Free Dvd Conversion Software For Mac

MakeMKV is a DVD ripper tool with a combination of both freeware and shareware. It provides free functionality to open DVD discs. Features: Reads DVD and Blu-ray discs. Preserves chapters information. This is one of the best DVD rippers for Mac that offers software for conversion or decryption.

This is an updated list of 2021 best free DVD rippers for MacOS (Big Sur incl.). You can free download any free DVD ripping software for macOS and rip DVDs on Mac freely as per the detailed steps here.

The advent of Netflix, Disney+, and Apple TV+ changes the way of home entertaining from physical media to digital video. So the internet is abuzz with views of physical discs heading for the graveyard, especially when Apple and Microsoft gradually phased out DVD drives from Mac and Windows. Ah, there is a U-turn. You can revive your movie library by digitizing them with the help of a DVD ripper for Mac.

1. Free Download Free Download. Pavtube Free DVD Creator for Mac. This software is available in both free and paid versions. However, the free version is also capable of converting MKV videos to DVD just as easily as the paid version.
2. Free and Safe DVD Ripping Software for Mac. Free DVD Ripper helps Mac users rip and convert unencrypted DVDs to common video/audio formats, like MP4, MOV, M4V, AVI, WMV, MKV, FLV, MP3, etc. After that, you are enabled to playback, edit, backup or share DVD files easily.

Ideally, a good DVD ripper can extract digital files from DVDs to hard drive in such a way to free up space in your room and protect cherished discs against scratch or damage. It further extends the viewing option to your Macbook, iMac, iPhone, iPad, or any other media players. Therefore, you won't drop the DVD in the disc drive, download an MPEG2 decoder, or take along the bulky DVDs any more. For that reason, we handpicked a list of 10 best free DVD ripper software for Mac, at no cost at all. Keep reading.

Download Best yet 100% Free DVD Ripper for Mac

MacX DVD Ripper Free - Convert any DVD without a Hitch! [Most Recommended by Users]

• Copy and digitize any DVD to MP4, MKV, MOV, H.264, HEVC, ISO, etc.
• Convert DVD content for playing on Mac, Hard drive, TV and mobile devices.
• Unique! Support any new DVDs, 99-title DVDs, damaged DVDs, etc.
• Hardware acceleration supported: It takes 5 mins Only to rip a full DVD with original quality.

Top 10 List of Free DVD Rippers for Mac

What Is the Best DVD Ripper for Mac

There are plenty of free DVD ripping software for Mac, which claims to rip any DVDs to any formats, say DVD to MP4, MOV, MPEG, H.264, etc. But most often, you endure a whole day long sitting aside your Macbook, trying to get the contents off DVDs yet find it crashes constantly, makes scratching high frequency sounds, gets choppy video on output, or keeps giving messages like no valid source found, etc. Therefore, you shall take 'something' into consideration prior to download a free Mac DVD ripping software. Here are the 5 decisive criteria that make up the best one.

macOS Compatibility: macOS Big Sur and M1 Macs weed out 32-bit apps, causing many non-Apple apps incl. DVD rippers hang at launch. So make sure you download a 64-bit DVD ripper on Mac if you've upgraded to Catalina and Big Sur.

Fast Speed: Some DVD converters rely on CPU while some others can accelerate the speed twice or more with GPU's concurrent computing. If you have hundreds of DVDs to be digitized, choose a DVD ripper with GPU acceleration enabled.

High Quality: DVD transcoding involves in codec compression that leads to quality degradation inevitably. Good DVD ripping software manages to create high-quality movie file with almost imperceptible loss of quality (preferably the bitrate is around 1500kbps), by virtue of advanced video transcoding kernel.

Ease to Use: Great tools will feature intuitive interface, with features that are clearly marked and locally placed, leaving little room for guesswork. Preferably, Mac users can go DVD to digital process within 3 clicks, regardless of the computer skills.

DVD decrypting ability: DVD studios adopt copy protection schemes, incl. well-known CSS and region code, to prevent illegal redistribution of commercial DVDs. When facing with the schemes, free DVD rippers no longer hold water but end up with errors like halfway encoding, unwatchable rips, etc. Click to see the complete DVD ripping errors & fixes >>

So the ability to defeat encryption codes is a key factor to consider when searching for a good DVD ripping software for Mac.

No.1 - MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition

MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition is a free DVD for Mac (macOS Big Sur) that offers excellent DVD ripping performance. What makes it the top way to rip a DVD on Mac is its ability to read DRM-protected discs. It supports almost all the common and latest encryption schemes on the market, including CSS, Region Code, RCE, ARccOS, Disney X-Project DRM, etc. No third-party tools or extra actions required.

It can freely convert DVDs to HEVC, MOV, M4V, H.264, MKV, AVI, ISO, any other formats you need. With just clicks, you can watch DVD movies on QuickTime, iPhone, iPad, iTunes, Apple TV, other mobiles, TVs, or save DVDs on SSD, NAS, USB, cloud storage. There is a full range of basic editing features to let you cut, crop, merge, add subtitles, etc. 4 unique DVD backup modes are provided for those who want to save a lossless DVD copy.

With GPU acceleration, hyper-threading, and multi-core CPU techs, ripping DVD on Mac is super fast. On a newer MacBook or iMac, it's able to rip a full DVD to MP4 in 5-10 minutes. That's about 300% the speed of Handbrake. The High-quality engine and De-interlacing engine are built-in to produce remarkably high quality.

Free download the DVD ripper on Mac >>
Free download the DVD ripper on Windows >>

No.2 - iSuper DVD Ripper

iSuper DVD Ripper is a useful tool to convert homemade DVDs on MacBook Pro, Air, iMac. It's safe and free to download from the Mac App Store. You can use it to rip non-protected DVDs to MP4, MOV, AVI, WMV, MKV, FLV, M4V, HD MP4, HD AVI, HD MKV, HD WMV, and extract the DVD audio in MP3, AAC, WMA, etc.

For un-encrypted DVDs, iSuper DVD Ripper is very helpful to extract the contents from the disc, add some simple video effects, and convert to different output formats. If you want more features to, for example, rip DVDs with copy protections or make an intact copy of DVD in ISO image or DVD folder, you will need to purchase its upgrade version at $26.25.

How do I rip a DVD to my Mac for free?

1. To rip DVD on Mac with iSuper DVD Ripper, download it from the Mac App Store. It may require your Apple ID or tough ID to finish the download. Then start the free ripper.
2. Insert the disc to the Mac drive or an external disc drive, click the Load Disc button on the top to import the disc.
3. Select the DVD chapter you want to rip and click on the menu profile to select an output format.
4. You can crop, edit, adjust the video settings if needed. Once finished, select an output folder on your Mac and click the Convert button to start ripping the DVD on Mac.

No.3 - HandBrake

Handbrake is an open-source DVD ripper for Mac, Windows, and Linux. It can freely convert DVD to MP4 and MKV in H.265, H.264, H.265 MPEG-4 and MPEG-2, VP8, VP9, and Theora. There are several profiles for Apple, Android, Roku, PSP, Xbox, Web, etc. Handbrake only rips DVD that is homemade or unprotected. It cannot rip commercial DVDs without third party-tool like VLC or DVD decrypter, not to mention the Disney newer protections.

Handbrake is one of the best free choices to rip a DVD to MP4 on Mac. Why? Because it supports AMD VCE, Apple VideoToolbox, Intel Quick Sync Video, and NVIDIA NVENC GPU acceleration for H.264/HEVC encoding. Generally, Handbrake auto enables HW acceleration for DVD ripping tasks and switches to pass 2 for better encoding. That means Handbrake will rip DVDs to MP4 fast on a Macbook or iMac equipped with a powerful video card.

How do I use Handbrake to rip a DVD on a Mac?

1. Go to its official site to download and install the freeware. Handbrake works with Mac OS X 10.12 to Big Sur.
2. Insert DVD disc into Mac's DVD drive and run Handbrake. Click the Source button to load the DVD. To rip protected DVDs, download libdvdcss on Mac to remove the CSS.
3. Click 'Browse' to set where you want to save the output files. Then click 'Presets' and select an output format.
4. What's the best setting for Handbrake ripping a DVD? Unless you aim for a target filesize or speed, we recommend you use Constant Quality with an RF of ~21, Contant Frame Rate, Very Slow encode speed, High Encoder Profile, and 3.1 Encoder Level.
5. Apply other filters if needed. Once finished, click 'RUN' to rip DVDs for free on Mac now.

Tutorial: download Handbrake for Mac to rip DVD movies >>

No.4 - MakeMKV

To rip protected DVDs on Mac for free, MakeMKV is among the top solutions. It's an easy free DVD/Blu-ray ripper for Mac, Windows, and Linux to free rip DVD to MKV format. MakeMKV remuxes the movie content from DVD MPEG2 to MKV without affecting the quality, reserving all video/audio tracks and subtitles with meta-information. That also means the whole DVD to MKV converting is pretty fast. Therefore, MakeMKV is your premium choice to backup and store your movie contents on your hard drive, NAS or USB.

However, the output MKV files tend to be really big in size. Normally, a converted DVD movie takes 6 GB on the hard drive and a Blu-ray movie takes 30 GB. This is not good especially when you import the DVD movie into iPhone, iPad, devices with limited storage. In addition, don't expect the ability to customize the DVD video.

How do I rip a DVD on Mac with MakeMKV?

1. Free download MakeMKV on Mac. It's completely free to rip a DVD disc to Mac during the beta-testing phase, and if you want to decrypt Blu-Ray disc, you will need to pay $50.
2. Open the software and insert the disk. It accepts both DVD and Blu-Ray discs. Then click 'Open Disc' to load in the information.
3. MakeMKV will scan and identify the titles correctly and pop up a list of disk chapters. Choose the chapter, normally the longest and biggest title.
4. Select a folder on Mac to save the output MKV files and click 'Make MKV'. It shows a fast DVD to digital processing speed on Mac, with an average of 30 minutes to rip Blu-ray disc. The output MKV keeps high video and audio quality, but MKV file is enormous (6.73GB MKV file for a 7.84GB DVD in our test).

No.5 - VLC

Among the many ways to rip a DVD on a MacBook Pro, Air, or iMac, there is no doubt the easiest one. Whether you're on Mac, Windows, Mac, Linux, and even mobiles, chance that you have VLC player installed on your system. VLC is not the most powerful DVD ripper for Mac, but it can get the job done. It offers a handy option to convert DVDs to H.264, H.265, MPEG-1/2, MPEG-4, DIVX, H.263, VP8, WMV, MJPEG, Theora, and Dirac.

Like Handbrake, VLC itself supports homemade DVDs only. The good news is that you can use the extra library to decode a protected DVD with VLC. On Mac computer running El Capitan and later, you need to open the Terminal window by hitting Command + Space keys and execute the command brew install libdvdcss to download and install the library (http://download.videolan.org/pub/libdvdcss/1.2.11/macosx/libdvdcss.pkg).

How do I rip a DVD on Mac with VLC?

1. Free download VLC on Mac if you haven't installed it. It works on Mac OS X 10.7.5 or later.
2. Insert the DVD to Mac and open VLC. On the top menu bar, click File and select Open Disc. It has no problem loading any non-protected DVDs. For commercial DVDs, you need to download libdvdcss, or it'll keep recording the menu video repeatedly.
3. At the bottom left corner, check the box forStream output and click the Setting button.
4. First, click Browse and a window will pop up to let you name the converted DVD and select an output folder on Mac to save it. Next, open the drop-down menu at the Encapsulation Method and choose an output format. You can rip DVD to QuickTime for Mac. Below are some basic options for video and audio settings.
5. Then click Open to convert DVD on Mac with VLC. See the detailed guide on ripping DVD with VLC on Mac.

No.6 - MacTheRipper

MacTheRipper, also called for MTR, has long been a popular tool that helps Mac users to create backup copies of DVDs. It has many versions, and MacTheRipper V2.6.6, V3, and V4 are the most downloaded versions. You should note that only Version 2.6.6 and earlier is free and supports protected DVDs (UOPs, ARccOS, RCE, CSS, APS, etc.). But it doesn't work on Mac OS X newer than Snow Leopard. You need to send gift on its official forum for a license to use MacTheRipper 3.0 and MacTheRipper 4.1.

There are 3 modes provided to rip DVDs on Mac: Auto Full Disc Extraction mode, Auto Full Disc ISO Extraction mode, and Full Disc Rip And Rebuild mode. You can't use it to convert a DVD for QuickTime, Apple TV, iPad, iPhone, other devices as it only extracts DVD and won't convert DVD to video. It's the best choice to save a DVD backup copy on Mac hard drive for later burning.

How do I rip a DVD on Mac with MTR?

1. Download the latest version of MactheRipper on your Mac, install it for ripping DVD on Mac.
2. Insert your DVD disc into your Mac and launch the Mac The Ripper application.
3. MTR will detect and scan titles in the disc. If RCE Region Protection was detected, it will ask you to modify the 'RCE Region' number. The RCE Region should be set to the region the DVD was purchased in. For example, the US is Region 1, while Europe is Region 2.
4. Click Extract to starting ripping DVD on Mac with MacTheRipper. The converted DVD will be saved as a folder on Mac.

No.7 - FFmpeg

FFmpeg is a powerful, free and open-source command-based project used to handling videos, including ripping DVDs on Mac. FFmpeg supports most video formats, from the most obscure ancient formats up to the latest ones. The libavcodec, libavutil, libavformat, libavfilter, libavdevice, libswscale and libswresample libraries contained in it can satisfy any needs when ripping a DVD on Mac.

However, the command lines require a steep learning curve, making FFmpeg an unfriendly choice for beginners. For advanced users, you can simply brew install ffmpeg GUI on your Mac, input a command line to do many flexible tasks. For example, to rip a DVD with FFmpeg, browse for the DVD files in the Finder and get the .vob file name you want to convert in the VIDEO_TS folder:

To rip DVD to MP4:
ffmpeg -i concat:VTS_02_1.VOB|VTS_02_2.VOB|VTS_02_3.VOB|VTS_02_4.VOB|VTS_02_5.VOB -map 0:v:0 -map 0:a:0 -codec:a libvo_aacenc -ab 128 -codec:v libx264 -vpre libx264-ipod640 movie.mp4

To rip DVD to H.265:
ffmpeg -i 'concat:VTS_01_1.VOB|VTS_01_2.VOB' -vcodec libx265 new-video-h265.mp4

No.8 - Cisdem Video Converter

Cisdem Video Converter for Mac, though not free, is an all-in-one solution for various audio and video processing operations. It has a strong DVD ripper built-in to rip both homemade and protected DVDs. Most encryptions currently applied on discs are supported, including CSS, region code, RCE, RPC, UOP, and more. Simply load any disc, you can rip it to MP4, MKV, MOV, H.265 MP4, H.264 MKV, and etc. More than that, 300+ ready profiles for Apple devices, Android devices, TVs, etc. are here to make things easier.

The overall DVD ripping speed on Mac is fast with its advanced accelerating tech. You can further adjust the video parameters like resolution, frame rate, aspect ratio, etc. to get the best output quality. However, it won't let you copy DVD intactly to formats like ISO image. Therefore, it can hardly reserve 100% output quality.

No.9 - DVDFab DVD Ripper

DVDFab DVD Ripper for Mac has free and paid versions. With the free version, you're allowed to rip DVDs to MKV and MP4 at 480P only. Don't expect ripping the DVD at a satisfactory speed, as the free version relies on the CPU for encoding. You may also find that newer DVDs are not supported. But if you upgrade to its paid version at $84.99, you will get a far more comprehensive Mac DVD ripping solution.

The paid version is updated with the latest encryptions. Here, you can find almost all the possible output formats or specific devices you may need. You'll have full control over settings for frame rate, output resolution, video, and audio bitrates, audio sample rate, image cropping, and many more. The DVD ripping is GPU accelerated to offer a fast conversion speed. The best part is, its unique Enlarger AI (sold separately) can be applied to upscale the DVD video from 480P to 1080P with high quality.

No.10 - Any Video Converter Ultimate

Any Video Converter Ultimate lets you rip DVD, convert videos, record screen, burn DVD, and download videos. After downloading it on Mac running on Mac OS X from 10.7 to 10.15, you can easily convert DVDs to MP4, M4V, AVI, WMV, MOV, WMA, MP3, and 200+ other formats. If you need to extract the CD music to a playable audio file, it also helps. With GPU acceleration, you don't need to worry about the ripping speed.

However, before you download the DVD ripper on Mac, there are things to note. The biggest drawback of it is the lack of support for ripping protected DVDs. To remove the DVD encryptions, you will need to download another program called DVDSmith Movie Backup. This free program can help AVC deal with encrypted discs. But it's available for Windows only. Also, avoid it if you want one click to convert DVDs to the latest devices.

How Do I Rip a DVD to My Mac for Free

The above-mentioned Mac DVD rippers are equally matched. What matter most is whether the program fits your bill. For a quality-loss DVD ripping, MakeMKV and Mac The Ripper are second to none. But if you have hundreds of discs and want to have your entire DVD library backed up onto hard drive at fast speed without exhausting your storage space, MacX DVD ripper, Handbrake, VLC, iSuper DVD Ripper are your good options.

While if the last thing you want to do is to end up with errors just because the new title comes with tricky protection scheme or the DVD is formatted unnaturally, the ultimate choice is to download MacX DVD Ripper, which not only features great DVD decryption ability, but also comes with unique level-3 hardware acceleration tech that can speed up the whole process and maintain good balance between quality and size.

You can follow the tutorial below and learn how to rip a DVD on a Mac using MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition with best balance in speed, qulaity and size.

Step 1: Insert DVD into your Mac drive

Prior to the ripping, make sure to spare some space to save the final rip. Then free download the DVD ripper on your Mac and insert your disc. Run the software and click 'Add DVD' button to load the disc. You can also convert DVD folder or ISO image to a digital format.

MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition will easily find the accurate main title. For DVDs with tough protections, MacXDVD's unique title check mechanism and DVD analysis algorithm automatically scan the title, crack severely protected DVDs and smooth the ripping process.

Free download the DVD ripper on Mac >>
Free download the DVD ripper on Windows >>

Step 2: Choose the output format

The Mac specific library also offers diversified options, ranging from back up DVD to ISO image, MKV, MPG, to convert DVD to Apple, Android, TVs, Web. Here are the further suggestions:

• To view DVD on players, phones, tablets, TVs, or so, choose digital format MP4 H.264 for better compatibility, quality and smaller file siz. With no further tweaking, it achieves an H.264 file with crisp picture.
• To play DVD on newer iPhones or iPads running on iOS 11/12, choose digital format MP4 HEVC for higher quality and smaller space.
• To save an original copy with menus and extras, copy DVD to ISO image. The disc image contains the whole data of the disc at 1:1 ratio for later burning but ha s less compatibility with media players and devices.

You can also enable the editing features, available for you to cut the commercials, merge the useful parts, add subtitles to the movie rip, etc.

Step 3: Start ripping the DVD on Mac

Click Browse button to specify the output folder and press RUN to begin DVD ripping. Just leave the rest to the DVD ripper. It will finish the process quickly.

Optional: Transfer Ripped Movies to iPad or iPhone.

After the DVD ripping, you can use Finder to transfer the ripped file to your phone or tablet. Connect your iPhone or iPad to your Mac using a USB or Wi-Fi connection. Select the device in the Finder sidebar > Movies > check the box “Sync movies onto [device name]”> choose the movie you want to sync > click Apple. Or you can rely on third-party data transfer software such as MacX MediaTrans for help.

Performance Test:

MacXDVD's ripping performance is impressive on an iMac 5K (3.2 GHz Intel Core i5, AMD Radeon R9 M380, 2048MB, on Big Sur). We tested several titles, including the classic Star Trek, and new releases Frozen 2, Venon, Incredible 2. It did a great job selecting the right title. While Handbrake, VLC or other free Mac DVD rippers, though with the help of third-party tool like libdvdcss, either popped up error message, quitted unexpectedly, or produced problematic rips.

The conversion frequency of MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition reached averagely 240 fps, twice as high as that of Handbrake. It took 12 minutes to convert the full-length Frozen 2 DVD to MP4, while we could still view web pages and do other tasks since the CPU usage remains as low as 131-134%. Bear in mind, DVD encoding speed is greatly dependant on your computer configuration. Higher config will lead to great performance.

As to the quality, MacXDVD repackages the movie content from DVD MPEG2 to MKV, which doesn't affect the output quality at all while preserving all video, audio and subtitle tracks. We also tested the DVD transcoding feature, which is known to lead to some quality loss inevitably. Fortunately, MacXDVD created a small .mp4 file with 720x480 (16:9) in 1.61GB from the 7.84GB DVD, and there wasn't any noticeable change between the source DVD and ripped file, but merely pixel-level difference.

You can definitely download MacX DVD Ripper Mac Free Edition for a try.

FAQ about DVD Ripping

Q1. Is It Legal to Rip DVDs on Mac?

Many users who want to space-shift or format-shirt their legally purchased DVD or Blu-ray discs often concern about the legality of DVD ripping. The fact is, currently it is considered illegal to rip copyrighted DVDs in US, even if you bought the DVDs yourself. Some other countries have already made it legal. In practice, as the DVD conversion happens locally on your computer, you won't get prosecuted or caught if you don't distribute the digital copies. However, you're highly suggested to obey to the law where you live. Check if it's legal to rip copy protected DVDs in your country.

Q2. Can I Rip a DVD to My Mac with Mac Build-in App?

No. The DVD ripping process on Mac doesn't go as simple as burning, which can be achieved with Mac's built-in app like Finder or iDVD. While the former is still out of reach with Mac unless you own a third-party DVD converter software.

This is because almost all DVD movies or TV shows bought or rented are technically copyrighted and DVD rips will inevitably involve in breaking DVD copy protections, e.g. the Content Scramble System. Such action is currently unlawful in the US and UK. Apple is of course unwilling to set against law or money in consideration of continuous cooperation with U.S. studios for iTunes movies. Therefore, there is no built-in method to rip DVD to Mac. This makes it a sense to download a third-party DVD ripper for Mac instead.

Q3. How do I Rip a Protected DVD on a Mac?

For DVDs encoded with CSS or region code, you can install libdvdcss on Mac or windows to crack the DVD copy protection and then rip the DVD with Handbrake or VLC.

Chances are DVDs from major film studios like Disney, Sony, Warner Bros., etc. often impose strong protections on DVDs. These discs are deliberately placed with bad information and hide the true titles. As a result, 99% of DVD rippers for Mac will go awry like DVD won't load, encounter a large number of tracks with the same runtime, show impossibly 40gb or more of data but output just several KB.To rip the severely protected DVDs, the workaround is to resort to MacX DVD ripper that is built in DVD analysis scheme to crack Sony ARccOS, Disney X-project DRM, UOP, 99-titles, and more.

Q4. What Is the Best Format to Rip DVD to Mac?

Apple apps such as Mac's default player QuickTime, Photos, and Keynote work with many video formats, among which MP4 and MOV are well-known with the best compatibility. When digitizing DVD with free DVD ripper for Mac, many users are at a loss whether to choose MP4 or MOV.

* MP4 - Both MP4 and MOV use lossy video compression to sacrifice minimal quality for file size. MP4 is popular for streaming over the internet and playable on Mac, Windows and almost all media players, say VLC, 5KPlayer, QT, etc. But P-frames or B-frames in MP4 makes it difficult to edit.

* MOV - As MOV is originally developed by Apple for its QuickTime player, it's much friendlier in Apple ecosystem. MOV contains one or more tracks, meant to store each type of data including audio, video, subtitle, etc in a hierarchical structure, which is good for editing. So for Mac computers, to convert DVD to digital MOV for Mac QuickTime is more preferred than MP4.

Q5. Is it Prossible to Rip Scratched DVD on Mac?

DVDs are too fragile, that's why we need to backup the DVD collection. If your discs are already damaged or scratched, there are measures to remedy.

• For a bit of stretches on the surface, polish the surface with cotton balls and abrasive white toothpaste or Brasso plolish. You need to polish across the grain and do not in circular direction. This need patience.
• For deep scratches and servere damages, you can take the damaged disk to a local DVD store with a polishing machine or other places like Phoenix to resurface the badly scuffed disc. This will cost for a couple of dollars. Or if the standalone DVD player with error-recovery scheme can ignore the errors and play the DVD, you can capture the movie with a DV. But this will lost the selectable audio, subtitles streams and original menus.

Note: if the program refuses to rip a well-conditioned DVD with an error stating that there is a bad sector, it's because the DVD is protected by a copy protection scheme from Sony named ARccOS. The system deliberately mixes corrupted sectors with the correct one to mislead DVD copying software.

According to a report from The Numbers®, Frozen 2, the top-selling DVD in 2020, reaches up 1.25 million sales in the US, followed by Jumanji: The Next Level (1.09 million) and Joker (0.76 million). Although the desire for physical media has been on the decline with the explosion of streaming media, DVD and Blu-ray still have a significant market share. Last year, more than 16 million people bought or rented home entertainment content, among which 8.8 million people purchased DVDs and Blu-ray discs. And it is estimated that the number might go larger this year due to the coronavirus pandemic and stay-at-home policies.

Since you are landing here, I guess you are a DVD collector with hundreds and thousands of discs and wondering how to relieve the space from shelves of DVDs that you preserve for years or just purchased from Amazon. Apparently, ripping them into digital files would help you a lot as long as you are using the best DVD ripper.

How Does the Best DVD Ripper Benefit DVD Collectors

• Save physical space by ripping DVDs to external hard drive, flash drive, or clouds.
• Protect old and precious DVDs from scratching, rotting, and damaging.
• Watch DVD videos on a bigger projection screen, smart TV, laptop, iPad, mobile phone, etc.
• Share DVD media content online more conveniently.
• Extract materials for video essays and yearly movie compilation editing.
• Recover damaged or unplayable movie DVDs.
• ..

Disclaimer

Before we dive into the DVD ripping software review, we need to address the elephant in the room – DVD copy protection. According to the case Real Networks v. DVD CCA, any use of circumvention tools for infringing purposes is illegal and forbidden, while, to make a personal backup copy of the media content is permissible under some conditions. But note that this differs from country to country. Therefore, go check your local laws before you use these DVD rippers.

1. VideoProc Converter – Best DVD Ripper for Mac and Windows 10

Operating system: Windows 10, 8.1, 8, 7; Mac OS X 10.6 and later

Editor's rating:

As the sibling of the famous DVD ripper WinX DVD Ripper, VideoProc Converter, although born as a video editor and video converter, is also endowed with the same talent of copying and ripping DVD discs. It is competent to rip all old and new DVDs with copy-protections, copy full title to MKV, VIDEO_TS folder, and ISO image file, and convert the ripped DVD video to more than 370+ formats. For tech-savvy users, VideoProc Converter gives you full control over the video resolution, the bitrate, the frame rate, the video codec, and the subtitle track. For beginners, it has well-rounded presets (categorized by output devices and video playback platforms) for you to rip a DVD in minutes.

If you are a senior DVD collector owning thousands of discs but have no idea which software is powerful enough to rip so many DVDs, VideoProc Converter is surely capable of helping you out. By the level 3 hardware acceleration tech, VideoProc Converter rips DVDs in the fastest manner. Since knowing that most DVD owners want the best of the best, it allows you to improve 480P DVDs to HD and modify DVD movies by cutting, cropping, adding subtitles and effects, syncing video and audio, etc.

Pros:

• Workable for both homemade and commercial DVD discs, movies, music, TV shows, workout, and anime DVDs.
• Bypass the region restriction of DVDs and remove copy protection from DVDs including Disney 99-title DVDs.
• Support hardware acceleration and boost DVD ripping up to 47x real-time faster.
• Copy and convert DVD to MP4, FLV, MTS, MKV, AVI, MP3, and any format you want.
• 6 DVD backup options to deliver videos in the original quality.
• Enhance video quality of old, low-reslution, blurry, and slightly scratched DVDs.
• Compress and edit ripped DVD videos to fit smart TV, Facebook, YouTube, iPhone, Android, etc.

Cons:

• Cannot rip Blu-ray discs.

Three Hacks That Make DVD Ripping in VideoProc Converter Never this Easy

#1. If you don't know the type of your DVD file system, just keep the default setting, and VideoProc Converter will detect the right title for you automatically.

#2. Tick the box before NVIDIA/Intel/AMD and select multi-core usage, and you can enjoy real-time faster ripping speed.

#3. Toggle on the Safe Mode, and VideoProc Converter will take care of the whole ripping process and prevent it from stopping accidentally.

2. WinX DVD Ripper Platinum – Powerful DVD Ripper

Operating system: Windows, Mac

Editor's rating:

The next DVD ripper we are going to talk about is WinX DVD Ripper. You must be familiar with this brand if you started using DVD ripper a long time ago. It has set the industry standard for DVD ripping. By its special compatible CSS mechanism, it decrypts Disney X-project DRM, Sony ARccOS Protection, DVD region lock, and user operation prohibition. So it can rip DVD on Windows 10 and Mac without fuss. Another thing makes WinX DVD Ripper Platinum a robust ripper is the tech of hyper-threading and multi-core hardware acceleration (up to 8 cores), which empowers you to rip a full DVD to MP4 H.264 in 5 minutes.

Besides MP4, it can rip DVD to AVI, MPEG, M2TS, and any format accepted by TV, hard drive, laptops, and mobile devices. To keep everything you want, it backs up almost all content in your DVD including all chapters, subtitle track, and tag info. And if necessary, you can do some edits before ripping, like say, trimming, cropping, or adjusting audio volume.

Pros:

• Optimize the file size 80% smaller while keeping the original resolution.
• Remove DRM from Disney, Warner Bros, and Paramount movies.
• 350+ output format options for playing DVD videos on any devices and platforms.
• It offers a free edition for people on a budget.

Cons:

• Cannot rip Blu-ray discs.
• It doesn't support AMD hardware acceleration.

Official website: https://www.winxdvd.com/dvd-ripper-platinum/

3. Format Factory – Free DVD Ripping Software for Windows

Operating system: Windows 10/8/7

Editor's rating:

Format Factory is a powerful multimedia processing tool competent to convert videos, images, and documents. And DVD ripping is just one of its functions. Just as the name suggests, it is compatible with a truly wide array of formats. Besides DVDs, you can use to rip BD, and music CD. In the ROM Device/DVD/CD/ISO option, Format Factory offers 5 ripping utilities for converting DVD to video file, Blu-ray disc to MKV, CD to audio file, DVD/CD to ISO/CSO, and ISO to CSO. You can pick the output format as you like from its format arsenal freely.

Pros:

• It is completely free and safe.
• It reads and keeps all the contents in the DVD, titles, chapters, metadata, etc.
• Compatible with most media formats: MP4, WMV, AVI, 3GP, MP3, AAC, WMA, etc.
• Simple editing tools for video, audio, and image files.

Free Dvd Ripper For Mac 10.6.8

Cons:

• You cannot preview the movie before ripping.
• It can't detect and select the best title automatically.
• Format Factory has no Mac version.
• It tends to take a long time to rip movie DVDs without the help of hardware acceleration.

Official website: http://pcfreetime.com/formatfactory/

4. VidCoder - Open Source DVD Ripper for Windows

Operating system: Windows 10, 8, 7 (64-bit)

Editor's rating:

VidCoder comes in handy if you want to rip DVD or BD to widely supported and playable video formats MP4 and MKV. Like most DVD ripping software, VidCoder offers both customizable ripping settings and dumb-easy presets. If you are an experienced user, you can control the results as you wish, such as the format, video size, resolution, and quality. In most cases, we just keep the default settings and then wait for the ripped video.

The core encoding engine is written by HandBrake developers based on the Net Framework. You don't need to install Handbrake but have NET 4.7.1 pre-installed on your PC. Otherwise, VidCoder won't start running and will prompt you to download and install it.

Pros:

• Instant preview of what the ripped video looks like.
• Flexible settings for video titles and chapters, languages, and subtitles.
• Rip and merge multiple chapters into one video.
• Powerful batch encoding.
• Multiple codec options: H.264, H.265. MPEG-4. MP3, AAC, etc.
• Video encoding is boosted by hardware acceleration.

Cons:

• Cannot rip decrypted commercial discs.
• Only two available video containers in VidCoder – MP4 and MKV.
• You can't preview the whole video until the DVD ripping is finished.

Official website: https://vidcoder.net/

5. HandBrake – Open Source DVD Ripper

Operating system: Windows (64-bit only), Mac, Linux

Editor's rating:

HandBrake is an open source video transcoder that also functions as the best free DVD ripper. It supports DVD, Blu-ray discs, and ISO image files without copy protection. For advanced users who prefer customize output settings, this software gives you maximum free to tweak on your DVD videos – video encoding modes, resolution, bitrate, subtitle tracks, title/chapter selection, video dimensions, filters, etc. Besides, it has handy presets categorized by devices, web, Matroska, production, and general use.

Although it comes with easy video editing features like rotate, flip, sharpen, and denoise, you cannot preview what you have done to your video in real time. It takes a long time to render the ripped video and then unitizes the system default media player to play it. Beginners may spend hours and even days adjusting DVD ripping settings before they get the whole media content from the disc successfully.

Pros:

• Capable of ripping both DVDs and Blu-ray discs.
• Entirely free and lightweight.
• Flexible ripping settings, and can be manipulated with command lines.
• Support most modern and widely used video codecs: H.265, H.264, VP9, and MPEG-4.

Cons:

• Unable to rip encrypted DVD and Blur-ray.
• No real-time preview.
• Limited output formats – MKV, MP4, and WebM.
• Fail to rip large movie DVD/Blu-ray when you load multiple tasks on your computer.

Official website: https://handbrake.fr/

6. VLC - Best Free DVD Ripper for Windows and Mac

Operating system: Windows (64-bit only), Mac, Linux

Editor's rating:

VLC is well-known as a media player available on both computers and mobile devices. It supports a wide arrange of media formats, of course, including discs. You can browse to open DVD, Blu-ray, audio CD, and SVCD/VCD with VLC, and convert them to MKV, MP4, TS, and more. Since it won't rip DVD with smart presets, you need to manually adjust settings of codecs, resolution, frame rate, and select title, audio track and subtitle track. To rip DVD/Blu-ray in the original quality, output settings have to match the source content, so you must be well aware of the source information.

Compared with HandBrake, VLC is much simpler for beginners and semi-pros. Follow the lead of its intuitive interface, you can load, rip, and export the DVD video easily. But note that, you are only allowed to select one title/chapter at a time. If no title that contains all chapters in the DVD, you have to rip DVD chapters one by one, and finally, merge them into one video. Alas, it gets users baffled again.

Pros:

• Free and supported on most computers.
• Intuitive and easy to pick up for most users.
• Rip kinds of discs – DVD, Blu-ray, VCD, and CD.
• A perfect player on computer for DVD and Blu-ray.

Cons:

• Can't read the best title automatically.
• No sound issue occurs when ripping DVD to MP4 format container.

Official website: https://www.videolan.org/vlc/index.html

7. Magic DVD Ripper – DVD Ripper and Copy Software for Windows

Operating system: Windows 10/8/7

Editor's rating:

Since developed as a pure DVD ripper, Magic DVD spends every effort dealing with DVD, and that's why there are no extra features like video editing in it. Most users are confused by it its brother Magic DVD Copier. Actually, they come with almost the same functions, but Magic DVD Copier is more expensive and has one more feature - burning videos to blank discs.

Back to Magic DVD Ripper, it has 4 ways to rip the disc – copying the disc fully, ripping the main movie, splitting DVD9 into DVD5 discs, and compressing the DVD to tit on a single player disc (but with 55% quality loss). On top of that, DVD Magic Ripper can help you convert DVDs including encrypted DVDs to playable formats on smartphones, iPods, PSP, PS4/PS3, etc. Besides common video formats, it also enables you to convert DVD to VCD or SVCD.

Pros:

• Rip full DVD disc including trailers, menus, and special features.
• Remove DVD restrictions (Region, RCE, CSS, etc.).
• High speed ripping without much quality loss.
• Compatible with all Windows computers.

Cons:

• No real-time preview.
• No smart title selection. You need to play the DVD and figure out the right title in advance.

Official website: http://www.magicdvdripper.com/

8. MakeMKV - Best DVD and Blu-ray Ripper

Operating system: Mac, Windows, Linux

Editor's rating:

Although MakeMKV is a video converter, it offers less optimal formats for the ripped DVD video. It grabs all the contents from the disc and saves them in an MKV file. After you insert a disc and load it to MakeMKV, the ripper detects and presents all the tiles and source information in a fast manner. If you don't know which title to rip, just choose the one with the biggest size. This DVD and Blu-ray ripper choose MKV as the only output format because it contains all the data you need: video, audio, chapters, track language, etc.

Pros:

• It reads and converts both DVD and Blu-ray discs even protected with AACS and BD+.
• It preserves the original video quality of BD and DVD movies.
• The MKV file you get contains all media contents in the discs.
• The workflow is super easy for all users.
• Its beta version comes with all features available and completely free.

Cons:

Free Dvd Ripper For Macbook Pro

• Only one video format container MKV.
• You need to play the disc and select the right title manually.
• No more customizable settings to reduce the file size or change the video resolution.

Aladdin hardlock usb emulator for brother. Official website: https://www.makemkv.com/

9. MediaCoder – Best Free DVD Ripper for Windows

Operating system: Windows 10, 8.1, 8, 7, Vista

Editor's rating:

This is an audio and video transcoder that can be applied to grab videos from unencrypted DVD, VCD, CD, and BD. You can tell from its interface that this is an aged tool – old-school UI design with loads of settings panels. Honestly, this is not friendly to newbies. It costs you much time understanding the function of each panel and setting the start and end of your desired part, because it doesn't read the discs by titles, instead it roughly grabs all video files and merges them into a long video.

Pros:

• A rich set of parameters for tuning the video and audio files.
• Support tens of lossy and lossless compression formats.
• Best for advanced users with much multimedia knowledge.
• Completely free and easy to download.

Free Dvd Conversion Software For Mac Desktop

Cons:

• Not available for Mac.
• It rips all titles by default.
• Extremely slow preview on the recent Windows 10 system.

Official website: https://www.mediacoderhq.com/

10. Freemake – DVD Ripper for Windows

Operating system: Windows 10, 8, 7, Vista

Editor's rating:

The DVD ripping software from Freemake is recognized as the best DVD ripper for Windows for almost 10 years. It is pretty easy to extract subtitles, video, audio, menus from DVDs and Blu-ray discs. It has assisted millions of users with varied goals - archiving, copying, transferring online, or playing DVDs on portable devices. As long as the media content is non-corrupted, Freemake can rip any type of DVDs including DVD-R DL, DVD+R DL, DVD-R/RW, and DVD+R/RW, as well as region-locked and copy-protected DVDs and Blu-ray.

Pros:

• Rip most old and new DVDs and decrypt region-locked DVDs.
• Customizable settings for optimizing video quality and size.
• Easy for beginners.
• Copy DVD videos to USB, HDTV, iPhone, iPad, Android, etc.
• Support 50+ video formats.

Cons:

• Windows only.
• It does not support video codecs like H.265, VP9, and AV1.
• Apparent quality loss when shrink the DVD size.
• The ripped video will be watermarked in the free version.

Freemake DVD Ripper 'Downloading installation files failed' Error

Even though you can download the.exe file from its official site, you are always stuck by this error. That's because Freemake DVD Ripper has been expired and merged into another software called Freemake Video Converter.

Official website: https://www.freemake.com/

Best DVD Ripper Software Comparison

For anyone who in a rush, we've made this comparison table of the 10 best DVD ripping software on the market. Check it out and pick the best one for you in just a second.

Why These DVD Rippers Are Not on the List

DVDShrink

DVDShrink is an obsolete Windows freeware to copy and back up DVDs, and it doesn't perform very well in Windows 10, 8, 7. Although it claims that it won't charge anything, it asks you to donate and redirects you to other sites. And after browsing the entire website, I did not find any download button.

Aurora DV Ripper

Aurora was once the hot DVD ripping software on Windows XP and Windows 98, but it hasn't been updated since 2006. So it is not the best DVD ripper on modern computers.

Convertxtodvd For Mac

FAQs

1. Ripping or copying?

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DVD ripping and copying both read and extract data from physical discs to a digital format, but differ in the way of achieving this goal. DVD ripping is a compressed process and strips out some special features, thus ripped videos are smaller than the one copied. While copying is to duplicate the original discs bit by bit. So when you play the copied DVD video, you'll feel like playing the original DVDs and dealing with menus, trailers, etc.

Best Video Converter For Mac

2. What is the best format to rip a DVD?

If your goal is to rip and store the DVD in the best quality, it is better to choose DVD standard video format MPEG2 that keeps the original resolution 720p @29.97fps. But note that you'll lose subtitles, VMG files and more info. While for 1:1 copy in an uncompressed way, ISO and Video_TS Folder are your best choices.

When you rip and convert movie DVDs for playback on tablets, smartphones, or TVs, the best format should be widely supported and playable. MKV is the most recommended among DVD collectors because it includes subtitles, video and audio tracks, menus, and chapters.

3. How long does it take to rip a DVD?

It depends. The DVD video length and size, the target format, the computer configuration, and the DVD ripper you use all combine to affect the ripping speed. Generally, it takes 12 - 30 minutes to rip a standard DVD movie. However, the time can be shorter or longer based on the DVD ripping software you use and whether it utilizes hardware acceleration and multi cores to improve the speed.

Taking VideoProc Converter as an example, with the hardware acceleration engine enabled, it only takes 10 minutes while keeping the CPU usage around 20% to rip a Disney movie DVD (109 min, NTSC 720x480) to MKV.