How to Download Free Movies

Downloading a Free Public Movie

Understand what is legally available for free. The majority of free, legal movies are B-movies, cult classics, and the occasional big-budget film that flopped in theaters. There isn't a way to download a free version of a movie that's still in theaters or that has recently been released without breaking the law.

Open the Public Domain Torrents website. Go to http://www.publicdomaintorrents.info in your browser. This is the only website that has torrent files for old movies readily available without breaking any laws.

Select a category. On the left side of the page, click a category of film (e.g., Horror).

Select a movie. Scroll through the available movies until you find one that you would like to download, then click it. Doing so opens the movie's page.

Scroll down and click a download link. Near the bottom of the page, you'll see several links for different file types. Typically speaking, you'll want to click the Click for Divx link, which is usually the top link. Your torrent will begin downloading. The torrent file will usually only take a few seconds to download.

Open uTorrent. Its app icon resembles a white "µ" on a lime-green background. If you haven't yet installed uTorrent on your computer, install it before proceeding.

Click File. It's in the upper-left corner of the uTorrent window (or the screen if you're on a Mac). A drop-down menu will appear.

Click Add Torrent…. This option is in the File drop-down menu. A pop-up window will open.

Select your torrent. Click the torrent that you just downloaded to do so. You may first have to click the torrent's location (e.g., the "Downloads" folder) on the left side of the window. On Windows, you can scroll up or down the left side of the window to search for folders.

Click Open. It's in the bottom-right corner of the window. Your torrent's details window will open.

Select a movie save location. Click … to the right of the "Save In" section in the upper-left side of the window, then click the folder (e.g., Desktop) in which you want to save the movie.

Click Select Folder. It's in the bottom-right corner of the window. This will change the folder into which the movie will be downloaded to your selected folder.

Click OK. This option is in the bottom-right corner of the window. Doing so prompts the movie file to begin downloading.

Wait for your movie to download. This can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours depending on your movie's size, your Internet speed, and the number of people who are "seeding" (uploading) the torrent at the moment.

Convert your movie file if necessary. Divx links usually download files in the AVI format, which isn't playable for some media players. You can convert the file into an MP4 file, which is playable on almost every platform imaginable. If you have a video player that can play AVI files (such as VLC Media Player), you shouldn't need to convert the file.

Play your movie. Double-click the movie file to open it in your computer's default video player, then sit back and enjoy your film.

Consider using other free film resources. While it isn't quite as convenient as downloading, you can watch online films legally by using the following sites: Crackle - Go to http://www.crackle.com/ for this site. Crackle includes a large number of modern B-movies, as well as some cult classics and documentaries. The Internet Archive - Go to http://archive.org/index.php for this site. You can view old documentaries and films here. Culture Unplugged Studios - Go to http://www.cultureunplugged.com/ for this site. CUS is filled with full-length documentaries. Popcorn Flix - Go to http://popcornflix.com/ for this site. Here, you'll find a variety of free movies available, most of which are also formatted for viewing on portable devices. You may be able to download movies from some of these sites by using a browser extension or online service.

Downloading a Feature Film

Open a web browser. In order to download for free a film that isn't usually free, you'll have to download a torrent for it from a file-sharing site. This is against most Internet Service Providers' contracts, and it may result in legal repercussions.

Search for your movie's torrent file. The easiest way to do this is by typing the movie's name and year followed by torrent download into Google or a similar search engine. For example: to search for a torrent for The Blair Witch Project, you would type in blair witch project 1999 torrent download. If you have a specific file sharing site in mind, type in the movie's name followed by the site's name instead (e.g., blair witch the pirate bay).

Review the results. Look for a link that matches the general title and year of the movie that you want to download. The Pirate Bay is a commonly used file-sharing site.

Select a link. Click a link that matches the file that you want to download. This will open the torrent's download page.

Make sure that the file is legitimate. Many file-sharing websites have obtrusive ads and sketchy design, but you can usually determine whether or not a torrent is good by looking for comments on it. If the comments are largely positive, the torrent is probably fine to download; if not, avoid the site altogether. You can also get an idea of the quality of the torrent by looking through the comments.

Click the "Download" button. This may be a button that says "Download", a downward-facing arrow, or a link that says something like "Click here to download [torrent name]", so look around the torrent page to find the download button. Many torrent sites will redirect you to another page on which you have to click another "Download" button. You may be redirected to an ad page. If so, click your browser's "Back" button, or look for a Skip Ad button that appears after five seconds.

Wait for your torrent to finish downloading. You may have to navigate through a couple of ad pages before the torrent begins to download, but the torrent itself should only take a few seconds to download onto your computer.

Open uTorrent. Its app icon resembles a white "µ" on a lime-green background. If you haven't yet installed uTorrent on your computer, install it before proceeding.

Click File. It's in the upper-left corner of the uTorrent window (or the screen if you're on a Mac). A drop-down menu will appear.

Click Add Torrent…. This option is in the File drop-down menu. A pop-up window will open.

Select your torrent. Click the torrent that you just downloaded to do so. You may first have to click the torrent's location (e.g., the "Downloads" folder) on the left side of the window. On Windows, you can scroll up or down the left side of the window to search for folders.

Click Open. It's in the bottom-right corner of the window. Your torrent's details window will open.

Select a movie save location. Click … to the right of the "Save In" section in the upper-left side of the window, then click the folder (e.g., Desktop) in which you want to save the movie.

Click Select Folder. It's in the bottom-right corner of the window. This will change the folder into which the movie will be downloaded to your selected folder.

Click OK. This option is in the bottom-right corner of the window. Doing so prompts the movie file to begin downloading.

Wait for your movie to download. This can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours depending on your movie's size, your Internet speed, and the number of people who are "seeding" (uploading) the torrent at the moment.

Convert your movie file if necessary. Most file-sharing sites host video files in MP4 format, which is playable on most platforms; however, if you download a file in MOV or AVI format, you may have to convert it to an MP4 file to be able to play it. If you have VLC Media Player, you shouldn't need to convert the file—VLC can handle most video types.

Play your movie. Double-click the movie file to open it in your computer's default video player, then sit back and enjoy your film.