Best Free DRM Removal Tools for Mac and PC

Removing DRM is a common request for most people especially those who like to purchase media content online. Suppose you bought a hot movie from iTunes Store, you can only watch the film on Apple approved devices and platforms because of the DRM protection. Or if you rent a movie from iTunes, you’ll find it will expire after 24 hours once you start watching it. Same thing happens to users who purchase audiobooks from Audible or Amazon Instant Video, etc. All those restrictions are caused by DRM, the Digital Rights Management technology. So in order to break those limitations and get back the full ownership of the iTunes movies, TV shows, music, audiobooks, etc, we have to find out a permanent solution to get rid of the DRM protection once and for all. Fortunately, there are various DRM removal software out there for assistance. In this review, we’ll cover the top 3 most popular DRM removal freeware for Mac and Windows from their performance, compatibility, speed, etc. so that you know which is better for you when removing DRM from protected media content.

No.1 Requiem (Mac, Windows) – Remove DRM from iTunes movies, songs, books, etc.

Requiem is the most famous and best free iTunes DRM removal software specialized in removing FairPlay DRM from iTunes videos, music and eBooks. Unlike some fake DRM removal utilities that simply perform a screen recording of iTunes videos, Requiem is promised to remove iTunes DRM losslessly without re-encoding. However, Requiem lost the war with Apple in 2012. It was stopped upgrading permanently since the release of iTunes 11 that year. The latest version remains in Requiem 4.1. That’s to say, if you want to use Requiem to strip DRM from your iTunes media for free, the first thing you have to do is downgrading iTunes to version 10.7 or lower. To decrypt DRM from iTunes music and movies, Requiem 4.1 is the required version. For decrypting iBooks, the best combo would be Requiem 3.3.6 and iTunes 10.5.3.

Useful tips: As Requiem is not compatible with iTunes 10.11 or higher versions, it’s not the ideal solution for people who are not technical or who like to use the most recent features of iTunes. So if you are looking for the best alternative to Requiem 4.1 that can remove iTunes DRM losslessly on the latest iTunes, you can try DRmare M4V Converter. It’s similar to Requiem but owns a lot new features.

See also: iTunes DRM Removal Battle: Requiem vs DRmare M4V Converter

 

No.2 myFairTunes (Windows) – Remove DRM from iTunes Music

myFairTunes is another free DRM removal program but mainly focuses on removing DRM from iTunes M4P songs. Although Apple already dropped out DRM from its iTunes music files since 2009, this freeware can still act as a great tool for iTunes users who collected thousands of protected songs from iTunes Store earlier than 2009. Comes with a user-friendly interface, myFairTunes empowers you unlock iTunes FairPlay-encrypted songs and albums by converting the DRM-ed M4P music files to common MP3 format easily. Thus, you can share your iTunes songs to non-Apple devices freely after conversion.

No.3 Calibre (Mac & Windows) – Remove DRM from eBooks

Calibre is a free e-book application suite developed to help users manage their e-book collections, by converting, editing, creating and reading eBooks of different formats. It could be the best free way to remove DRM from eBooks. It supports a variety of formats, including Kindle books, Barnes and Noble, Adobe Digital Content, etc.

For more details about those best free DRM cracking software, you can simply visit this source page: Top 3 Best Free DRM Removal Software.

How to Sync iTunes Videos to Play on Android OS

Android is currently the most widely used mobile operating system on most popular smartphones and tablets, such as Samsung Galaxy S8, HTC U11, Amazon Kindle Fire, Sony Xperial series, etc. iOS, the operating system for Apple’s mobile devices, is the strongest rival to Android. One of the biggest differences between Android and iOS products is that the latter supports playing more online media content than Android, due to the DRM technology developed by Apple. For instance, iDevices are able to play movies and TV shows from both iTunes and Google Play, while Android devices are not allowed to access to iTunes media straightforward because of the DRM restriction on iTunes movies. So here comes the problem, suppose you always purchase movies from iTunes but don’t like iPhone or iPad,  you must be wondering whether you can anyhow transfer the iTunes movie purchases to your Android phone for watching, right? Good question! That’s what we are discussing in the following content. Read on to find out how to get iTunes movies play smoothly on Android devices.

Tools You’ll Need to Convert iTunes Movies to Android

As we mentioned above, the reason why we can’t directly watch iTunes movies through our Android smart phone or tablet is because the videos are encrypted by Apple’s DRM and saved in M4V format which is only supported by iTunes compatible platforms and devices. So in order to play iTunes movies on Android OS, the most important breakthrough is finding out a solution to delete the DRM protection. In other words, you’ll need the help of some iTunes DRM removal applications.

Here you are highly recommended to try DRmare M4V Converter, a smart iTunes to Android converter tool specialized in cracking DRM lock from rented and purchased iTunes movies, TV shows and music videos and converting the protected M4V videos to Android supported video formats, like MP4, AVI, etc. with original tracks and subtitles, including CC, AC3 5.1 audio kept. For more details, you can visit the official page: http://www.drmare.com.

Before we getting started to remove DRM and convert the iTunes videos to Android, make sure you have these things ready:

• Install the free version of DRmare M4V Converter for Mac or Windows.
• Upgraded your iTunes to the latest version.
• Downloaded the movies or TV shows you want to watch on Android on your computer and authorize your iTunes so they can play properly.

Complete Guide to Transfer iTunes M4V Movies to Android Devices

Now you can follow these step to transfer and play iTunes movies on Android phones and tablets in minutes.

1. Simply click ‘Add Files’ button at the bottom left to open the iTunes library and then check the box in front of the files you want, then click ‘Add’ button to import.

2. Please go to the ‘Devices’ tab of the software to see if your Android phone or tablet is listed or not, if yes, you can select it accordingly. Else you can return to the ‘HD Video’ or ‘General Video’ tab to choose MP4 for any Android devices.

3. When you finish the settings, please press the conversion button, DRmare M4V Converter will convert the videos to the ones you customized and the output videos should be DRM free and work for your Android devices.

4. Start to sync the converted iTunes movies without DRM to Android via USB cable or some Android transferring apps.

 

How to Stream iTunes Movies via Plex Media Server for Playing

Plex has made it easy for us to stream and manage all kinds of local and online media content on different devices and platforms through its smart client-server media player called Plex Media Server. As a powerful solution that supports so many digital content and file formats, however, many iTunes users just encountered problems when they are trying to play their iTunes videos through Plex. If you are looking for the solution to stream iTunes movies on Plex Media Server too, the following article will show you a workaround to get it done in minutes.

What’s Plex Media Server?

Plex is a client-server media player system which comprised of two parts, including Plex Media Server and Plex Media Player.

Plex Media Server is a media managing software which can be downloaded to computers like Windows, MacOS, LInux , NAS, Wifi routers or just runs on Plex cloud. By settings up the server, it can add the videos from your library and make they accessible by other devices within the same Plex account.

Plex Media Player is also known as the Plex app or Plex Media Server software. It supports Android, Windows, IOS phones, Sonos, Chromecast, Nvidia Shield, Xbox One, Smart TV, Amazon Alexa and etc. And it can help you play the local media file under a free account and stream the videos which you have added to the Plex Media Server under a premium subscription membership.

Why Can’t We Stream Videos from iTunes to Plex?

We’ll get errors when playing iTunes movies via Plex on other devices. That’s simply because the iTunes movies and TV episodes are protected by Apple’s DRM technology. In result, those protected iTunes videos, also known as .m4v files, can only be played on Apple’s own devices, or in other words, the iTunes-supported platforms. Therefore we are not allowed to stream and manage iTunes videos with Plex Media Server straightly.

Is It Possible to Play iTunes M4V Movies on Plex Media Server?

Fortunately, thanks to the come up of some powerful iTunes DRM removal tools, it’s easy to break the DRM lock from iTunes movies so that we can make them playable via Plex without limit.

Here you meet DRmare M4V Converter for Mac/Windows, one of the fastest and best iTunes video converter specially developed to remove DRM protection from iTunes rented and purchased movies, TV shows and music videos with lossless quality, including AC3 5.1, AAC, CC, subtitles, etc. preserved in common MP4 and M4V formats. After conversion, you can import the converted iTunes video files to your Plex Media Server for playback on any device.

The following tutorial will show you how to convert iTunes movies purchases and rentals to Plex Media Server using DRmare M4V Converter step by step. So you are suggested to download the free version on your Mac or Windows PC first before we getting started.

User Guide: How to iTunes M4V Videos for Playing with Plex

1. Launch DRmare M4V Converter.
2. Add iTunes movies to DRmare via drag-and-drop or via “Add” button.
3. Choose output format and set video parameters via Format panel.
4. Start to convert iTunes movies/TV shows to Plex compatible formats.

More Tips: How to Stream DRM-free iTunes Movies to Play via Plex Media Server

Download Plex Media Server and Plex app on the devices you want to play the iTunes movies. Then sign up a new account to log in. Then you can start to syn the iTunes movies to Plex Media Server and play the videos on the devices where you installed Plex app. You should note that the features are limited under a free account, like you can only stream the videos via Plex app on a limited devices. To play iTunes videos on all kinds of devices, you are suggested to subscribe the premium account with $4.99/month or $39.99/year or $119.99 for lifetime.

Simple Guide to Download Free iTunes Videos

As one of the most popular online digital stores in the world, iTunes plays a big role in providing us with the largest number of movies and TV shows, from classic to the hottest. For a long time, iTunes has been offering the users two ways to get the videos via purchasing or renting. It provides free apps, podcasts and books sometimes. But never with the movies and TV episodes until November 2014 when Apple launched a new iTunes section called “Free on iTunes” where iTunes users have access to a great many of free full-length TV episodes. Now, some premium items are offered time from time for free too. If you haven’t downloaded any free iTunes media files before and have no idea on how to get free iTunes episodes, you head to the tutorial below to learn how to download free videos from iTunes in a few clicks step by step.

Tools You’ll Need to Download Free iTunes TV Shows

Firstly, you should pay attention to the requirements before getting started. Typically, to make it work more smoothly, you need to have the following 3 tools prepared in advance.

A Windows or Mac computer. Usually you can download videos from a mobile device as long as it supports iTunes. But to make it easier to locate and download iTunes videos, we’d recommend to use a computer.

Latest version iTunes. If you have a Mac computer, the iTunes is already built in the system, you just need to go to iTunes top menu > Click ‘Check for Updates’ to update to the latest version. For a Windows computer, you can download and install the latest version from Apple official website.

An Apple ID. If you don’t have one, you should sign up firstly. It is not difficult at all, just go to ‘Sign In’ page and then click ‘Create New Apple ID’ and then input your personal info and credit card info to register a new free account.

Complete Tutorial: How to Download Free Videos from iTunes

1. Open iTunes application on your Mac or Windows by double-clicking the app icon. Then click “TV Shows” > “iTunes Store” option on the top of iTunes interface.

2. Pull down the store page of TV Shows till you see the “Free on iTunes” section.

3. Now you will see the free music and TV shows listed on the page. Simply select the one you want to download and click to get more info of that free episode.

4. You can click “Get HD” button behind the name of the shows and start to download the free full-length iTunes TV episodes automatically.

More Useful Tips: Get Your Free iTunes TV Shows More Free!

Before you go, you should know that iTunes movies and TV shows, including the free episodes are only allowed to play on Apple’s devices, or in other words, the iTunes compatible devices. That’s to say, it’s impossible to play the free iTunes TV shows on Android or other popular devices and players, unless we remove the restriction, called DRM from those videos. Fortunately, there are many solutions for iTunes movies, here we mean DRmare M4V Converter which will help you completely crack DRM encryption from all iTunes videos and losslessly convert the locked iTunes M4V files to common MP4, M4V, MOV, etc. for playing on any device.

Find the complete tutorial here: How to Convert iTunes M4V Videos to MP4.

Apple Listing 4K HDR Movies in iTunes – Is 4K Apple TV Coming Soon?

Apple is reported to preparing its new Apple TV in 4K as one MacRumors forum member from the UK noticed his purchased iTunes movies showing as 4K and HDR in receipt. Although he’s not allowed to download the 4K movie yet, the fact we can’t deny is that Apple may be gearing up for 4K and HDR support for its iTunes movie as well as the upcoming new Apple TV this fall.

After a further investigation, it appears that the 4K is available in UK and Canada only. Other regions like US doesn’t experience the same situation. But it’s hard to imagine that Apple would added those tags if  it’s not working on 4K, HDR videos.

4K Apple TV for 2017: What to Expect?

It would be unsurprisingly that Apple would join the 4K market as other big players, like Google Play and Nexus have already embraced the 4K content in their stores last year. In fact, back to February this year, Bloomberg has reported that Apple was testing a new generation Apple TV for 4K videos. Although there might be few new features in the new Apple TV, mentioned by Bloomberg, we can’t ignore the fact that the 4K is probably coming to Apple TV soon.

However, Apple hasn’t made any statement on this issue yet. If in any chance Apple is not launching 4K Apple TV, another feasible possibility is that it’s loading up its iTunes video store for an influx of new Macbook Pro or iMac users, many of whom might be upgrading to 4K HDR laptops and desktops in the coming months and years.

Quick tips to stream iTunes movies to Apple TV

The current Apple TV 4th generation is able to stream iTunes movies in 1080p HD. To find out the complete guide on how to play iTunes videos on Apple TV, this tutorial will help: How to Stream iTunes Movies to Play on Apple TV.