Downloading – A Basic Guide

Are all the files on the Internet Archive downloadable?

No, not all files are downloadable.

There are access restricted items such as books in the lending program and some other collections, as well as some file formats in items to allow other files to be downloaded.

If an item is downloadable, there will a DOWNLOAD OPTIONS box on the right of the page that looks similar to this example.

How do I download an item such as an image?

1. To download, go to the DOWNLOAD OPTIONS section on the right side of a page.

2.  Select your preferred Download Option and click on the download icon.

3.  Once downloaded, save the item to your preferred location.

How do I download an item that has many files in just one format? For example, all the chapters in an audiobook.

1.  Select your preferred DOWNLOAD OPTION

2.  Select the download icon Download_icon.GIF to download all the files for that option.

If there are multiple files in that format, you will be prompted to download a zip file containing all the files.

If there is only one file in that format it will either open in your browser (a pdf for example) or download it if it’s a format that does not render in your browser (such as ePuB).

3.  You can also download all the originals and metadata or all the files available to download by clicking on one of the links at the bottom of the DOWNLOAD OPTIONS section. In the example below, it’s: 110 Files or 24 Originals.

You will be prompted to download a zip file containing all the files in your selection. (Files or Original)

How do I download one file? For example, one chapter from an audiobook?

1.  Select SHOW ALL at the bottom of the DOWNLOAD OPTIONS box.

2.  Select the single file that you would like to download.

3.  You can listen or view to the selected file in your browser, or you can download it. Just follow the screenshots below.

Press play to listen.

To download, select the 

Click Download

How do I bulk download?

At this time, there are two methods to do bulk downloading. Both require some comfort working in a Unix environment:

wget – please see http://blog.archive.org/2012/04/26/downloading-in-bulk-using-wget for guidance

Internet Archive Command-line Tool – The Internet Archive has created a python wrapper useful for many functions including bulk download. It can be found at: https://github.com/jjjake/internetarchive