mpv (media player)

mpv
Original author(s)Vincent Lang,[1] MPlayer and mplayer2 developers
Developer(s)Community
Initial releaseAugust 7, 2013; 11 years ago (2013-08-07)[2]
Stable release
0.39.0[3] Edit this on Wikidata / 23 September 2024
Repository
Written inC, Objective-C, Lua[4]
Engine
  • FFmpeg
Edit this at Wikidata
Operating systemBSD-based, Linux, macOS, Windows
PlatformARM, MIPS, PowerPC, RISC-V, s390x, x86 / IA-32 and x86-64 / AMD64 [5]
SizeSource code: 2.9 MB (tar.gz)
TypeMedia player
LicenseGPLv2+, parts under LGPLv2.1+, some optional parts under GPLv3[6]
Websitempv.io Edit this at Wikidata

mpv is free and open-source media player software based on MPlayer, mplayer2 and FFmpeg. It runs on several operating systems, including Unix-like operating systems (Linux, BSD-based, macOS) and Microsoft Windows, along with having an Android port called mpv-android.[7] It is cross-platform, running on ARM, MIPS, PowerPC, RISC-V, s390x, x86/IA-32, x86-64, and some other by 3rd party.[5]

History

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mpv was forked by Vincent Lang, also known as wm4, in 2012 from mplayer2, which was forked in 2010 from MPlayer.[8] The motive for the fork was to encourage developer activity by removing unmaintainable code and dropping support for very old systems. As a result, the project had a large influx of contributions.[9]

Since June 2015, the project's source code is in the process of being relicensed from GNU General Public License version 2 (GPLv2) or later to GNU Lesser General Public License version 2.1 (LGPLv2.1) or later to allow using mpv as a library in more applications.[10]

Changes from MPlayer

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mpv has had several notable changes[11] since it was forked from MPlayer; the most user-visible being the addition of an on-screen-controller (OSC) minimal GUI integrated with mpv to offer basic mouse-controllability. This was intended to make interaction easier for new users and to enable precise and direct seeking.

  • Video websites: By using yt-dlp, mpv natively supports playback of high-definition video (HD) content and audio on YouTube and over 1000 other supported sites.[12] This allows mpv to replace site-specific video players based on HTML5.
  • High quality video output: mpv includes a customizable video output driver based on OpenGL[13] as well as the Vulkan API,[14] which supports over 100 options for controlling playback quality, including the use of advanced upscaling filters, color management, and customizable pixel shaders.[15]
  • Audio scaling algorithm: The player is equipped with a scaletempo2 parameter for speed changing at constant pitch, for which it uses the Waveform Similarity Overlap-and-add (WSOLA) algorithm, citing more smoothness than the original scaletempo used in the original mplayer, and rubberband.[16]
  • Improved client API: Beyond working as a stand-alone media player, mpv is designed to be used directly by other applications through a library interface called libmpv. This required making all mpv code thread safe. An example of an application which uses libmpv is Plex.[17] This form of player control, along with a JSON IPC mechanism, replaces MPlayer's "slave mode".
  • Encoding subsystem: mpv includes a new video encoding mode that can be used to save files being played under different formats. This allows mpv to work as a transcoder, supporting many video formats.[18] This feature serves as a direct replacement for the MEncoder component of MPlayer, which was a separate program rather than being built into the player.
  • Lua scripting: mpv's behavior and functions are customizable via use of small programs written in the Lua scripting language, which can be used for tasks like cropping video, providing a graphical user interface (GUI) or automatically adjusting the display's refresh rate.[19]

Removed functions

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  • all support for VCD discs

Interface and graphical front-ends

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Like the original MPlayer, mpv is still primarily a command-line application although it has a more advanced user interface than MPlayer that can use not only the keyboard but also the mouse for mpv's on screen controller (OSC). However, this OSC is still not a full-featured GUI, and there are a number of front-ends available, which use GUI widgets for Qt, GTK, or some other widget toolkit to give mpv a more complete graphical interface.

The following are all open source front-ends of mpv (based on "libmpv" or the command-line version of mpv) which try to provide more features and more user-friendly interface than mpv, and/or better integration with various operating systems or desktop environments.[20]

  • Baka MPlayer - media player on Windows, Linux, and macOS although macOS version requires the user to compile from source, with Qt5 widgets, written in C++. Its main goal is uncluttered, simple design.[21] Its development stalled in January 2017 in favor of another mpv frontend by the same developers, Mochi Player, which is not yet complete.
  • C-Play - is a video/media player developed for cluster environments where you need multiple computers and/or displays to run your video/image content on. The displays could be flat or curved, and the video content 180 fulldome / fisheye, 360 equirectangular or equiangular cubemap or regular flat content, as well as stereoscopic (Side-by-side or Top-Bottom). Installers and testing is primarily performed for Microsoft Windows, but the code is cross-platform, written in C++ with Qt6/Qt5 QML UI.[22]
  • Deepin Movie - for Linux - Written by and default video player for the Chinese Deepin distro and desktop environment.[23]
GNOME MPV (Celluloid) 0.18 with its preferences
  • Celluloid (formerly GNOME MPV) - for Linux - based on GTK. Its goal is to be a simple GTK-based graphical interface for mpv that meets the GNOME Human Interface Guidelines.[24]
  • Haruna Media Player - for Linux, Windows - based on Qt/QML. A KDE media player project with YouTube support and customizable shortcuts. [25]
  • IINA - macOS 10.10+ media player with native macOS Cocoa interface. It is a full-featured native macOS graphical interface for mpv that makes use of new features in the most recent versions of macOS. mpv config file and script system are also integrated.[26]
  • Kawaii-Player - Linux and Windows 10 - media player and media server with Qt5 widgets. Its goal is to not just be a multimedia player but also an audio/video library manager and portable media server and torrent streaming server/player.[27]
  • Media Player Classic Qute Theater (mpc-qt) - Linux and Windows media player with Qt5 widgets, written in C++. Its goal is to reproduce and ultimately improve upon the functionality of Media Player Classic Home Cinema (mpc-hc), a Windows-only program, as a cross-platform mpv-based multimedia player that also works on Unix-like operating systems like Linux.
  • mpv.net - Windows media player with native Windows interface. Its goal is to provide the standard mpv OSC interface on Windows along with a customizable Windows context menu, C# scripting, and a Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) for addons.[28]
  • OvoPlayer - Linux and Windows music player that supports many backends, based on LCL widgetsets, written in Pascal. Its goal is to be a flexible audio player that supports as many audio engine backends like mpv as possible.[29]
  • SMPlayer - full-featured, cross-platform and skinable with advanced features and YouTube and Chromecast support that can use MPlayer or mpv. Available for Microsoft Windows, Linux and macOS, and written in C++ with Qt4/Qt5.[30]
  • Sugoi Player - media player on Windows (that might work on Linux and macOS but those are untested) forked from Baka MPlayer, with Qt5 widgets, written in C++. It aims to improve upon and continue development of an mpv frontend based on Baka MPlayer, since Baka MPlayer's development stalled in January 2017.[31]
  • xt7-player-mpv - Linux media player with Qt5 or Qt4 widgets, written in Gambas 3 (a dialect of BASIC). Its goal is usability, and a variety of extra features like YouTube and SHOUTcast integration, media tagging, library and playlist management, as well as adding more features beyond that.[32]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "Contributors to mpv-player". GitHub. 2017-11-04. Archived from the original on 2021-09-15. Retrieved 2021-09-15.
  2. ^ wm4 (2013-08-07). "Release 0.1". MPV.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  3. ^ "v0.39.0". 23 September 2024. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
  4. ^ "mpv-player", Analysis Summary, Open Hub, archived from the original on 2017-08-02, retrieved 2016-08-11
  5. ^ a b Debian - Details of package mpv
  6. ^ "Copyright". mpv. Retrieved 2015-03-21.
  7. ^ "mpv-android - Apps on Google Play". play.google.com. Retrieved 2020-03-28.
  8. ^ "MPV, A New Fork Of MPlayer/MPlayer2". Phoronix. Retrieved 2015-01-28.
  9. ^ "Contributors to mpv-player/mpv". GitHub. Retrieved 2016-03-21.
  10. ^ wm4. "LGPL relicensing (#2033)". mpv-player/mpv (source code repository). GitHub. Archived from the original on 2017-09-14. Retrieved 2017-09-14. ... GPL-incompatible dependencies such as OpenSSL are a big issue for library users, even if the library user is ok with the GPL. ...{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  11. ^ "list of changes from MPlayer". GitHub. Retrieved 2018-04-05.
  12. ^ "yt-dlp: Supported sites". GitHub. Retrieved 2024-09-06.
  13. ^ Sneddon, Joey (2017-09-13). "MPV 0.27 Released with Minor Fixes, New OpenGL Options". OMG! Ubuntu!. Ohso Ltd. Retrieved 2017-02-13.
  14. ^ Larabel, Michael (2017-12-25). "MPV Player 0.28 Adds Initial Vulkan Support". Phoronix. Phoronix Media. Archived from the original on 2017-12-26. Retrieved 2017-12-26.
  15. ^ "mpv manual (opengl video output driver section)". Retrieved 2016-03-21.
  16. ^ "MPV.io".
  17. ^ "Introducing the Plex Media Player". Retrieved 2015-03-21.
  18. ^ "mpv manual (encoding section)". Retrieved 2016-03-21.
  19. ^ "User Scripts - mpv-player/mpv Wiki". GitHub. Retrieved 2016-03-21.
  20. ^ "Applications using mpv". GitHub. Retrieved 2020-12-28.
  21. ^ "Baka MPlayer Github page". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  22. ^ "C-Play". Retrieved 2024-08-05.
  23. ^ "Deepin Movie". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  24. ^ "Celluloid". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  25. ^ "Haruna media player". KDE. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
  26. ^ "IINA". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  27. ^ "Kawaii Player Github Repository". GitHub. Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  28. ^ "mpv.net Github Repository". GitHub. Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  29. ^ "OvoPlayer on Lazarus Wiki". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  30. ^ "SMPlayer". Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  31. ^ "Sugoi Player Github Repository". GitHub. Retrieved 2022-09-15.
  32. ^ "xt7-player Github Repository". GitHub. Retrieved 2022-09-15.
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