Dec. 31, 2012 Note - Thanks so much for clicking on this post. It's a couple of years old now, so I feel I owe it to you - and hundreds of others who view it every day - to tell you there's a much faster and cleaner way to download video directly to your iPad. The trick is a wonderful browser app called iCab Mobile. Use that browser to go to YouTube and search for the video you want. Once you find it, click play, let it run for a few seconds, then press and hold your finger on the video itself. You'll see a download button pop up. Hit that and your download starts automatically. When it finishes it will be much higher resolution that you'll ever get from the Dropbox method I describe below. You also have a choice to let that video reside within iCab Mobile or download it to your Camera Roll. If you need a few more instructions please see the reference to this browser in my post Cool stuff I learned over the summer on social media.
You can download video directly to your iPad over wi-fi or 3G without using iTunes. The trick is to first upload video to your Dropbox account on your desktop or laptop, then favorite it in the free Dropbox for iPad app.
The simple act of favouriting in Dropbox for iPad begins a download process you barely notice. Somehow your vid is saved directly to the iPad in no time flat.
So if you want to pull a YouTube video down to your iPad:
- Go to Keepvid on your desktop and save your video as an mp4.
- Upload to your Dropbox account.
- Download the free Dropbox for iPad app.
- Find your video on the iPad app and favorite it.
The Thanksgiving video above was the first one I download with this method. It took five minutes to upload to Dropbox on my laptop over wi-fi, but almost nothing to download to my iPad after clicking star in Dropbox for iPad.
Still scratching my head over how fast this works.
