
Introduction
Everyone downloads a lot of stuff from the Internet. Be it software, videos, music, documents or images, you fill your hard drive with all of this. To track and manage all these downloads is a daunting task, and having a clean workspace to organize all these downloadable contents is the need of the hour. This is where a download manager comes to the rescue, also accelerating your downloads all the way.
Let's take a look at some download managers rated in this article. All tests were done on Windows 10, 64 bit system with 8GB RAM running the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox, IE, Edge, Vivaldi & Opera browsers. The ratings are comparative, so when a new download manager is reviewed, the corresponding rating of others might change. After testing around 12 download managers, these are my top 5 recommendations from the list.
Read also the Features of Download Managers at the end of this article.
Rated Products

Platforms/Download: Linux | Mac OS | Windows (Desktop) |
Version reviewed: 7.1.4
Gizmos Freeware
Our Rating: 5/5 |
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Platforms/Download: Windows (Desktop) |
Version reviewed: 2.0.4
George.J
Our Rating: 5/5 |
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Platforms/Download: Windows (Desktop) |
Version reviewed: 0.19
Gizmos Freeware
Our Rating: 4.5/5 |
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Platforms/Download: Mac OS | Windows (Desktop) |
Version reviewed: 5.1.23
Gizmos Freeware
Our Rating: 4/5 |
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Internet Download Accelerator
This commercial-turned-free download manager has the best customization capabilities
Platforms/Download: Windows (Desktop) |
Version reviewed: 6.13
George.J
Our Rating: 4/5 |
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Other Download Managers
I've tested these download managers and they fell short of top 5 for various reasons mentioned here but you can still try them out as an alternative.
Wont Be Reviewed
- Orbit Downloader won't be reviewed, and users are advised to stay away from it, because not only is the product bundled with all sorts of 3rd party software, it's also classified as malware, as it turns the application into a DDOS tool. More report here at Softpedia.
- Download Accelerator Plus Free & FlashGet since they haven't been updated for a long time (2014)
Browser Addons
- FlashGot allows you to set your own preferred download manager and integrate it with the Firefox browser for auto download.
- DownThemAll is another browser extension to add advanced download capabilities to Firefox.
- Video Download Professional can help you download videos from various streaming media sites on Chrome.
Features of Download Managers
The major features that makes an external download manager extremely useful are:
- Resume broken downloads: Downloads can be paused or resumed at will even after computer shutdowns or unexpected power outages, and it'll resume any unfinished download from the place it left off.
- Categories: Helps to organize your downloads automatically according to their type (videos, music, documents) in different folders and also define extensions to be included in the type.
- Download Acceleration: A single file is split into multiple sections/segments and then using several simultaneous connections to download each segment from a single server.
- Queueing: Start the downloads instantly or save it for later, setting up the download in a queue, and define the maximum number of concurrent downloads. Certain download manager allows you to define multiple queues.
- Scheduler: Start and stop downloads in the queue at a predefined time on a particular day, or synchronize your downloads to run on different days of the week. Additionally you may choose to shut down/hibernate computer after downloading.
- Browser integration: Integrate your download manager with various browsers and it'll take over the downloads automatically. Additionally clipboard monitoring, will let you capture copy-pasted direct links. Popular browsers like Firefox, IE, Chrome, Opera support is essential.
- Media grabber: Download streaming video and audio from various sites and even preview or convert them to different types.
- Batch downloads: Easy way to download whole ranges of files/links from a particular webpage . Also by adding a group of sequential file names of a particular type you can download multiple files from a website.
Other interesting features that I am looking in a download manager are:
- Protocol support: Mainly HTTP, HTTPS and FTP support, also support for RTSP, MMS, Metalink, Bittorrent and RTMP would be a bonus.
- Export/Import: At times when you want to uninstall/reinstall the program, it's useful to export/import the downloads in the list, so that it'll save you time and extra-work.
- Inclusion/Exclusion list: Include/exclude various File Types and Websites you want to monitor.
- Speed limiter: Set maximum download speed for a file and adjust the traffic usage for browsing and other stuff.
- Proxy/Socks support: Work behind HTTP and FTP proxy-servers.
- Refresh expired links: Sometimes a download link remains valid for only few hours and if not completed within that time boundary, download fails. Refreshing the link let's you resume these downloads.
- Multiple mirrors: Search for and download files from multiple mirrors simultaneously
- Sites manager: Certain sites require authentication for download request from internet and proxy servers
- Virus checking: Check downloaded files with a scanner you've set up to protect users from harmful virus/spyware.
- Float windows: Indicator to show the current downloads and its status.
Editor
This software category is maintained by volunteer editor George.J. Registered members can contact the editor with any comments or questions they might have by clicking here.
I've used TechSupportAlert and the older Support Alert Newsletter for almost a decade so I have saved hundreds of hours of work and many more dollars by following Gizmo's Freeware recommendations. Thanks for the opportunity to give something back.
If you have had a similar experience then you should consider becoming a reviewer too.
Back to the top of the article.
Comments
You stated that "Ninja Download" doesn't support IE, but according to the download page, it supports IE out of the box.
In any case, I tried briefly but it was disappointing. It has several flaws, some of which you mentioned already, but there are two particular flaws that were a deal breaker for me.
1) The automatic categorization for downloads seems to be broken, more often than not it would give me the category of "None" regardless of the extension of the file I'm downloading.
2) The integration does not work unless "Ninja Download" is running in the background. If you close it, then the integration either doesn't work or gives you an error. I shouldn't have to keep it open 24/7 in the background, I certainly don't need to do that with FDM.
In any case, it looked promising, but FDM remains my favorite still.
I must say I like EagleGet a lot. It's missing proper Batch Download though (or I did not find it), like FDM and FlashGet (adding links with (*) and tell it to replace it with numbers or letters, like 01 to 99). And it is missing a Linux version. But other than that it works as it should and is low on resources.
Thank you for the answer. Did not see it (your answer). Will test it later when I am back to Windows. Or do you by any chance know if it works for galleries? Or will it only download the thumbnails instead of the whole pictures (that's the reason for me for using batch download.
I am never ever going to use Download Ninja.
First it's size was double that of FDM. 15 MB compared to 7 MB
Second it's a resource eating monster. It consumes 52 MB RAM while idle and 84 MB! while downloading.
I tried to create a new category but it saved the file in 'Programs' category on it's on.
Lousy software.
I am comparing DN to others. I have 4GB RAM which is more than enough.
I created a category Software and mentioned .exe files to download in a specified location.
Instead DN downloaded the file (CCleaner latest download) in 'Programs' category which is default.
I have tried EagleGet. It's much better. Low RAM uses, small setup size and ...pleasing to eyes.
EagleGet v2.0.1.6 Stable was released on 13th september
EagleGet v2.0.1.8 Stable released.
Thanks for the info :)
Waiting for fdm to release its new version.Then we can see how they compete with others.
:D :D :D
I like EagleGet. better than DownloadNinja
Thanks for testing it.There seems to be a problem in the resume algorithm too.
Today I tried Download Ninja and it seems it does not support ftp Downloads. It always added http:// before the ftp:// protocol. EagleGet works fine with ftp links.
I can't setup download ninja cuz it needs visual c++ ,everytime I'm trying to setup visual c++ I have an error "error 1935", what should I do?
I did that so much times ,the same problem still found
problem solved, thanks alot.
Thank you for the reviews. I am waiting for a test for FlareGet as I want to have a replacement for Free Download Manager which is cross platform also, as I do not like the new version (version 5) of FDM.
I did a small test of FlareGet under linux and the free version is atleast download wise limited. I only was allowed to download 10 files per day. I do not remember, if that limit is general or for batch job as I did add a batch job yesterday.
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