[TikTok] cover's mtime overwrites video's mtime

[skymatr1x]

tiktok.covers as true apply its jpg mtime to the video.

video's mtime is different when tiktok.covers reverted to false, and this mtime is the same as downloading with yt-dlp --mtime.

[AlttiRi]

Maybe it's related to:

• [Feature Request] Set date of all files to the same as video file yt-dlp/yt-dlp#655

[skymatr1x]

yt-dlp's --mtime doesn't apply to covers.

gallery-dl "covers": false then have video mtime the same mtime as yt-dlp.

gallery-dl set mtime for both video and cover. i think the issue is that the mtime process for cover also get applied to video, which overwrite the correct video mtime done by the prior process.

[mikf]

I'm not entirely sure what you mean. Lets use https://www.tiktok.com/@memezar/video/7449708266168274208 as an example with default settings and -o covers=1.

As mtime values, I get

1765979755 cover
1734520384 video

What do you expect them to be?

[skymatr1x]

i meant to reply @/AlttiRi that i don't think this is related to the yt-dlp issue they linked.

i tested your video and i actually get different video mtime (seconds off) than you.

As mtime values, I get

cover 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT = 1765979755
video 2024-12-18 11:13:04 GMT = 1734520384

---

gallery-dl v1.31.1 "covers": true:

cover mtime 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT
video mtime 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT
video btime 2025-12-18 11:13:39 GMT

i also just found out that cover mtime from different regions could be different (video mtime is consistent across).
(US) cover 2025-12-28 7:32:44 GMT

gallery-dl v1.31.1 "covers": false mtime:

video 2025-12-18 11:13:39 GMT

yt-dlp --mtime mtime:

video 2025-12-18 11:13:39 GMT

[mikf]

cover 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT = 1765979755
video 2024-12-18 11:13:04 GMT = 1734520384

So the same as gallery-dl with 5427e33

gallery-dl v1.31.1 "covers": true:
cover mtime 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT
video mtime 2025-12-17 13:55:55 GMT

Again, fixed in 5427e33