Hello everyone, how are you all doing today? I hope you are all having a good day so far. My Wednesday morning is great, I am getting ready to go visit my neighbor as soon as I finish typing this post, they are having a birthday party for a friend or something like that, but I am invited! Lol anyway please continue…
Today we will highlight the best Media Player software for Ubuntu and Linux. You will get to compare main features and screenshots of each Media Player listed below. I know the favorite these days is probably still VLC Media Player right? Or I am just getting too old? Let’s begin.
What Is A Media Player
A media player is a computer program for playing multimedia files. Media players display standard media control icons known from physical devices such as tape recorders and CD players, such as Play, Pause, and Stop buttons.
#1. Download VLC Media Player For Ubuntu
VLC is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player and framework that plays most multimedia files as well as DVDs, Audio CDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols.
VLC Media Player Main Features:
- Simple, fast and powerful media player.
- Plays everything: Files, Discs, Webcams, Devices and Streams.
- Plays most codecs with no codec packs needed:
MPEG-2, DivX, H.264, MKV, WebM, WMV, MP3… - Runs on all platforms: Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Unix…
- Completely Free, no spyware, no ads and no user tracking.
- Can do media conversion and streaming.
I am sure most people still believe VLC is the best media player for Ubuntu/Linux but to me it’s #2. It is great and most of you would love it but to me, sometimes it can be slow or simply not work right.
VLC Screenshot
#2. Download SMPlayer For Ubuntu
SMPlayer is a free media player for Windows and Linux with built-in codecs that can play virtually all video and audio formats. It doesn’t need any external codecs. Just install SMPlayer and you’ll be able to play all formats without the hassle to find and install codec packs.
One of the most interesting features of SMPlayer: it remembers the settings of all files you play. So you start to watch a movie but you have to leave… don’t worry, when you open that movie again it will be resumed at the same point you left it, and with the same settings: audio track, subtitles, volume…
SMPlayer is a graphical user interface (GUI) for the award-winning MPlayer, which is capable of playing almost all known video and audio formats. But apart from providing access for the most common and useful options of MPlayer, SMPlayer adds other interesting features like the possibility to play Youtube videos or download subtitles.
SMPlayer Screenshot
#3. Download MPV Player For Ubuntu
MPV is a fork of mplayer2 and MPlayer. It shares some features with the former projects while introducing many more.
MPV Player Main Features:
- MPlayer’s options parser was improved to behave more like other CLI programs, and many option names and semantics were reworked to make them more intuitive and memorable.
- mpv has a OpenGL based video output that is capable of many features loved by videophiles, such as video scaling with popular high quality algorithms, color management, frame timing, interpolation, and more.
- A straightforward C API was designed from the ground up to make mpv usable as a library and facilitate easy integration into other applications.
- While mpv has no official GUI, it has a small controller that is triggered by mouse movement.
- mpv leverages the FFmpeg hwaccel APIs to support VDPAU, VAAPI, DXVA2, VDA and VideoToolbox video decode acceleration.
- mpv is under active development, focusing on code refactoring and cleanups as well as adding features.
MPV Player Screenshot
#4. Download Bomi Player For Ubuntu
Bomi is a multimedia player formerly known as CMPlayer, which is aimed for easy usage but also provides various powerful features and convenience functions. Bomi is a graphical user interface(GUI) player based on mpv for Linux. By taking the advantage of mpv and GUI, bomi provides various features.
Bomi Player Main Features:
- User-friendly interface
bomi provides a easy-to-use graphical user interface(GUI). You can find all features in the context menu. All configurations can be done in a preferences dialog.
Unlimited playback history - bomi records all playback history by default and provdes the way to resume playback later. bomi also tracks playback states such as selected audio/loaded subtitle etc.
Automatic playlist generation and restoration - bomi can generate playlist based on file name. Also, last played playlist is saved and restored automatically.
Enhanced subtitle handling - bomi supports various subtitle formats. bomi can render multiple subtitle files at the same time. bomi also can render styled subtitles such as SAMI and ASS format.
#5. Download Miro Media Player For Ubuntu
Miro (formerly named Democracy Player or DTV) is an audio, video player and Internet television application developed by the Participatory Culture Foundation. It runs on Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, FreeBSD and Linux and supports most known video file formats. It offers both audio and video, some in HD quality.
- Miro will remember where you stopped watching a video and will start at that point when you play it again.
- Forget about the format wars. Miro can play MPEG, Quicktime, AVI, H.\264, Divx, Windows Media, Flash Video, and almost every other major video format.
- When you install Miro, you can search you computer to find all your video files and list them in your Miro Library.
- Miro can download individual BitTorrent files and torrents that are in feeds. When a video torrent is downloaded it will be in your channel and library ready to watch, just like any other video download.
- Miro now lets you watch any video in a separate window, so you can browse and download while you watch. You can play videos in a separate window individually or set a preference to always play videos in a separate window.
Miro Screenshot
Quick Links: Best BitTorrent Apps for Ubuntu | Best Video Editing Software on Ubuntu | Microsoft Office Alternatives on Ubuntu