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livestreams
rDownloader records livestreams through the external tool streamlink, writing .ts segments.
Recordings use their own runner slots and never block ordinary downloads.
The Streams view (sidebar, or 3) holds the channel list. Settings are under Settings → Media → Streams.
streamlink is not bundled with the native builds — see
External tools. The Docker image contains it.
The quickest route: give a URL and record it immediately, one time. No channel entry is created.
A channel is a persistent entry with:
- the stream URL,
- a display name,
- a quality —
best,1080p,720p, or a custom Streamlink selector, - a destination category,
- an enabled state.
An enabled channel is monitored automatically and recording starts as soon as it goes live. At most one recording per channel runs at a time. The row shows the error status and the timestamp of the last live detection, and probing backs off after repeated failures.
Package and file names are timestamped.
A channel that only streams to signed-in viewers is watched and recorded with the
authentication profile approved for its site:
the probe, the recording and the thumbnail carry the site's cookies, handed to streamlink as a
private file that is removed afterwards, never on its command line. This needs streamlink 8.2 or
later, the oldest version rDownloader records with at all.
A channel can carry recurring weekly windows or a one-off event time, each with a configurable pre-roll and post-roll for broadcasts that start early or overrun.
- A channel with a schedule is watched only inside its windows.
- A channel without one is polled continuously.
- Record now works alongside either.
Duplicate on a schedule makes a copy and opens it in the form. Deleting a schedule — like deleting a channel — asks first; recordings already made are kept.
A window keeps its local time across daylight saving:
- The repeated hour when clocks go back yields one occurrence.
- The skipped hour when clocks go forward yields none — not a shifted one.
Restarts never produce a second recording of one broadcast.
A window that closed without the channel going live — including while the service was stopped — is recorded as a missed recording, which is visible, rather than as nothing at all.
Where the provider exposes a replay window, recording can start from the beginning of the stream rather than from the moment you noticed it. The recording records whether replay was actually used.
A recording is a sequence of segments, not one long file:
- A dropped connection ends one segment; the recording continues in the next. Nothing already written is discarded.
- After a crash the recording still knows where its gaps are.
- Reconnects are bounded: a stream that has ended looks exactly like one that dropped, so rDownloader eventually stops trying.
Long recordings can be split by elapsed time or by size. A deliberate split and a disconnect produce the same file boundary but are recorded differently: only a disconnect counts as a gap. Segment names are zero-padded so they sort in recording order.
Completed recordings can be joined into MKV or MP4 as a post-processing step, by stream copy rather than a re-encode. It resumes after a restart, and the segments are removed only once the joined file exists and is non-empty.
Metadata and thumbnail sidecars are named after the recording.
A sidecar that was requested but is unavailable records why. Subtitles and live chat are not supported.
Settings → Media → Streams:
| Setting | Default |
|---|---|
| Check interval | 120 seconds (60–3600) |
| Parallel recordings | 2 (1–8) |
| Quality | best |
The path to streamlink is under Settings → Tools → Paths; empty means the vendor folder, then PATH.
The Streams view can export its channels to a file and read them back on another installation. The file references categories by name and carries no credentials.
Settings → Tools → Status shows the version streamlink reported and a verdict — Supported, Too
old, Known bad or Version unknown. A tool that is behind blocks only the capabilities it is
named for. rDownloader can also download and activate verified versions itself; this is off
unless you switch it on. See External tools.
Settings → Services → Stream recordings. Matching links are refused at intake and anything queued moves to Blocked.
- Video and audio downloads — a live HLS manifest is routed here
- The download queue
- Post-processing — joining segments
- External tools