Top 8 Best Free DVD Ripper for Mac Review [2024 Updated]

Here we conducted a comprehensive review of the 8 best free DVD rippers for macOS (Sonoma included). Within this review, you will find a favorite DVD ripping tool that allows you to convert DVDs into digital files for easy playback on any device and platform.

Nowadays, video entertainment gradually shifts from disc to digital. Therefore, the demand for DVD ripping and conversion is doomed to rise. For one thing, you can prevent your DVD discs from physical damage. For the other thing, you can extend your DVD movie view options to mobile devices with no DVD drive required. Actually, you can easily get the job done along with some help from a brilliant DVD ripping program.

If you're a Mac user and looking for the best DVD ripper for Mac to rip DVDs on Mac or save DVDs to Mac's hard drive, you've come to the right place. In this article, we have a thorough review of 8 best free DVD rippers for macOS. And you will find a favorite DVD ripping tool for Macintosh to help you rip DVDs to MP4, WMV, AVI, MOV, ISO, and other formats without compatibility issues.

Part 1. Review of 2024 Top Best Free DVD Rippers for Mac

As outlined below, we have selected the top 8 free DVD ripping programs for macOS for your consideration.

The 8 Best Free DVD Rippers for Mac at a Glance
DVD Ripper for Mac	Best for	Supported Formats
#1. EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac	Best macOS DVD ripper overall to rip, copy and convert any protected DVDs to digital formats on Mac (macOS Sonoma incl.).	Input: Protected DVDs, DVD folder, ISO image Output: MP4, MOV, AVI, MKV, iPhone, iPad, Android, etc, 500+ output profiles
#2. Handbrake for Mac	The best open-source DVD ripper for Mac to rip homemade DVDs to MP4, MKV or WebM.	Input: Homemade DVDs, DVD folder/ISO Output: MP4, MKV, WebM
#3. VLC for Mac	The best free DVD ripper for Mac for handling a couple of unencrypted DVDs.	Input: Homemade DVDs, DVD folder/ISO Output: MP4, MOV, AVI, MPEG, several more
#4. MakeMKV for Mac	The best to rip protected DVDs on Mac with best quality.	Input: Protected DVDs, Blu-ray discs Output: MKV
#5. MacTheRipper	An easy Mac DVD ripper (extractor) to create DVD backup without quality loss.	Input: Some protected DVDs Output: Full Disc, ISO
#6. FFmpeg	A free and open-source software project consisting of a large suite of libraries.	Input: Unportected DVDs, VOB files Output: MP4, MOV, MKV, H.264, HEVC, etc.
#7. Disk Utility	Built in macOS so users don't need to download extra DVD rippers on Mac.	Input: homemade DVDs Output: Disk images of DVD
#8. iSuper DVD Ripper for Mac	The free DVD ripper on Mac App Store is perfect to rip old family video DVDs to digital files.	Input: homemade DVDs Output: MP4, MOV, AVI, WMV, MKV, FLV, M4V, etc. 200+

What makes a good DVD ripper for Mac?

There's a good mixture of DVD ripping programs for Mac users out there, including free, paid, and freemium options. These differ in various aspects, including ease of use and features. Before we jump into our list, let's take a look at the criteria we used to choose the best Mac DVD rippers. Those that made it to the list meet most, if not all, of the following criteria:

• The compatibility to cope with different types of DVDs, including copy-protected DVDs;
• Ability to output high-quality video and sound, baiscally losslessly;
• Ability to enable all Mac users to rip DVD on Mac for playback on any devices;
• Feature flexible parameter settings to give you full control over video/audio codec, resolution, frame rate, etc;
• Ability to support hardware accelerated DVD encoding and decoding;
• Easy to use and beginner-friendly.

1. EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac

EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac has harvested an overwhelming number of loyal users throughout its 10-year-long journeys in the DVD ripping industry and it tops our list of the best DVD rippers for MacOS. It is compatible with macOS Sonoma, Ventura, Monterey, Big Sur or lower versions and copes well with commercially protected DVDs, damaged/scratched DVDs, covering complicated 99-title discs, ISOs or folders, workout DVDs, regional and even non-standard discs. And it is easy to handle.

EaseFab DVD Ripper has the ability to convert DVDs to almost all mainstream video and audio formats, including but not limited to ripping DVD to MP4, MOV, MKV, AVI, H.265, H.264, etc. If you don't know what settings to use to rip DVD for your devices, not to worry, as there are more than 200 pre-configured device profiles for iPad, iPhone, Apple TV, iTunes, iMovie, Android, game console, and more. Moreover, the program is constantly updated to support the latest macOS, the newest devices, and the newly-released DVDs.

3 DVD copy modes manage to back up DVD with 100% quality reserved. And its High Quality Engine can deliver almost original quality while ripping DVD to digital files while Hyper-threading Tech, Multi-core support and hardware acceleration technology gurantee the ultra-fast DVD encoding speed. It may only take 5 minutes to rip and copy a DVD on a Mac.

A bulit-in video editor can help you trim, crop, add watermark, effects, etc. to make the result videos more stylish. And you can flexibily select desired subtitle and audio tracks, add external subtitles and you're allowed to adjust resolution, bitrate, codec, etc to produce optimal file size.

How to rip a DVD on Mac with EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac

First of all, you need to download and install this best DVD Ripper for Mac on your Macintosh. It is fully compatible with macOS 14 Sonoma, Ventura, Monterey, Big Sur, Catalina, Mojave, High Sierra, etc. Once you finish installtion, follow the steps to rip protected DVD to Mac.

If you're using a PC, please free download the Windows version here.

Step 1. Insert the DVD you want to rip into the DVD drive connected to your Mac computer.

Step 2. Open EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac and click "Load DVD" button to add the source DVD disc.

Step 3. Click "Profile" icon and then choose an output format based on your own needs.

Step 4. Hit "Convert" button to start ripping DVD on your Macintosh computer.

2. Handbrake for Mac

HandBrake is a popular yet free DVD ripper among users running Mac, Windows and Linux. There is no more DVD decryption feature built-in Handbrake since version 0.9.3. But you can still use Handbrake rip some protected DVDs to MP4, MKV, or WebM, if with VLC libdvdcss installed. By loading the libdvdcss library in the application folder, Handbrake will dynamically read CSS and region-locked DVDs and then re-encode them on a Mac.

Besides enabling you to rip DVDs to digital format on macOS, Handbrake also lets you get a quick result by taking advantage of the presets in the side panel, from General, Web, Matroska to Devices. There are advanced parameters you can tinker with, available for precise encoding settings, effects, parameter adjustment, etc, which, though, are something of a learning curve.

However, if you're not be with good mathematical calculation skills, you will encounter much trouble to create a preset for your device. Moreover, HandBrake usually has a short unsupported gap when a new version of macOS launches. And it's a hit-and-miss when ripping some strictly encrypted DVDs on Mac, especially new releases and Disney titles.

How to use HandBrake and libdvdcss to rip DVDs on Mac

You can use Handbrake to rip burned and homemade DVDs with its own. To rip protected discs, you'll need to install libdvdcss on your macOS. Below are the detailed steps.

Step 1. Install libdvdcss on Mac.

It's easy to do this if you use Mac OS X Yosemite or older OS. Simply download the libdvdcss.pkg here and double click on it to install.

If you use Mac OS X El Capitan or later, the process will be a little bit complicated due to a security feature called System Integrity Protection arriving with EI Capitan. First of all, we need to install a command line tool called Homebrew. Once done, press Command+Space and search for Terminal to open a command line window. Next, type in brew install libdvdcss and hit enter. Then, Homebrew will start downloading and installing the libdvdcss library. Once done, HandBrake should be able to access copy-protected DVDs.

You can follow the tutorial "How to rip protected DVDs with Handbrake" to learn how to install libdvdcss for Handbrake.

Step 2. Install HandBrake.

The latest HandBrake version 1.5.1 is available for macOS 10.13 and later. If use macOS 10.12 or earlier, you can download old versions.

Step 3. Copy DVD on Mac with HandBrake.

Insert target DVD into your Mac's disc drive and open HandBrake. Under Source Selection, you should select your DVD.

Then HandBrake will scan DVD titles.

Once done, make sure selected title and chapters are what you want. Additionally, you need to specify preset and format (MP4, MKV or WebM). If necessary, you can adjust video audio parameters and more.

Next click the Browse button at the bottom right to specify save path and output file name.

When you finish all settings, now simply click the Start button. Now, HandBrake will begin ripping DVD to your Mac.

3. VLC for Mac

VLC proves itself a solid choice with its simplified interface and powerful DVD decoder feature on macOS. It offers an easy way to transcode video/DVD to MP4 H.264, H.265, WMV, WebM, and more, with no need for extra codec packs.

However, VLC comes with a few trade-offs. VLC just supports ripping CSS and regional discs. You can't decrypt and rip a sophisticatedly-protected DVD with VLC, and you have no control over the conversion - resolution, bitrate, frame rate, deinterlacing, aspect ratio, volume, and more. Despite VLC doesn't offer more conversion profiles like AVI or WMV, and there are some hidden tabs and buttons in our test, you can still follow the steps to rip DVDs on Mac with VLC.

How to rip a DVD on Mac using VLC

For detailed steps, you can follow this tutorial "How to rip DVD with VLC" to learn more.

Step 1. Download and install VLC on your Mac if you haven't done this. Once finished, open VLC - one of the best free DVD ripper for Mac on your Macintosh.

Step 2. Insert the DVD you want to rip onto your Mac. Then click on "File" at the top left corner of the main window, then choose "Open Disc..." button. Choose the DVD you'd like to rip with VLC and load it.

Step 3. Under Disc tab, you should click Disable DVD menus and check Stream output. And you need to click the Settings icon to open DVD conversion settings. On this panel, you need to:

● Check File and specify save path and file name for your DVD rip file.
● Choose encapsulation method, such as QuickTime.
● Select encoding format, bitrate, and audio channels.

Step 3. After you finish settings, click OK to begin ripping the DVD on Mac.

4. MakeMKV for Mac

Besides a Blu-ray ripper, MakeMKV can also be used a free DVD ripper for Mac, Windows and Linux. This tool is specially designed to convert DVD discs to MKV format. It will rip DVD to MKV with all video and audio tracks, chapters information, and all meta information. It works fast because it doesn't transcode video, just extract. More importantly, it's able to remove copy protections from DVD and Blu-ray discs, so that it's the best solution to free rip protected DVDs to MKV losslessly on macOS.

However, MakeMKV doesn't support converting DVD to AVI, MP4, MOV, FLV, etc. digital video formats. You should be noting that MakeMKV is not signed by Apple and you need to adjust gatekeeper options to install this free DVD ripper on Mac. Moreover, the DVD ripping freeware exports a super large MKV file, which will take about 4-8GB. So you should make sure your Mac's hard drive has enough free space.

How to rip DVDs to MKV on Mac free with MakeMKV

Step 1. Download and install MakeMKV on your Mac. MakeMKV 1.17.3 (the latest version) for Mac OS X requires x64 or ARM64 Mac OS X 10.7 or later. If your Macintosh meets the requirements, just go to makemkv.com, click the Download option on the left navigation bar, and now you'll find the download link for MakeMKV. Please be noted that MakeMKV is not signed by Apple so you might need to adjust gatekeeper options in order to install the program.

Step 2. Insert the target DVD into your DVD drive. Then open MakeMKV and click the big button that looks like an optical drive. Then, it will start reading your DVD and display your content as a tree structure.

Step 3. Choose the title, audio and subtitle tracks you want to rip.

Step 4. Set output folder.

Step 5. Click MakeMKV and wait for DVD ripping on your Mac.

5. MacTheRipper

MacTheRipper is a fast and free DVD ripper for Mac. It has three most common versions – MacTheRipper 2.6.6, MacTheRipper 3.0, and MRT 4. 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 a 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, or 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.

The bad is that MacTheRipper is unstable. It may suddenly exit or crash when you rip DVD on Mac OS X system. And the interface is a little confusing at first take it. You need to take time to know the functions. Once you overcome those problems, you could take it as your most reliant DVD ripper for Mac.

How to rip a DVD on Mac with MacTheRipper

1. Download the latest version of MactheRipper on your Mac, and install it for ripping DVDs 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 start ripping DVDs on Mac with MacTheRipper. The converted DVD will be saved as a folder on Mac.

6. FFmpeg

FFmpeg is a powerful and open-source tool that can handle videos and rip DVDs on Mac using command lines. It 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, FFmpeg is not a friendly choice for beginners since the command lines require a steep learning curve. Moreover, FFmpeg cannot handle copy-protected DVDs. For advanced users, you can simply brew install ffmpeg GUI on your Mac and input a command line to do many flexible tasks. For example, to rip a DVD on Mac 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

7. Disk Utility

If you just want to rip a few handmade DVDs for simpler playback or backup, you can adopt Disk Utility for help. It comes pre-installed on all Mac machines and can be used as a DVD ripper for Mac.

However, Disk Utility cannot deal with copy-protected DVDs. Therefore you'll need additional software or tools to bypass the encryption before using Disk Utility for ripping. Moreover, it lacks advanced features commonly found in dedicated Mac DVD ripping software. As a result, you won't be able to choose which audio, video, or subtitle tracks to use while the file is being ripped. More so than other rippers, it is slower.

How do I rip a DVD on Mac with Disk Utility?

1. Insert the DVD into your Mac's DVD drive. Open "Disk Utility". You can find it in the "Utilities" folder, which is located within the "Applications" folder.
2. In Disk Utility, you will see a list of drives and volumes on the left-hand side. Select the DVD that you want to rip from the list. Click on the "File" menu in the top-left corner of the screen and select "New Image" and then "DVD/CD Master". This will create a disk image of the DVD.
3. Choose a location on your Mac where you want to save the disk image file. You can also choose the desired file name for the disk image. Make sure to select a location with enough storage space. Adjust the image format to "DVD/CD master" and the encryption to "none".
4. Click the "Save" button to start creating the disk image. This process may take some time, depending on the size of the DVD and the speed of your Mac. Once the disk image is created, you can eject the DVD from your Mac by right-clicking on its icon and selecting "Eject".

8. iSuper DVD Ripper

iSuper DVD Ripper is also a reliable DVD ripping freeware for macOS. With it, you can digitize and rip homemade DVDs to MP4, AVI, MOV, MKV, FLV, AAC, MP3, WAV, etc. This free DVD ripper for Mac also offers a DVD audio extraction feature and basic video editing functions. You can edit the DVD video effect, adjust the video brightness, saturation, hue, and contrast, cut /merge videos, add watermark, etc.

However, iSuper DVD Ripper comes with a few trade-offs. It only supports homemade DVDs and many editing features are not available in the free version. The output movie has black bars and looks like a widescreen video. There are other glitches as well, such as video audio being out of sync during the playback. The ripped movies are out of order and you have to put the movie file in the right order.

How to rip DVD on macOS with iSuper DVD Ripper

Step 1. Download and install this free DVD ripper for macOS from the Mac app store.

Step 2. Insert your DVD disc into your DVD drive. Then open this software and click Load disc button to add the DVD disc.

Step 3. Select an output file format according your needs.

Step 4. Start ripping DVDs free on Mac.

Part 2. FAQs about DVD Ripper for Mac

1. What is the best DVD ripper for Mac?

If you're interested in backing up your DVD collection and don't want to be held back by time restrictions or slow processing, EaseFab DVD Ripper for Mac is the best DVD rippers for macOS we've tried. It isn't free like other free DVD rippers, but you get a lot for your money, and it can even handle discs that are strongly-encrypted (99-titles, Disney X-project, etc.), new-released, region-locked and unplayable. It can create videos files for playback on virtually any device too, with preset profiles so you can watch your movies on a phone or tablet.

Having to pay for the best DVD ripper for macOS isn't all bad though. It means you don't have to contend with in-app ads and upsells, and you get advanced features you wouldn't find in free DVD rippers. Plus, EaseFab's price tag is fairly low (to use the full version for one year, you only need to pay $19.95), and we definitely think it's worth it.

2. Can I use a DVD ripper to extract audio from DVD to MP3?

Yes. Most of these macOS DVD rippers can help you extract audio from a DVD to MP3 and other audio formats. If you want to extract the exact audio, you're recommended to get a DVD ripper with built-in editor. To get the job done effortlessly, you can adopt EaseFab DVD Ripper or iSuper DVD Ripper for help.

3. Which is the best free DVD ripper for Mac?

In general, a paid tool is bound to give you a better experience than its free counterparts, but you might find a DVD ripper does the trick. We've featured some free tools above, including freemium software such as iSuper, MakeMKV, as well as one completely free option: HandBrake. While these aren't necessarily bad options, there are some possible downsides to be aware of:

• Watermarks: Some providers will add their logo to free conversions to help advertise the service or encourage users to upgrade to a paid, watermark-free tool. Some watermarks are unobtrusive, for example, remaining in the corner of the video, and may be acceptable to some users. Others are large and appear in the center of the frame throughout the video, making them more of a nuisance.
• Length limits: Common in freemium software, a provider might limit the conversion length to something like five minutes of the original DVD video.
• Limited features: It requires resources to keep software updated with the latest features, so you may find that a free tool doesn't have the functionality you're looking for.
• Prompts to upgrade: Freemium tools will often bombard users of the free software with upsell popups. This doesn't impact use of the tool itself but can become an annoyance over time.

4. How to convert a commercial DVD to MP4 on Mac?

Among the Mac DVD rippers we recommend above, EaseFab DVD Ripper, Handbrake and VLC can help you convert DVD to MP4 on Mac. You can simply follow the tutorials above to get the job done.