Pear Desktop Download for Windows, macOS & Linux

What Pear Desktop is

Pear Desktop is a community-built desktop client for YouTube Music. Instead of loading the website in a browser, it runs the service in its own window and layers desktop behaviour on top: media keys, a system tray, notifications and offline-friendly download handling.

The project lives at pear-devs/pear-desktop and has around 33.8k stars, making it the most widely used option for this use case. It is MIT licensed, so the code is open and the builds are free.

Best for

• People who pay for or use YouTube Music and want it in a proper desktop window.
• Users who want built-in ad-blocking rather than maintaining a separate blocker for a browser tab.
• Listeners who like the plugin ecosystem and want to add features without switching apps.
• Anyone who wants the same client on Windows, macOS and Linux with matching behaviour.

Key features

• Ad-blocking built into the client, on by default.
• A built-in downloader for saving media you are entitled to keep offline.
• Dozens of built-in plugins covering playback, interface tweaks and shortcuts.
• Native media key support and a system tray controller.
• An updater that pulls new versions from the official release channel.

Platforms & requirements

Windows users get a 64-bit installer of 274.0 MB. macOS gets separate Apple Silicon and Intel disk images at 118.4 MB and 119.3 MB. Linux ships a Debian package of 105.8 MB and an AppImage of 135.3 MB.

The current Pear Desktop release is v3.12.0. Because the client tracks the YouTube Music web interface, a recent operating system and a reasonably current browser engine inside the app matter. Expect occasional updates when the upstream service changes its markup.

How to install Pear Desktop safely

• Download installers only from the pear-devs GitHub release page.
• Match the file to your architecture; on Apple Silicon prefer the arm64 disk image over the Intel one.
• On Windows, verify the installer is signed before running it.
• On macOS, drag the app from the disk image to Applications and launch it from there.
• On Linux, install the Debian package or make the AppImage executable and run it.
• Do not install modified builds from video tutorials or file-sharing sites; they often ship extra payloads.

Limits to know

• This page is about a desktop client for the YouTube Music service. It is not a video-to-audio conversion tool and MP3hub does not publish conversion pages.
• Ad-blocking can break temporarily whenever the upstream service changes how it serves advertisements; fixes arrive as app updates.
• Plugins are community-maintained, so a plugin can fall behind after a major client release.
• The client follows the web interface, so a service-side redesign can affect the layout until the project catches up.

Alternatives to compare

If you want the same YouTube Music experience on a phone, Metrolist is the Android counterpart, and Spotube covers the Spotify side with a free account.

Each has a dedicated page on MP3hub with its own verified release assets, so you can compare platforms and download sizes before choosing.