Apple ID to Xcode

Xcode → Settings → Accounts → + → Apple ID. A Personal Team appears under your account. This is the free signing identity. No paid developer enrollment needed.

3Clone Vidacity

git clone https://github.com/leokossdev/vidacity.git
cd vidacity
open Vidacity/Vidacity.xcodeproj

4Change the bundle identifier

In Xcode, select the Vidacity target → Signing & Capabilities → set the Bundle Identifier to something unique to you (e.g. com.yourname.vidacity). Set Team to your Personal Team.
5Plug in your iPhone or iPad

Connect via USB (or pair wirelessly in Finder). On the device: Settings → Privacy & Security → Developer Mode → On. The device reboots.
6Build & run

Pick your device from the Xcode destination dropdown and press ⌘R. First time only: on the device, Settings → General → VPN & Device Management → trust your developer profile.

Heads-up: free Apple IDs are limited

Apps signed with a free Apple ID expire after 7 days. After that, re-run from Xcode (or use AltStore to auto-refresh).
A single free Apple ID can sign at most 3 different apps on a device at once.
None of the limits are something Vidacity controls. They apply to every free-signed app on iOS.

How to download YouTube, Instagram & TikTok videos on iPhone for free.

No subscription, no ads, no watermark. The Link tab inside Vidacity uses yt-dlp to pull videos directly from the source. Same flow for every supported site.

Download a YouTube video

Copy the video URL from the YouTube app or Safari.
Open Vidacity, switch to the Link tab.
Paste the URL and tap Fetch.
On the Preview screen, pick a video format (up to 1080p+) and tap Download.
The file lands in the Downloads tab, playable offline.

Download an Instagram reel

In the Instagram app, tap the reel's Share icon and choose Copy link.
Open Vidacity → Link tab → paste.
Tap Fetch, then Download on the Preview screen.
Saved as MP4 in Downloads. Reels stay watchable without an Instagram account.

Download a TikTok video (no watermark)

Tap Share on the TikTok and copy the link.
Open Vidacity → Link tab → paste.
Tap Fetch. yt-dlp grabs the source MP4, which on TikTok is usually the watermark-free version.
Tap Download. Plays offline from the Downloads tab.

The same three-step flow works for X (Twitter), Vimeo, SoundCloud, Reddit, Twitch, Dailymotion, Bilibili, Facebook, and roughly 2,000 other sites that yt-dlp supports. Vidacity auto-updates its bundled yt-dlp every 7 days so new sites and breakage fixes arrive without you rebuilding the app.

Why Vidacity over other YouTube apps for iPhone.

Most "YouTube without ads" solutions on iOS fall into three buckets: paid (YouTube Premium), web wrappers, or browser-extension hacks. Vidacity is a real native app, free, and doesn't track you.

Feature	Vidacity	YouTube official	YouTube Premium	Web wrappers
Free	✓	✓	$13.99/mo	✓
No ads	✓	✗	✓	partial
Background audio	✓	✗	✓	✗
Picture-in-Picture	✓	Premium only	✓	✗
AirPlay	✓	✓	✓	limited
Offline downloads	✓	Premium only	✓	✗
Download from non-YouTube sites	✓ (2,000+)	✗	✗	✗
Sign in with your account	✓	✓	✓	varies
Open source	✓	✗	✗	✗
No telemetry / tracking	✓	✗	✗	varies

Vidacity is not on the App Store (Apple's guideline 5.2.3 blocks unofficial YouTube clients), so you install it from source with Xcode. That's a one-time setup compared to the recurring cost and tracking of Premium.

Built on open-source giants.

Vidacity glues together a stack of battle-tested libraries. Nothing custom for things others do better. Full credit to the maintainers below.

yt-dlp

165k

The download engine. Extracts stream URLs from YouTube and ~2,000 other sites. Runs in-process via PythonKit.

YouTubeKit

126

Cookie-based YouTube data layer. Search, comments, playlists, subscriptions, likes, all without a Google API key.

FFmpeg

60k

In-process video and audio muxing, transcoding to H.264 / MP3. Compiled as a static library for iOS.

YoutubeDL-iOS

147

Brings yt-dlp + Python to iOS via PythonKit. Auto-updates the yt-dlp Python module weekly.

Kingfisher

24k

Disk-cached image loader. Powers every thumbnail and channel avatar in the app.

LNPopupUI

598

The expanding mini-player above the tab bar. Same interaction model as Apple Music and Podcasts.

KeychainAccess

8.2k

Secure Keychain wrapper for storing YouTube session cookies. Cookies never touch disk or any log.

SwimplyPlayIndicator

The animated audio bars that mark the currently-playing item in the up-next queue.

All Swift Package dependencies are pinned in the Package.resolved manifest and resolve automatically on first build.

Frequently asked questions

Couldn't find what you're looking for? Open an issue on GitHub or email leokossdev@gmail.com.

Is Vidacity really free?

Yes. Vidacity is 100% free and open source under an MIT-style license. There are no ads, no tracking, no in-app purchases, no premium tier. The source code is published on GitHub and you build the app yourself.

Which sites can I download from?

The Link tab supports every site that yt-dlp can extract, roughly 2,000 today. That includes YouTube, Vimeo, X/Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, SoundCloud, Reddit, Twitch, Dailymotion, Bilibili, and many more. yt-dlp updates automatically every 7 days inside the app so new sites and fixes arrive without rebuilding.

Do I need a paid Apple Developer account?

No. A free Apple ID is enough to sideload Vidacity to your own iPhone or iPad via Xcode. The catch is that free-signed builds expire after 7 days and have to be re-installed. The paid Apple Developer Program ($99 a year) extends that to a full year and removes the device-count cap, but it isn't required.

Will my YouTube account get banned?

Vidacity authenticates the same way the YouTube website does, via cookies captured from an in-app WKWebView. There is no public Google API key, no automation that simulates human input, no scraping at a rate above normal browsing. We have no evidence of bans, but YouTube can change their policy at any time. Sign in with caution and use a secondary account if you want to be safe.

Does Vidacity work on iPad?

Yes. Vidacity is a universal app. iPhone and iPad share the same binary. The layout adapts to wider screens and the popup player remains pinned above the tab bar on both.

Does it work on Mac?

Yes, via Apple's "Designed for iPad" runtime on Apple Silicon Macs (M1 and newer). Just pick the Mac destination in Xcode and run. There are extra keyboard shortcuts and a menu-bar Reveal-in-Finder integration for the Mac runtime. Mac Catalyst is not currently supported because Vidacity depends on iOS-only Python and FFmpeg slices.

Why does the app expire after 7 days?

That's an Apple-imposed restriction on free Apple Developer accounts, not something Vidacity controls. Free-signed provisioning profiles are valid for 7 days. Tools like AltStore can auto-resign and re-install in the background to make the limit invisible. With a paid $99/year developer account the certificate is valid for a full year.

Can I sign in with my YouTube account?

Yes. The Library tab presents a "Sign in to YouTube" button that opens the real YouTube login inside an in-app WebView. Once you complete sign-in, Vidacity captures the session cookies, stores them in the iOS Keychain (never on disk or in any log), and uses them to fetch your subscriptions, history, playlists, liked videos, and Watch Later. Sign out wipes the Keychain immediately.

What formats can I download?

Whatever yt-dlp exposes for the source video. The Preview screen lets you pick a video format (resolution and codec, typically up to 1080p or higher when YouTube serves it) and an audio format separately, with optional on-device transcoding to H.264 for Apple-friendly playback and to MP3 for audio-only saves. Conversion runs in-process via FFmpeg with no network round trip.

Is Vidacity on the App Store?

No. Vidacity is for personal use, sideload, or TestFlight distribution only. Apple's App Store guidelines (specifically rule 5.2.3) prohibit unofficial YouTube clients, so a public App Store release isn't possible. Build from source via Xcode or get a TestFlight invite from a maintainer.

What is the best free YouTube app for iPhone without ads?

Vidacity is the leading free, open-source YouTube client for iPhone that plays videos without any ads. Unlike YouTube Premium (which costs $13.99/month) it has no subscription, no in-app purchases, and no tracking. Background audio, Picture-in-Picture, AirPlay, offline downloads and YouTube account sign-in all work, and it's fully native SwiftUI rather than a web wrapper.

How do I watch YouTube without ads on iPhone for free?

Install Vidacity on your iPhone via Xcode and a free Apple ID. Because Vidacity uses YouTubeKit (a cookie-based YouTube data layer that doesn't request ads in its API calls), every video plays ad-free by default. No content blocker, VPN, or jailbreak is required, and there's no subscription cost.

How do I download YouTube videos to my iPhone for free?

Open Vidacity, tap the Link tab, paste the YouTube video URL, tap Fetch, then tap Download on the Preview screen. The video saves to the Downloads tab as a local MP4, playable offline with no time limit. Up to 1080p and higher is available wherever YouTube serves it. The same flow works for Instagram, TikTok, X (formerly Twitter), Vimeo, SoundCloud, Reddit, Twitch and roughly 2,000 other sites.

How do I download Instagram reels on iPhone?

Tap Share on the reel in Instagram and choose Copy link. Open Vidacity, switch to the Link tab and paste the URL. Tap Fetch then Download. The reel saves as MP4 to the Downloads tab and can be played offline. You do not need an Instagram account to watch the saved file.

How do I download TikTok videos without watermark on iPhone?

Copy the TikTok video link from the Share menu. Paste it into the Link tab in Vidacity and tap Fetch. yt-dlp pulls the underlying source MP4, which on TikTok is usually the watermark-free original. Tap Download to save it locally.

Does Vidacity require jailbreak?

No. Vidacity does not require a jailbroken iPhone. It installs through standard Apple sideload tooling: Xcode on a Mac, or AltStore for ongoing wireless re-signing. Your iPhone stays fully stock and you keep system updates.

Ready to try it?

The whole project lives on GitHub. Star it, fork it, file issues, send PRs. It's a hobby project that lives off contributions.

View on GitHub → Installation guide