Problem

An online course platform hosted its videos on a well-known video streaming service that split content into multiple 3-second segments to prevent users from downloading the entire file. While this ensured smoother streaming, it also made it nearly impossible to access the complete video offline without playing it in real time.

Solution

By analyzing the network requests made while the video was playing, I discovered that the streaming service still relied on a master source file containing the sequence and location of all segments. If accessed directly, this file could point to the complete high-quality video source, allowing it to be downloaded as one piece instead of hundreds of tiny fragments.

Implementation

  1. Used Chrome DevTools → Opened the Network tab while the video played.

  2. Filtered Requests → Searched for source file there.

  3. Identified the Master Playlist → This file contained the entire sequence of video segments and their quality variants.

  4. Wrote a Custom Script → Using Python, I passed the playlist URL to download and merge all segments automatically into a single MP4 file.

  5. Tested and Optimized → Verified that the downloaded file matched the original streaming quality without data loss.

Get in touch with me to get the source file name and python code.

Result

  • Successfully bypassed the segmented streaming limitation, obtaining the complete video file in one download.

  • Created a repeatable workflow to replicate the process for other videos on the same platform.

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