Blackboard Downloader

Automatically download course files from any Blackboard Learn instance. Supports any school, any term, and any file type.

Features

• Works with any Blackboard Learn school (just enter your domain)
• Lists all your terms and lets you pick which one to download
• Pick exactly which modules to download (or use --courses to script it)
• Preserves top-level folder structure from Blackboard
• Skips files you've already downloaded
• Supports any file type: PDF, PPTX, DOCX, etc.
• Handles both classic attachments and Blackboard Ultra embedded files

Requirements

• Python 3.8+
• Google Chrome installed

Installation

git clone https://github.com/YOUR_USERNAME/blackboard-downloader.git
cd blackboard-downloader

python3 -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate        # Windows: venv\Scripts\activate

pip install -r requirements.txt

Usage

Interactive mode (recommended)

python3 bb_downloader.py

The script will ask for:

1. Your Blackboard domain (e.g. learn.bu.edu)
2. File types to download (default: .pdf)
3. Which term to download
4. Which modules within that term (e.g. 1,3,5 or 1-3 or all)

Command-line flags

python3 bb_downloader.py \
  --url learn.bu.edu \
  --output ~/Desktop/Blackboard \
  --ext .pdf .pptx .docx

Flag	Description	Default
--url	Blackboard domain	prompted
--output	Download folder	~/Downloads/Blackboard
--ext	File extensions	prompted (default .pdf)
--courses	Course names/IDs to download (substring match). Skips the interactive picker.	prompted

Output structure

Blackboard/
  MA225 Multivariate Calculus (Spring 26)/
    Lectures/
      lecture01.pdf
      lecture02.pdf
    Syllabus/
      syllabus.pdf
  LJ460 Haruki Murakami and His Sources (Spring 26)/
    Content/
      reading01.pdf
      ...

How it works

1. Opens a Chrome window for you to log in manually (handles SSO/2FA)
2. Transfers the session cookies to a requests session
3. Uses the Blackboard REST API to enumerate your courses and content
4. Parses both traditional attachments and Blackboard Ultra's data-bbfile embedded links
5. Downloads matching files into a mirrored folder structure

Notes

• Re-running is safe — already downloaded files are skipped
• External links are not downloaded (e.g. files hosted on Google Drive or OneDrive)
• Tested on Blackboard Learn SaaS (Ultra experience) at Boston University (learn.bu.edu) and Trinity College Dublin (tcd.blackboard.com)

Contributing

PRs welcome. If your school's Blackboard uses a different content structure and some files aren't being picked up, open an issue with the output of the debug steps in the wiki.

License

MIT