YouTube Video to Audio is only for a public video you may save
Get the audio from a YouTube link you have rights to, without keeping the picture.
The public video is resolved and the audio is saved.
The link leaves your browser
Do not use this for music you do not have a license to download. If the download fails, the video may be restricted.
Details are in the privacy policy.
Why YouTube Video to Audio is its own job
YouTube Video to Audio sits on this site because YouTube and Audio are not interchangeable, even when they look similar in a file list. Get the audio from a YouTube link you have rights to, without keeping the picture. Use it only for a video you own, recorded, or have permission to download. Use the general audio tool when you know the player and you need to choose the target yourself.
The public video is resolved and the audio is saved.
The YouTube file you already have
A YouTube link points at a public video. It is not a file on your computer until a tool fetches it. Private, live, members-only, and age-restricted videos fail. YouTube also blocks third-party access without notice.
You are not uploading your own file. The link is sent to the server so the stream can be fetched, and the download is not kept as a library.
What a Audio result is for
The download has to be Audio, because that is the format the next step named. Use the general audio tool when you know the player and you need to choose the target yourself. MP3, WAV, AAC, OGG, FLAC, AIFF, Opus, and M4A are available after the converter loads once.
Convert only audio you have the right to use. The first run downloads the converter.
How to tell that YouTube Video to Audio worked
YouTube Video to Audio is worth using only when Audio is what the next step actually named. Get the audio from a YouTube link you have rights to, without keeping the picture. What you get from YouTube Video to Audio: The public video is resolved and the audio is saved. Before you trust it: Do not use this for music you do not have a license to download. If the download fails, the video may be restricted. The link is sent to the server so a public stream can be fetched. The download is not kept. Most other tools on this site never upload the file. A second pass rarely helps. If the first Audio file is rejected, read the error from the program that rejected it. Another conversion of a bad result usually makes the file worse, not more compatible. When you are done, you should still have the YouTube original and one Audio download that you have opened. If those two are the same kind of failure, this was the wrong tool and the page above is the place that says so. YouTube Video to Audio is only for a public video you are allowed to save. Private, live, members-only, and age-restricted links fail, and YouTube can block a fetch that worked last month. The link is sent so the stream can be fetched. The file is not kept. Copyright still applies even when the download succeeds.
Here is the decision for YouTube Video to Audio. You start with YouTube and you stop when a real program accepts Audio. A public watch, Shorts, or youtu.be link can be saved as audio or video when YouTube allows the fetch. A named pair such as WAV to MP3 is clearer when you already know both formats. Lossy to lossless does not improve the take. If those two sentences describe a tradeoff you do not want, do not convert. Renaming the extension by hand will not do this job. Running the tool twice on its own output will not do it either.
Do not use this for music you do not have a license to download. If the download fails, the video may be restricted.
A related step, if you still need one, is YouTube to MP3.
Other jobs start from the homepage, where each tool is named for the conversion it actually does.