Provided by: mpv_0.37.0-1ubuntu4_amd64 
NAME
mpv - a media player
SYNOPSIS
mpv [options] [file|URL|PLAYLIST|-]
mpv [options] files
DESCRIPTION
mpv is a media player based on MPlayer and mplayer2. It supports a wide variety of video
file formats, audio and video codecs, and subtitle types. Special input URL types are
available to read input from a variety of sources other than disk files. Depending on
platform, a variety of different video and audio output methods are supported.
Usage examples to get you started quickly can be found at the end of this man page.
INTERACTIVE CONTROL
mpv has a fully configurable, command-driven control layer which allows you to control mpv
using keyboard, mouse, or remote control (there is no LIRC support - configure remotes as
input devices instead).
See the --input- options for ways to customize it.
The following listings are not necessarily complete. See etc/input.conf in the mpv source
files for a list of default bindings. User input.conf files and Lua scripts can define
additional key bindings.
See COMMAND INTERFACE and Key names sections for more details on configuring keybindings.
See also --input-test for interactive binding details by key, and the stats built-in
script for key bindings list (including print to terminal).
Keyboard Control
LEFT and RIGHT
Seek backward/forward 5 seconds. Shift+arrow does a 1 second exact seek (see
--hr-seek).
UP and DOWN
Seek forward/backward 1 minute. Shift+arrow does a 5 second exact seek (see
--hr-seek).
Ctrl+LEFT and Ctrl+RIGHT
Seek to the previous/next subtitle. Subject to some restrictions and might not
always work; see sub-seek command.
Ctrl+Shift+LEFT and Ctrl+Shift+RIGHT
Adjust subtitle delay so that the next or previous subtitle is displayed now. This
is especially useful to sync subtitles to audio.
[ and ]
Decrease/increase current playback speed by 10%.
{ and }
Halve/double current playback speed.
BACKSPACE
Reset playback speed to normal.
Shift+BACKSPACE
Undo the last seek. This works only if the playlist entry was not changed. Hitting
it a second time will go back to the original position. See revert-seek command
for details.
Shift+Ctrl+BACKSPACE
Mark the current position. This will then be used by Shift+BACKSPACE as revert
position (once you seek back, the marker will be reset). You can use this to seek
around in the file and then return to the exact position where you left off.
< and >
Go backward/forward in the playlist.
ENTER Go forward in the playlist.
p and SPACE
Pause (pressing again unpauses).
. Step forward. Pressing once will pause, every consecutive press will play one frame
and then go into pause mode again.
, Step backward. Pressing once will pause, every consecutive press will play one
frame in reverse and then go into pause mode again.
q Stop playing and quit.
Q Like q, but store the current playback position. Playing the same file later will
resume at the old playback position if possible. See RESUMING PLAYBACK.
/ and *
Decrease/increase volume.
9 and 0
Decrease/increase volume.
m Mute sound.
_ Cycle through the available video tracks.
# Cycle through the available audio tracks.
E Cycle through the available Editions.
f Toggle fullscreen (see also --fs).
ESC Exit fullscreen mode.
T Toggle stay-on-top (see also --ontop).
w and W
Decrease/increase pan-and-scan range. The e key does the same as W currently, but
use is discouraged.
o and P
Show progression bar, elapsed time and total duration on the OSD.
O Toggle OSD states between normal and playback time/duration.
v Toggle subtitle visibility.
j and J
Cycle through the available subtitles.
z and Z
Adjust subtitle delay by +/- 0.1 seconds. The x key does the same as Z currently,
but use is discouraged.
l Set/clear A-B loop points. See ab-loop command for details.
L Toggle infinite looping.
Ctrl++ and Ctrl+-
Adjust audio delay (A/V sync) by +/- 0.1 seconds.
Shift+g and Shift+f
Adjust subtitle font size by +/- 10%.
u Switch between applying only --sub-ass-* overrides (default) to SSA/ASS subtitles,
and overriding them almost completely with the normal subtitle style. See
--sub-ass-override for more info.
V Toggle subtitle VSFilter aspect compatibility mode. See
--sub-ass-vsfilter-aspect-compat for more info.
r and R
Move subtitles up/down. The t key does the same as R currently, but use is
discouraged.
s Take a screenshot.
S Take a screenshot, without subtitles. (Whether this works depends on VO driver
support.)
Ctrl+s Take a screenshot, as the window shows it (with subtitles, OSD, and scaled video).
PGUP and PGDWN
Seek to the beginning of the previous/next chapter. In most cases, "previous" will
actually go to the beginning of the current chapter; see --chapter-seek-threshold.
Shift+PGUP and Shift+PGDWN
Seek backward or forward by 10 minutes. (This used to be mapped to PGUP/PGDWN
without Shift.)
d Activate/deactivate deinterlacer.
A Cycle aspect ratio override.
Ctrl+h Toggle hardware video decoding on/off.
Alt+LEFT, Alt+RIGHT, Alt+UP, Alt+DOWN
Move the video rectangle (panning).
Alt++ and Alt+-
Combining Alt with the + or - keys changes video zoom.
Alt+BACKSPACE
Reset the pan/zoom settings.
F8 Show the playlist and the current position in it (useful only if a UI window is
used, broken on the terminal).
F9 Show the list of audio and subtitle streams (useful only if a UI window is used,
broken on the terminal).
i and I
Show/toggle an overlay displaying statistics about the currently playing file such
as codec, framerate, number of dropped frames and so on. See STATS for more
information.
DEL Cycle OSC visibility between never / auto (mouse-move) / always
` Show the console. (ESC closes it again. See CONSOLE.)
(The following keys are valid only when using a video output that supports the
corresponding adjustment.)
1 and 2
Adjust contrast.
3 and 4
Adjust brightness.
5 and 6
Adjust gamma.
7 and 8
Adjust saturation.
Alt+0 (and Command+0 on macOS)
Resize video window to half its original size.
Alt+1 (and Command+1 on macOS)
Resize video window to its original size.
Alt+2 (and Command+2 on macOS)
Resize video window to double its original size.
Command + f (macOS only)
Toggle fullscreen (see also --fs).
(The following keys are valid if you have a keyboard with multimedia keys.)
PAUSE Pause.
STOP Stop playing and quit.
PREVIOUS and NEXT
Seek backward/forward 1 minute.
ZOOMIN and ZOOMOUT
Changes video zoom.
If you miss some older key bindings, look at etc/restore-old-bindings.conf in the mpv git
repository.
Mouse Control
Left double click
Toggle fullscreen on/off.
Right click
Toggle pause on/off.
Forward/Back button
Skip to next/previous entry in playlist.
Wheel up/down
Decrease/increase volume.
Wheel left/right
Seek forward/backward 10 seconds.
USAGE
Command line arguments starting with - are interpreted as options, everything else as
filenames or URLs. All options except flag options (or choice options which include yes)
require a parameter in the form --option=value.
One exception is the lone - (without anything else), which means media data will be read
from stdin. Also, -- (without anything else) will make the player interpret all following
arguments as filenames, even if they start with -. (To play a file named -, you need to
use ./-.)
Every flag option has a no-flag counterpart, e.g. the opposite of the --fs option is
--no-fs. --fs=yes is same as --fs, --fs=no is the same as --no-fs.
If an option is marked as (XXX only), it will only work in combination with the XXX option
or if XXX is compiled in.
Legacy option syntax
The --option=value syntax is not strictly enforced, and the alternative legacy syntax
-option value and -option=value will also work. This is mostly for compatibility with
MPlayer. Using these should be avoided. Their semantics can change any time in the future.
For example, the alternative syntax will consider an argument following the option a
filename. mpv -fs no will attempt to play a file named no, because --fs is a flag option
that requires no parameter. If an option changes and its parameter becomes optional, then
a command line using the alternative syntax will break.
Until mpv 0.31.0, there was no difference whether an option started with -- or a single -.
Newer mpv releases strictly expect that you pass the option value after a =. For example,
before mpv --log-file f.txt would write a log to f.txt, but now this command line fails,
as --log-file expects an option value, and f.txt is simply considered a normal file to be
played (as in mpv f.txt).
The future plan is that -option value will not work anymore, and options with a single -
behave the same as -- options.
Escaping spaces and other special characters
Keep in mind that the shell will partially parse and mangle the arguments you pass to mpv.
For example, you might need to quote or escape options and filenames:
mpv "filename with spaces.mkv" --title="window title"
It gets more complicated if the suboption parser is involved. The suboption parser puts
several options into a single string, and passes them to a component at once, instead of
using multiple options on the level of the command line.
The suboption parser can quote strings with " and [...]. Additionally, there is a special
form of quoting with %n% described below.
For example, assume the hypothetical foo filter can take multiple options:
mpv test.mkv --vf=foo:option1=value1:option2:option3=value3,bar
This passes option1 and option3 to the foo filter, with option2 as flag (implicitly
option2=yes), and adds a bar filter after that. If an option contains spaces or characters
like , or :, you need to quote them:
mpv '--vf=foo:option1="option value with spaces",bar'
Shells may actually strip some quotes from the string passed to the commandline, so the
example quotes the string twice, ensuring that mpv receives the " quotes.
The [...] form of quotes wraps everything between [ and ]. It's useful with shells that
don't interpret these characters in the middle of an argument (like bash). These quotes
are balanced (since mpv 0.9.0): the [ and ] nest, and the quote terminates on the last ]
that has no matching [ within the string. (For example, [a[b]c] results in a[b]c.)
The fixed-length quoting syntax is intended for use with external scripts and programs.
It is started with % and has the following format:
%n%string_of_length_n
Examples
mpv '--vf=foo:option1=%11%quoted text' test.avi
Or in a script:
mpv --vf=foo:option1=%`expr length "$NAME"`%"$NAME" test.avi
Note: where applicable with JSON-IPC, %n% is the length in UTF-8 bytes, after decoding the
JSON data.
Suboptions passed to the client API are also subject to escaping. Using
mpv_set_option_string() is exactly like passing --name=data to the command line (but
without shell processing of the string). Some options support passing values in a more
structured way instead of flat strings, and can avoid the suboption parsing mess. For
example, --vf supports MPV_FORMAT_NODE, which lets you pass suboptions as a nested data
structure of maps and arrays.
Paths
Some care must be taken when passing arbitrary paths and filenames to mpv. For example,
paths starting with - will be interpreted as options. Likewise, if a path contains the
sequence ://, the string before that might be interpreted as protocol prefix, even though
:// can be part of a legal UNIX path. To avoid problems with arbitrary paths, you should
be sure that absolute paths passed to mpv start with /, and prefix relative paths with ./.
Using the file:// pseudo-protocol is discouraged, because it involves strange URL
unescaping rules.
The name - itself is interpreted as stdin, and will cause mpv to disable console controls.
(Which makes it suitable for playing data piped to stdin.)
The special argument -- can be used to stop mpv from interpreting the following arguments
as options.
When using the client API, you should strictly avoid using mpv_command_string for invoking
the loadfile command, and instead prefer e.g. mpv_command to avoid the need for filename
escaping.
For paths passed to suboptions, the situation is further complicated by the need to escape
special characters. To work this around, the path can be additionally wrapped in the
fixed-length syntax, e.g. %n%string_of_length_n (see above).
Some mpv options interpret paths starting with ~. Currently, the prefix ~~home/ expands
to the mpv configuration directory (usually ~/.config/mpv/). ~/ expands to the user's
home directory. (The trailing / is always required.) The following paths are currently
recognized:
┌─────────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│Name │ Meaning │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~/ │ If the subpath exists in any of │
│ │ the mpv's config directories the │
│ │ path of the existing file/dir is │
│ │ returned. Otherwise this is │
│ │ equivalent to ~~home/. Note │
│ │ that if --no-config is used │
│ │ ~~/foobar will resolve to foobar │
│ │ which can be unexpected. │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~/ │ user home directory root │
│ │ (similar to shell, $HOME) │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~home/ │ mpv config dir (for example │
│ │ ~/.config/mpv/) │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~global/ │ the global config path, if │
│ │ available (not on win32) │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~osxbundle/ │ the macOS bundle resource path │
│ │ (macOS only) │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~desktop/ │ the path to the desktop (win32, │
│ │ macOS) │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~exe_dir/ │ win32 only: the path to the │
│ │ directory containing the exe │
│ │ (for config file purposes; │
│ │ $MPV_HOME overrides it) │
└─────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
│~~cache/ │ the path to application cache │
│ │ data (~/.cache/mpv/) On some │
│ │ platforms, this will be the same │
│ │ as ~~home/. │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~state/ │ the path to application state │
│ │ data (~/.local/state/mpv/) On │
│ │ some platforms, this will be the │
│ │ same as ~~home/. │
├─────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│~~old_home/ │ do not use │
└─────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
Per-File Options
When playing multiple files, any option given on the command line usually affects all
files. Example:
mpv --a file1.mkv --b file2.mkv --c
┌──────────┬────────────────┐
│File │ Active options │
├──────────┼────────────────┤
│file1.mkv │ --a --b --c │
├──────────┼────────────────┤
│file2.mkv │ --a --b --c │
└──────────┴────────────────┘
(This is different from MPlayer and mplayer2.)
Also, if any option is changed at runtime (via input commands), they are not reset when a
new file is played.
Sometimes, it is useful to change options per-file. This can be achieved by adding the
special per-file markers --{ and --}. (Note that you must escape these on some shells.)
Example:
mpv --a file1.mkv --b --\{ --c file2.mkv --d file3.mkv --e --\} file4.mkv --f
┌──────────┬─────────────────────────┐
│File │ Active options │
├──────────┼─────────────────────────┤
│file1.mkv │ --a --b --f │
├──────────┼─────────────────────────┤
│file2.mkv │ --a --b --f --c --d --e │
├──────────┼─────────────────────────┤
│file3.mkv │ --a --b --f --c --d --e │
├──────────┼─────────────────────────┤
│file4.mkv │ --a --b --f │
└──────────┴─────────────────────────┘
Additionally, any file-local option changed at runtime is reset when the current file
stops playing. If option --c is changed during playback of file2.mkv, it is reset when
advancing to file3.mkv. This only affects file-local options. The option --a is never
reset here.
List Options
Some options which store lists of option values can have action suffixes. For example, the
--display-tags option takes a ,-separated list of tags, but the option also allows you to
append a single tag with --display-tags-append, and the tag name can for example contain a
literal , without the need for escaping.
String list and path list options
String lists are separated by ,. The strings are not parsed or interpreted by the option
system itself. However, most path or file list options use : (Unix) or ; (Windows) as
separator, instead of ,.
They support the following operations:
┌────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│Suffix │ Meaning │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-set │ Set a list of items (using the │
│ │ list separator, escaped with │
│ │ backslash) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-append │ Append single item (does not │
│ │ interpret escapes) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-add │ Append 1 or more items (same │
│ │ syntax as -set) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-pre │ Prepend 1 or more items (same │
│ │ syntax as -set) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-clr │ Clear the option (remove all │
│ │ items) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-remove │ Delete item if present (does not │
│ │ interpret escapes) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-toggle │ Append an item, or remove if if │
│ │ it already exists (no escapes) │
└────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
-append is meant as a simple way to append a single item without having to escape the
argument (you may still need to escape on the shell level).
Key/value list options
A key/value list is a list of key/value string pairs. In programming languages, this type
of data structure is often called a map or a dictionary. The order normally does not
matter, although in some cases the order might matter.
They support the following operations:
┌────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│Suffix │ Meaning │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-set │ Set a list of items (using , as │
│ │ separator) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-append │ Append a single item (escapes │
│ │ for the key, no escapes for the │
│ │ value) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-add │ Append 1 or more items (same │
│ │ syntax as -set) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-remove │ Delete item by key if present │
│ │ (does not interpret escapes) │
└────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
Keys are unique within the list. If an already present key is set, the existing key is
removed before the new value is appended.
If you want to pass a value without interpreting it for escapes or ,, it is recommended to
use the -append variant. When using libmpv, prefer using MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP; when using a
scripting backend or the JSON IPC, use an appropriate structured data type.
Prior to mpv 0.33, : was also recognized as separator by -set.
Filter options
This is a very complex option type for the --af and --vf options only. They often require
complicated escaping. See VIDEO FILTERS for details. They support the following
operations:
┌────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│Suffix │ Meaning │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-set │ Set a list of filters (using , │
│ │ as separator) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-append │ Append single filter │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-add │ Append 1 or more filters (same │
│ │ syntax as -set) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-pre │ Prepend 1 or more filters (same │
│ │ syntax as -set) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-clr │ Clear the option (remove all │
│ │ filters) │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-remove │ Delete filter if present │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-toggle │ Append a filter, or remove if if │
│ │ it already exists │
├────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│-help │ Pseudo operation that prints a │
│ │ help text to the terminal │
└────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
General
Without suffix, the operation used is normally -set.
Although some operations allow specifying multiple items, using this is strongly
discouraged and deprecated, except for -set. There is a chance that operations like -add
and -pre will work like -append and accept a single, unescaped item only (so the ,
separator will not be interpreted and is passed on as part of the value).
Some options (like --sub-file, --audio-file, --glsl-shader) are aliases for the proper
option with -append action. For example, --sub-file is an alias for --sub-files-append.
Options of this type can be changed at runtime using the change-list command, which takes
the suffix (without the -) as separate operation parameter.
CONFIGURATION FILES
Location and Syntax
You can put all of the options in configuration files which will be read every time mpv is
run. The system-wide configuration file 'mpv.conf' is in your configuration directory
(e.g. /etc/mpv or /usr/local/etc/mpv), the user-specific one is ~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf.
For details and platform specifics (in particular Windows paths) see the FILES section.
User-specific options override system-wide options and options given on the command line
override both. The syntax of the configuration files is option=value. Everything after a #
is considered a comment. Options that work without values can be enabled by setting them
to yes and disabled by setting them to no, and if the value is omitted, yes is implied.
Even suboptions can be specified in this way.
Example configuration file
# Don't allow new windows to be larger than the screen.
autofit-larger=100%x100%
# Enable hardware decoding if available, =yes is implied.
hwdec
# Spaces don't have to be escaped.
osd-playing-msg=File: ${filename}
Escaping special characters
This is done like with command line options. A config entry can be quoted with ", ', as
well as with the fixed-length syntax (%n%) mentioned before. This is like passing the
exact contents of the quoted string as a command line option. C-style escapes are
currently _not_ interpreted on this level, although some options do this manually (this is
a mess and should probably be changed at some point). The shell is not involved here, so
option values only need to be quoted to escape # and \, ", ' or % at the beginning of the
value, and leading and trailing whitespace.
Putting Command Line Options into the Configuration File
Almost all command line options can be put into the configuration file. Here is a small
guide:
┌──────────────────┬──────────────────────────┐
│Option │ Configuration file entry │
├──────────────────┼──────────────────────────┤
│--flag │ flag │
├──────────────────┼──────────────────────────┤
│-opt val │ opt=val │
├──────────────────┼──────────────────────────┤
│--opt=val │ opt=val │
├──────────────────┼──────────────────────────┤
│-opt "has spaces" │ opt=has spaces │
└──────────────────┴──────────────────────────┘
File-specific Configuration Files
You can also write file-specific configuration files. If you wish to have a configuration
file for a file called 'video.avi', create a file named 'video.avi.conf' with the
file-specific options in it and put it in ~/.config/mpv/. You can also put the
configuration file in the same directory as the file to be played. Both require you to set
the --use-filedir-conf option (either on the command line or in your global config file).
If a file-specific configuration file is found in the same directory, no file-specific
configuration is loaded from ~/.config/mpv. In addition, the --use-filedir-conf option
enables directory-specific configuration files. For this, mpv first tries to load a
mpv.conf from the same directory as the file played and then tries to load any
file-specific configuration.
Profiles
To ease working with different configurations, profiles can be defined in the
configuration files. A profile starts with its name in square brackets, e.g. [my-profile].
All following options will be part of the profile. A description (shown by --profile=help)
can be defined with the profile-desc option. To end the profile, start another one or use
the profile name default to continue with normal options.
You can list profiles with --profile=help, and show the contents of a profile with
--show-profile=<name> (replace <name> with the profile name). You can apply profiles on
start with the --profile=<name> option, or at runtime with the apply-profile <name>
command.
Example mpv config file with profiles
# normal top-level option
fullscreen=yes
# a profile that can be enabled with --profile=big-cache
[big-cache]
cache=yes
demuxer-max-bytes=123400KiB
demuxer-readahead-secs=20
[slow]
profile-desc="some profile name"
# reference a builtin profile
profile=high-quality
[fast]
vo=vdpau
# using a profile again extends it
[slow]
framedrop=no
# you can also include other profiles
profile=big-cache
Runtime profiles
Profiles can be set at runtime with apply-profile command. Since this operation is
"destructive" (every item in a profile is simply set as an option, overwriting the
previous value), you can't just enable and disable profiles again.
As a partial remedy, there is a way to make profiles save old option values before
overwriting them with the profile values, and then restoring the old values at a later
point using apply-profile <profile-name> restore.
This can be enabled with the profile-restore option, which takes one of the following
options:
default
Does nothing, and nothing can be restored (default).
copy When applying a profile, copy the old values of all profile options to a backup
before setting them from the profile. These options are reset to their old
values using the backup when restoring.
Every profile has its own list of backed up values. If the backup already exists
(e.g. if apply-profile name was called more than once in a row), the existing
backup is no changed. The restore operation will remove the backup.
It's important to know that restoring does not "undo" setting an option, but
simply copies the old option value. Consider for example vf-add, appends an
entry to vf. This mechanism will simply copy the entire vf list, and does _not_
execute the inverse of vf-add (that would be vf-remove) on restoring.
Note that if a profile contains recursive profiles (via the profile option), the
options in these recursive profiles are treated as if they were part of this
profile. The referenced profile's backup list is not used when creating or using
the backup. Restoring a profile does not restore referenced profiles, only the
options of referenced profiles (as if they were part of the main profile).
copy-equal
Similar to copy, but restore an option only if it has the same value as the
value effectively set by the profile. This tries to deal with the situation when
the user does not want the option to be reset after interactively changing it.
Example
[something]
profile-restore=copy-equal
vf-add=rotate=PI/2 # rotate by 90 degrees
Then running these commands will result in behavior as commented:
set vf vflip
apply-profile something
vf add hflip
apply-profile something
# vf == vflip,rotate=PI/2,hflip,rotate=PI/2
apply-profile something restore
# vf == vflip
Conditional auto profiles
Profiles which have the profile-cond option set are applied automatically if the
associated condition matches (unless auto profiles are disabled). The option takes a
string, which is interpreted as Lua expression. If the expression evaluates as truthy, the
profile is applied. If the expression errors or evaluates as falsy, the profile is not
applied. This Lua code execution is not sandboxed.
Any variables in condition expressions can reference properties. If an identifier is not
already defined by Lua or mpv, it is interpreted as property. For example, pause would
return the current pause status. You cannot reference properties with - this way since
that would denote a subtraction, but if the variable name contains any _ characters, they
are turned into -. For example, playback_time would return the property playback-time.
A more robust way to access properties is using p.property_name or get("property-name",
default_value). The automatic variable to property magic will break if a new identifier
with the same name is introduced (for example, if a function named pause() were added,
pause would return a function value instead of the value of the pause property).
Note that if a property is not available, it will return nil, which can cause errors if
used in expressions. These are logged in verbose mode, and the expression is considered to
be false.
Whenever a property referenced by a profile condition changes, the condition is
re-evaluated. If the return value of the condition changes from falsy or error to truthy,
the profile is applied.
This mechanism tries to "unapply" profiles once the condition changes from truthy to falsy
or error. If you want to use this, you need to set profile-restore for the profile.
Another possibility it to create another profile with an inverse condition to undo the
other profile.
Recursive profiles can be used. But it is discouraged to reference other conditional
profiles in a conditional profile, since this can lead to tricky and unintuitive behavior.
Example
Make only HD video look funny:
[something]
profile-desc=HD video sucks
profile-cond=width >= 1280
hue=-50
Make only videos containing "youtube" or "youtu.be" in their path brighter:
[youtube]
profile-cond=path:find('youtu%.?be')
gamma=20
If you want the profile to be reverted if the condition goes to false again, you can
set profile-restore:
[something]
profile-desc=Mess up video when entering fullscreen
profile-cond=fullscreen
profile-restore=copy
vf-add=rotate=PI/2 # rotate by 90 degrees
This appends the rotate filter to the video filter chain when entering fullscreen. When
leaving fullscreen, the vf option is set to the value it had before entering
fullscreen. Note that this would also remove any other filters that were added during
fullscreen mode by the user. Avoiding this is trickier, and could for example be solved
by adding a second profile with an inverse condition and operation:
[something]
profile-cond=fullscreen
vf-add=@rot:rotate=PI/2
[something-inv]
profile-cond=not fullscreen
vf-remove=@rot
WARNING:
Every time an involved property changes, the condition is evaluated again. If your
condition uses p.playback_time for example, the condition is re-evaluated approximately
on every video frame. This is probably slow.
This feature is managed by an internal Lua script. Conditions are executed as Lua code
within this script. Its environment contains at least the following things:
(function environment table)
Every Lua function has an environment table. This is used for identifier access.
There is no named Lua symbol for it; it is implicit.
The environment does "magic" accesses to mpv properties. If an identifier is not
already defined in _G, it retrieves the mpv property of the same name. Any
occurrences of _ in the name are replaced with - before reading the property. The
returned value is as retrieved by mp.get_property_native(name). Internally, a cache
of property values, updated by observing the property is used instead, so
properties that are not observable will be stuck at the initial value forever.
If you want to access properties, that actually contain _ in the name, use get()
(which does not perform transliteration).
Internally, the environment table has a __index meta method set, which performs the
access logic.
p A "magic" table similar to the environment table. Unlike the latter, this does not
prefer accessing variables defined in _G - it always accesses properties.
get(name [, def])
Read a property and return its value. If the property value is nil (e.g. if the
property does not exist), def is returned.
This is superficially similar to mp.get_property_native(name). An important
difference is that this accesses the property cache, and enables the change
detection logic (which is essential to the dynamic runtime behavior of auto
profiles). Also, it does not return an error value as second return value.
The "magic" tables mentioned above use this function as backend. It does not
perform the _ transliteration.
In addition, the same environment as in a blank mpv Lua script is present. For example,
math is defined and gives access to the Lua standard math library.
WARNING:
This feature is subject to change indefinitely. You might be forced to adjust your
profiles on mpv updates.
Legacy auto profiles
Some profiles are loaded automatically using a legacy mechanism. The following example
demonstrates this:
Auto profile loading
[extension.mkv]
profile-desc="profile for .mkv files"
vf=vflip
The profile name follows the schema type.name, where type can be protocol for the
input/output protocol in use (see --list-protocols), and extension for the extension of
the path of the currently played file (not the file format).
This feature is very limited, and is considered soft-deprecated. Use conditional auto
profiles.
USING MPV FROM OTHER PROGRAMS OR SCRIPTS
There are three choices for using mpv from other programs or scripts:
1. Calling it as UNIX process. If you do this, do not parse terminal output. The
terminal output is intended for humans, and may change any time. In addition,
terminal behavior itself may change any time. Compatibility cannot be guaranteed.
Your code should work even if you pass --no-terminal. Do not attempt to simulate
user input by sending terminal control codes to mpv's stdin. If you need
interactive control, using --input-ipc-server is recommended. This gives you access
to the JSON IPC over unix domain sockets (or named pipes on Windows).
Depending on what you do, passing --no-config or --config-dir may be a good idea to
avoid conflicts with the normal mpv user configuration intended for CLI playback.
Using --input-ipc-server is also suitable for purposes like remote control (however,
the IPC protocol itself is not "secure" and not intended to be so).
2. Using libmpv. This is generally recommended when mpv is used as playback backend for
a completely different application. The provided C API is very close to CLI
mechanisms and the scripting API.
Note that even though libmpv has different defaults, it can be configured to work
exactly like the CLI player (except command line parsing is unavailable).
See EMBEDDING INTO OTHER PROGRAMS (LIBMPV).
3. As a user script (LUA SCRIPTING, JAVASCRIPT, C PLUGINS). This is recommended when
the goal is to "enhance" the CLI player. Scripts get access to the entire client API
of mpv.
This is the standard way to create third-party extensions for the player.
All these access the client API, which is the sum of the various mechanisms provided by
the player core, as documented here: OPTIONS, List of Input Commands, Properties, List of
events (also see C API), Hooks.
TAKING SCREENSHOTS
Screenshots of the currently played file can be taken using the 'screenshot' input mode
command, which is by default bound to the s key. Files named mpv-shotNNNN.jpg will be
saved in the working directory, using the first available number - no files will be
overwritten. In pseudo-GUI mode, the screenshot will be saved somewhere else. See PSEUDO
GUI MODE.
A screenshot will usually contain the unscaled video contents at the end of the video
filter chain and subtitles. By default, S takes screenshots without subtitles, while s
includes subtitles.
Unlike with MPlayer, the screenshot video filter is not required. This filter was never
required in mpv, and has been removed.
TERMINAL STATUS LINE
During playback, mpv shows the playback status on the terminal. It looks like something
like this:
AV: 00:03:12 / 00:24:25 (13%) A-V: -0.000
The status line can be overridden with the --term-status-msg option.
The following is a list of things that can show up in the status line. Input properties,
that can be used to get the same information manually, are also listed.
• AV: or V: (video only) or A: (audio only)
• The current time position in HH:MM:SS format (playback-time property)
• The total file duration (absent if unknown) (duration property)
• Playback speed, e.g. x2.0. Only visible if the speed is not normal. This is the
user-requested speed, and not the actual speed (usually they should be the same, unless
playback is too slow). (speed property.)
• Playback percentage, e.g. (13%). How much of the file has been played. Normally
calculated out of playback position and duration, but can fallback to other methods
(like byte position) if these are not available. (percent-pos property.)
• The audio/video sync as A-V: 0.000. This is the difference between audio and video
time. Normally it should be 0 or close to 0. If it's growing, it might indicate a
playback problem. (avsync property.)
• Total A/V sync change, e.g. ct: -0.417. Normally invisible. Can show up if there is
audio "missing", or not enough frames can be dropped. Usually this will indicate a
problem. (total-avsync-change property.)
• Encoding state in {...}, only shown in encoding mode.
• Display sync state. If display sync is active (display-sync-active property), this shows
DS: 2.500/13, where the first number is average number of vsyncs per video frame (e.g.
2.5 when playing 24Hz videos on 60Hz screens), which might jitter if the ratio doesn't
round off, or there are mistimed frames (vsync-ratio), and the second number of
estimated number of vsyncs which took too long (vo-delayed-frame-count property). The
latter is a heuristic, as it's generally not possible to determine this with certainty.
• Dropped frames, e.g. Dropped: 4. Shows up only if the count is not 0. Can grow if the
video framerate is higher than that of the display, or if video rendering is too slow.
May also be incremented on "hiccups" and when the video frame couldn't be displayed on
time. (frame-drop-count property.) If the decoder drops frames, the number of
decoder-dropped frames is appended to the display as well, e.g.: Dropped: 4/34. This
happens only if decoder frame dropping is enabled with the --framedrop options.
(decoder-frame-drop-count property.)
• Cache state, e.g. Cache: 2s/134KB. Visible if the stream cache is enabled. The first
value shows the amount of video buffered in the demuxer in seconds, the second value
shows the estimated size of the buffered amount in kilobytes. (demuxer-cache-duration
and demuxer-cache-state properties.)
LOW LATENCY PLAYBACK
mpv is optimized for normal video playback, meaning it actually tries to buffer as much
data as it seems to make sense. This will increase latency. Reducing latency is possible
only by specifically disabling features which increase latency.
The builtin low-latency profile tries to apply some of the options which can reduce
latency. You can use --profile=low-latency to apply all of them. You can list the
contents with --show-profile=low-latency (some of the options are quite obscure, and may
change every mpv release).
Be aware that some of the options can reduce playback quality.
Most latency is actually caused by inconvenient timing behavior. You can disable this with
--untimed, but it will likely break, unless the stream has no audio, and the input feeds
data to the player at a constant rate.
Another common problem is with MJPEG streams. These do not signal the correct framerate.
Using --untimed or --no-correct-pts --container-fps-override=60 might help.
For livestreams, data can build up due to pausing the stream, due to slightly lower
playback rate, or "buffering" pauses. If the demuxer cache is enabled, these can be
skipped manually. The experimental drop-buffers command can be used to discard any
buffered data, though it's very disruptive.
In some cases, manually tuning TCP buffer sizes and such can help to reduce latency.
Additional options that can be tried:
• --opengl-glfinish=yes, can reduce buffering in the graphics driver
• --opengl-swapinterval=0, same
• --vo=xv, same
• without audio --framedrop=no --speed=1.01 may help for live sources (results can be
mixed)
RESUMING PLAYBACK
mpv is capable of storing the playback position of the currently playing file and resume
from there the next time that file is played. This is done with the commands
quit-watch-later (bound to Shift+Q by default) and write-watch-later-config, and with the
--save-position-on-quit option.
The difference between always quitting with a key bound to quit-watch-later and using
--save-position-on-quit is that the latter will save the playback position even when mpv
is closed with a method other than a keybinding, for example if you shutdown your system
without closing mpv beforehand, unless of course mpv is terminated abruptly and doesn't
have the time to save (e.g. with the KILL Unix signal).
mpv also stores options other than the playback position when they have been modified
after playback began, for example the volume and selected audio/subtitles, and restores
their values the next time the file is played. Which options are saved can be configured
with the --watch-later-options option.
When playing multiple playlist entries, mpv checks if one them has a resume config file
associated, and if it finds one it restarts playback from it. For example, if you use
quit-watch-later on the 5th episode of a show, and later play all the episodes, mpv will
automatically resume playback from episode 5.
More options to configure this functionality are listed in Watch Later.
PROTOCOLS
http://..., https://, ...
Many network protocols are supported, but the protocol prefix must always be specified.
mpv will never attempt to guess whether a filename is actually a network address. A
protocol prefix is always required.
Note that not all prefixes are documented here. Undocumented prefixes are either
aliases to documented protocols, or are just redirections to protocols implemented and
documented in FFmpeg.
data: is supported in FFmpeg (not in Libav), but needs to be in the format data://.
This is done to avoid ambiguity with filenames. You can also prefix it with lavf:// or
ffmpeg://.
ytdl://...
By default, the youtube-dl hook script only looks at http(s) URLs. Prefixing an URL
with ytdl:// forces it to be always processed by the script. This can also be used to
invoke special youtube-dl functionality like playing a video by ID or invoking search.
Keep in mind that you can't pass youtube-dl command line options by this, and you have
to use --ytdl-raw-options instead.
-
Play data from stdin.
smb://PATH
Play a path from Samba share. (Requires FFmpeg support.)
bd://[title][/device] --bluray-device=PATH
Play a Blu-ray disc. Since libbluray 1.0.1, you can read from ISO files by passing them
to --bluray-device.
title can be: longest or first (selects the default playlist); mpls/<number> (selects
<number>.mpls playlist); <number> (select playlist with the same index). mpv will list
the available playlists on loading.
bluray:// is an alias.
dvd://[title][/device] --dvd-device=PATH
Play a DVD. DVD menus are not supported. If no title is given, the longest title is
auto-selected. Without --dvd-device, it will probably try to open an actual optical
drive, if available and implemented for the OS.
dvdnav:// is an old alias for dvd:// and does exactly the same thing.
dvb://[cardnumber@]channel --dvbin-...
Digital TV via DVB. (Linux only.)
mf://[filemask|@listfile] --mf-...
Play a series of images as video.
cdda://[device] --cdrom-device=PATH --cdda-...
Play CD.
lavf://...
Access any FFmpeg/Libav libavformat protocol. Basically, this passed the string after
the // directly to libavformat.
av://type:options
This is intended for using libavdevice inputs. type is the libavdevice demuxer name,
and options is the (pseudo-)filename passed to the demuxer.
Example
mpv av://v4l2:/dev/video0 --profile=low-latency --untimed
This plays video from the first v4l input with nearly the lowest latency possible.
It's a good replacement for the removed tv:// input. Using --untimed is a hack to
output a captured frame immediately, instead of respecting the input framerate.
(There may be better ways to handle this in the future.)
avdevice:// is an alias.
file://PATH
A local path as URL. Might be useful in some special use-cases. Note that PATH itself
should start with a third / to make the path an absolute path.
appending://PATH
Play a local file, but assume it's being appended to. This is useful for example for
files that are currently being downloaded to disk. This will block playback, and stop
playback only if no new data was appended after a timeout of about 2 seconds.
Using this is still a bit of a bad idea, because there is no way to detect if a file is
actually being appended, or if it's still written. If you're trying to play the output
of some program, consider using a pipe (something | mpv -). If it really has to be a
file on disk, use tail to make it wait forever, e.g. tail -f -c +0 file.mkv | mpv -.
fd://123
Read data from the given file descriptor (for example 123). This is similar to piping
data to stdin via -, but can use an arbitrary file descriptor. mpv may modify some
file descriptor properties when the stream layer "opens" it.
fdclose://123
Like fd://, but the file descriptor is closed after use. When using this you need to
ensure that the same fd URL will only be used once.
edl://[edl specification as in edl-mpv.rst]
Stitch together parts of multiple files and play them.
slice://start[-end]@URL
Read a slice of a stream.
start and end represent a byte range and accept suffixes such as KiB and MiB. end is
optional.
if end starts with +, it is considered as offset from start.
Only works with seekable streams.
Examples:
mpv slice://1g-2g@cap.ts
This starts reading from cap.ts after seeking 1 GiB, then
reads until reaching 2 GiB or end of file.
mpv slice://1g-+2g@cap.ts
This starts reading from cap.ts after seeking 1 GiB, then
reads until reaching 3 GiB or end of file.
mpv slice://100m@appending://cap.ts
This starts reading from cap.ts after seeking 100MiB, then
reads until end of file.
null://
Simulate an empty file. If opened for writing, it will discard all data. The null
demuxer will specifically pass autoprobing if this protocol is used (while it's not
automatically invoked for empty files).
memory://data
Use the data part as source data.
hex://data
Like memory://, but the string is interpreted as hexdump.
PSEUDO GUI MODE
mpv has no official GUI, other than the OSC (ON SCREEN CONTROLLER), which is not a full
GUI and is not meant to be. However, to compensate for the lack of expected GUI behavior,
mpv will in some cases start with some settings changed to behave slightly more like a GUI
mode.
Currently this happens only in the following cases:
• if started using the mpv.desktop file on Linux (e.g. started from menus or file
associations provided by desktop environments)
• if started from explorer.exe on Windows (technically, if it was started on Windows, and
all of the stdout/stderr/stdin handles are unset)
• started out of the bundle on macOS
• if you manually use --player-operation-mode=pseudo-gui on the command line
This mode applies options from the builtin profile builtin-pseudo-gui, but only if these
haven't been set in the user's config file or on the command line, which is the main
difference to using --profile=builtin-pseudo-gui.
The profile is currently defined as follows:
[builtin-pseudo-gui]
terminal=no
force-window=yes
idle=once
screenshot-directory=~~desktop/
The pseudo-gui profile exists for compatibility. The options in the pseudo-gui profile are
applied unconditionally. In addition, the profile makes sure to enable the pseudo-GUI
mode, so that --profile=pseudo-gui works like in older mpv releases:
[pseudo-gui]
player-operation-mode=pseudo-gui
WARNING:
Currently, you can extend the pseudo-gui profile in the config file the normal way.
This is deprecated. In future mpv releases, the behavior might change, and not apply
your additional settings, and/or use a different profile name.
LINUX DESKTOP ISSUES
This subsection describes common problems on the Linux desktop. None of these problems
exist on systems like Windows or macOS.
Disabling Screensaver
By default, mpv tries to disable the OS screensaver during playback (only if a VO using
the OS GUI API is active). --stop-screensaver=no disables this.
A common problem is that Linux desktop environments ignore the standard screensaver APIs
on which mpv relies. In particular, mpv uses the Screen Saver extension (XSS) on X11, and
the idle-inhibit protocol on Wayland.
Before mpv 0.33.0, the X11 backend ran xdg-screensaver reset in 10 second intervals when
not paused in order to support screensaver inhibition in these environments. This
functionality was removed in 0.33.0, but it is possible to call the xdg-screensaver
command line program from a user script instead.
OPTIONS
Track Selection
--alang=<languagecode[,languagecode,...]>
Specify a priority list of audio languages to use, as IETF language tags.
Equivalent ISO 639-1 two-letter and ISO 639-2 three-letter codes are treated the
same. The first tag in the list whose language matches a track in the file will be
used. A track that matches more subtags will be preferred over one that matches
fewer, with preference given to earlier subtags over later ones. See also --aid.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Examples
• mpv dvd://1 --alang=hu,en chooses the Hungarian language track on a DVD and
falls back on English if Hungarian is not available.
• mpv --alang=jpn example.mkv plays a Matroska file with Japanese audio.
--slang=<languagecode[,languagecode,...]>
Equivalent to --alang, for subtitle tracks.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Examples
• mpv dvd://1 --slang=hu,en chooses the Hungarian subtitle track on a DVD and
falls back on English if Hungarian is not available.
• mpv --slang=jpn example.mkv plays a Matroska file with Japanese subtitles.
• mpv --slang=pt-BR example.mkv plays a Matroska file with Brazilian Portuguese
subtitles if available, and otherwise any Portuguese subtitles.
--vlang=<...>
Equivalent to --alang and --slang, for video tracks.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
--aid=<ID|auto|no>
Select audio track. auto selects the default, no disables audio. See also --alang.
mpv normally prints available audio tracks on the terminal when starting playback
of a file.
--audio is an alias for --aid.
--aid=no or --audio=no or --no-audio disables audio playback. (The latter variant
does not work with the client API.)
NOTE:
The track selection options (--aid but also --sid and the others) sometimes
expose behavior that may appear strange. Also, the behavior tends to change
around with each mpv release.
The track selection properties will return the option value outside of playback
(as expected), but during playback, the affective track selection is returned.
For example, with --aid=auto, the aid property will suddenly return 2 after
playback initialization (assuming the file has at least 2 audio tracks, and the
second is the default).
At mpv 0.32.0 (and some releases before), if you passed a track value for which
a corresponding track didn't exist (e.g. --aid=2 and there was only 1 audio
track), the aid property returned no. However if another audio track was added
during playback, and you tried to set the aid property to 2, nothing happened,
because the aid option still had the value 2, and writing the same value has no
effect.
With mpv 0.33.0, the behavior was changed. Now track selection options are reset
to auto at playback initialization, if the option had tries to select a track
that does not exist. The same is done if the track exists, but fails to
initialize. The consequence is that unlike before mpv 0.33.0, the user's track
selection parameters are clobbered in certain situations.
Also since mpv 0.33.0, trying to select a track by number will strictly select
this track. Before this change, trying to select a track which did not exist
would fall back to track default selection at playback initialization. The new
behavior is more consistent.
Setting a track selection property at runtime, and then playing a new file might
reset the track selection to defaults, if the fingerprint of the track list of
the new file is different.
Be aware of tricky combinations of all of all of the above: for example, mpv
--aid=2 file_with_2_audio_tracks.mkv file_with_1_audio_track.mkv would first
play the correct track, and the second file without audio. If you then go back
the first file, its first audio track will be played, and the second file is
played with audio. If you do the same thing again but instead of using --aid=2
you run set aid 2 while the file is playing, then changing to the second file
will play its audio track. This is because runtime selection enables the
fingerprint heuristic.
Most likely this is not the end.
--sid=<ID|auto|no>
Display the subtitle stream specified by <ID>. auto selects the default, no
disables subtitles.
--sub is an alias for --sid.
--sid=no or --sub=no or --no-sub disables subtitle decoding. (The latter variant
does not work with the client API.)
--vid=<ID|auto|no>
Select video channel. auto selects the default, no disables video.
--video is an alias for --vid.
--vid=no or --video=no or --no-video disables video playback. (The latter variant
does not work with the client API.)
If video is disabled, mpv will try to download the audio only if media is streamed
with youtube-dl, because it saves bandwidth. This is done by setting the
ytdl_format to "bestaudio/best" in the ytdl_hook.lua script.
--edition=<ID|auto>
(Matroska files only) Specify the edition (set of chapters) to use, where 0 is the
first. If set to auto (the default), mpv will choose the first edition declared as
a default, or if there is no default, the first edition defined.
--track-auto-selection=<yes|no>
Enable the default track auto-selection (default: yes). Enabling this will make the
player select streams according to --aid, --alang, and others. If it is disabled,
no tracks are selected. In addition, the player will not exit if no tracks are
selected, and wait instead (this wait mode is similar to pausing, but the pause
option is not set).
This is useful with --lavfi-complex: you can start playback in this mode, and then
set select tracks at runtime by setting the filter graph. Note that if
--lavfi-complex is set before playback is started, the referenced tracks are always
selected.
--subs-with-matching-audio=<yes|no>
When autoselecting a subtitle track, select a full/non-forced one even if the
selected audio stream matches your preferred subtitle language (default: yes). If
this option is set to no, a non-forced subtitle track that matches the audio
language will never be autoselected by mpv regardless of the value of --slang or
--subs-fallback.
--subs-match-os-language=<yes|no>
When autoselecting a subtitle track, select the track that matches the language of
your OS if the audio stream is in a different language if suitable (default track
or a forced track under the right conditions). Note that if -slang is set, this
will be completely ignored (default: yes).
--subs-fallback=<yes|default|no>
When autoselecting a subtitle track, if no tracks match your preferred languages,
select a full track even if it doesn't match your preferred subtitle language
(default: default). Setting this to default means that only streams flagged as
default will be selected.
--subs-fallback-forced=<yes|no|always>
When autoselecting a subtitle track, the default value of yes will prefer using a
forced subtitle track if the subtitle language matches the audio language and
matches your list of preferred languages. The special value always will only select
forced subtitle tracks and never fallback on a non-forced track. Conversely, no
will never select a forced subtitle track.
Playback Control
--start=<relative time>
Seek to given time position.
The general format for times is [+|-][[hh:]mm:]ss[.ms]. If the time is prefixed
with -, the time is considered relative from the end of the file (as signaled by
the demuxer/the file). A + is usually ignored (but see below).
The following alternative time specifications are recognized:
pp% seeks to percent position pp (0-100).
#c seeks to chapter number c. (Chapters start from 1.)
none resets any previously set option (useful for libmpv).
If --rebase-start-time=no is given, then prefixing times with + makes the time
relative to the start of the file. A timestamp without prefix is considered an
absolute time, i.e. should seek to a frame with a timestamp as the file contains
it. As a bug, but also a hidden feature, putting 1 or more spaces before the + or -
always interprets the time as absolute, which can be used to seek to negative
timestamps (useful for debugging at most).
Examples
--start=+56, --start=00:56
Seeks to the start time + 56 seconds.
--start=-56, --start=-00:56
Seeks to the end time - 56 seconds.
--start=01:10:00
Seeks to 1 hour 10 min.
--start=50%
Seeks to the middle of the file.
--start=30 --end=40
Seeks to 30 seconds, plays 10 seconds, and exits.
--start=-3:20 --length=10
Seeks to 3 minutes and 20 seconds before the end of the file, plays 10
seconds, and exits.
--start='#2' --end='#4'
Plays chapters 2 and 3, and exits.
--end=<relative time>
Stop at given time. Use --length if the time should be relative to --start. See
--start for valid option values and examples.
--length=<relative time>
Stop after a given time relative to the start time. See --start for valid option
values and examples.
If both --end and --length are provided, playback will stop when it reaches either
of the two endpoints.
Obscurity note: this does not work correctly if --rebase-start-time=no, and the
specified time is not an "absolute" time, as defined in the --start option
description.
--rebase-start-time=<yes|no>
Whether to move the file start time to 00:00:00 (default: yes). This is less
awkward for files which start at a random timestamp, such as transport streams. On
the other hand, if there are timestamp resets, the resulting behavior can be rather
weird. For this reason, and in case you are actually interested in the real
timestamps, this behavior can be disabled with no.
--speed=<0.01-100>
Slow down or speed up playback by the factor given as parameter.
If --audio-pitch-correction (on by default) is used, playing with a speed higher
than normal automatically inserts the scaletempo2 audio filter.
--pause
Start the player in paused state.
--shuffle
Play files in random order.
--playlist-start=<auto|index>
Set which file on the internal playlist to start playback with. The index is an
integer, with 0 meaning the first file. The value auto means that the selection of
the entry to play is left to the playback resume mechanism (default). If an entry
with the given index doesn't exist, the behavior is unspecified and might change in
future mpv versions. The same applies if the playlist contains further playlists
(don't expect any reasonable behavior). Passing a playlist file to mpv should work
with this option, though. E.g. mpv playlist.m3u --playlist-start=123 will work as
expected, as long as playlist.m3u does not link to further playlists.
The value no is a deprecated alias for auto.
--playlist=<filename>
Play files according to a playlist file. Supports some common formats. If no format
is detected, it will be treated as list of files, separated by newline characters.
You may need this option to load plaintext files as a playlist. Note that XML
playlist formats are not supported.
This option forces --demuxer=playlist to interpret the playlist file. Some
playlist formats, notably CUE and optical disc formats, need to use different
demuxers and will not work with this option. They still can be played directly,
without using this option.
You can play playlists directly, without this option. Before mpv version 0.31.0,
this option disabled any security mechanisms that might be in place, but since
0.31.0 it uses the same security mechanisms as playing a playlist file directly. If
you trust the playlist file, you can disable any security checks with
--load-unsafe-playlists. Because playlists can load other playlist entries,
consider applying this option only to the playlist itself and not its entries,
using something along these lines:
mpv --{ --playlist=filename --load-unsafe-playlists --}
WARNING:
The way older versions of mpv played playlist files via --playlist was not safe
against maliciously constructed files. Such files may trigger harmful actions.
This has been the case for all versions of mpv prior to 0.31.0, and all MPlayer
versions, but unfortunately this fact was not well documented earlier, and some
people have even misguidedly recommended the use of --playlist with untrusted
sources. Do NOT use --playlist with random internet sources or files you do not
trust if you are not sure your mpv is at least 0.31.0.
In particular, playlists can contain entries using protocols other than local
files, such as special protocols like avdevice:// (which are inherently unsafe).
--chapter-merge-threshold=<number>
Threshold for merging almost consecutive ordered chapter parts in milliseconds
(default: 100). Some Matroska files with ordered chapters have inaccurate chapter
end timestamps, causing a small gap between the end of one chapter and the start of
the next one when they should match. If the end of one playback part is less than
the given threshold away from the start of the next one then keep playing video
normally over the chapter change instead of doing a seek.
--chapter-seek-threshold=<seconds>
Distance in seconds from the beginning of a chapter within which a backward chapter
seek will go to the previous chapter (default: 5.0). Past this threshold, a
backward chapter seek will go to the beginning of the current chapter instead. A
negative value means always go back to the previous chapter.
--hr-seek=<no|absolute|yes|default>
Select when to use precise seeks that are not limited to keyframes. Such seeks
require decoding video from the previous keyframe up to the target position and so
can take some time depending on decoding performance. For some video formats,
precise seeks are disabled. This option selects the default choice to use for
seeks; it is possible to explicitly override that default in the definition of key
bindings and in input commands.
no Never use precise seeks.
absolute
Use precise seeks if the seek is to an absolute position in the file, such
as a chapter seek, but not for relative seeks like the default behavior of
arrow keys.
default
Like absolute, but enable hr-seeks in audio-only cases. The exact behavior
is implementation specific and may change with new releases (default).
yes Use precise seeks whenever possible.
always Same as yes (for compatibility).
--hr-seek-demuxer-offset=<seconds>
This option exists to work around failures to do precise seeks (as in --hr-seek)
caused by bugs or limitations in the demuxers for some file formats. Some demuxers
fail to seek to a keyframe before the given target position, going to a later
position instead. The value of this option is subtracted from the time stamp given
to the demuxer. Thus, if you set this option to 1.5 and try to do a precise seek to
60 seconds, the demuxer is told to seek to time 58.5, which hopefully reduces the
chance that it erroneously goes to some time later than 60 seconds. The downside of
setting this option is that precise seeks become slower, as video between the
earlier demuxer position and the real target may be unnecessarily decoded.
--hr-seek-framedrop=<yes|no>
Allow the video decoder to drop frames during seek, if these frames are before the
seek target. If this is enabled, precise seeking can be faster, but if you're using
video filters which modify timestamps or add new frames, it can lead to precise
seeking skipping the target frame. This e.g. can break frame backstepping when
deinterlacing is enabled.
Default: yes
--index=<mode>
Controls how to seek in files. Note that if the index is missing from a file, it
will be built on the fly by default, so you don't need to change this. But it might
help with some broken files.
default
use an index if the file has one, or build it if missing
recreate
don't read or use the file's index
NOTE:
This option only works if the underlying media supports seeking (i.e. not with
stdin, pipe, etc).
--load-unsafe-playlists
Load URLs from playlists which are considered unsafe (default: no). This includes
special protocols and anything that doesn't refer to normal files. Local files and
HTTP links on the other hand are always considered safe.
In addition, if a playlist is loaded while this is set, the added playlist entries
are not marked as originating from network or potentially unsafe location.
(Instead, the behavior is as if the playlist entries were provided directly to mpv
command line or loadfile command.)
--access-references=<yes|no>
Follow any references in the file being opened (default: yes). Disabling this is
helpful if the file is automatically scanned (e.g. thumbnail generation). If the
thumbnail scanner for example encounters a playlist file, which contains network
URLs, and the scanner should not open these, enabling this option will prevent it.
This option also disables ordered chapters, mov reference files, opening of
archives, and a number of other features.
On older FFmpeg versions, this will not work in some cases. Some FFmpeg demuxers
might not respect this option.
This option does not prevent opening of paired subtitle files and such. Use
--autoload-files=no to prevent this.
This option does not always work if you open non-files (for example using
dvd://directory would open a whole bunch of files in the given directory).
Prefixing the filename with ./ if it doesn't start with a / will avoid this.
--loop-playlist=<N|inf|force|no>, --loop-playlist
Loops playback N times. A value of 1 plays it one time (default), 2 two times, etc.
inf means forever. no is the same as 1 and disables looping. If several files are
specified on command line, the entire playlist is looped. --loop-playlist is the
same as --loop-playlist=inf.
The force mode is like inf, but does not skip playlist entries which have been
marked as failing. This means the player might waste CPU time trying to loop a file
that doesn't exist. But it might be useful for playing webradios under very bad
network conditions.
--loop-file=<N|inf|no>, --loop=<N|inf|no>
Loop a single file N times. inf means forever, no means normal playback. For
compatibility, --loop-file and --loop-file=yes are also accepted, and are the same
as --loop-file=inf.
The difference to --loop-playlist is that this doesn't loop the playlist, just the
file itself. If the playlist contains only a single file, the difference between
the two option is that this option performs a seek on loop, instead of reloading
the file.
NOTE:
--loop-file counts the number of times it causes the player to seek to the
beginning of the file, not the number of full playthroughs. This means
--loop-file=1 will end up playing the file twice. Contrast with --loop-playlist,
which counts the number of full playthroughs.
--loop is an alias for this option.
--ab-loop-a=<time>, --ab-loop-b=<time>
Set loop points. If playback passes the b timestamp, it will seek to the a
timestamp. Seeking past the b point doesn't loop (this is intentional).
If a is after b, the behavior is as if the points were given in the right order,
and the player will seek to b after crossing through a. This is different from old
behavior, where looping was disabled (and as a bug, looped back to a on the end of
the file).
If either options are set to no (or unset), looping is disabled. This is different
from old behavior, where an unset a implied the start of the file, and an unset b
the end of the file.
The loop-points can be adjusted at runtime with the corresponding properties. See
also ab-loop command.
--ab-loop-count=<N|inf>
Run A-B loops only N times, then ignore the A-B loop points (default: inf). Every
finished loop iteration will decrement this option by 1 (unless it is set to inf or
0). inf means that looping goes on forever. If this option is set to 0, A-B looping
is ignored, and even the ab-loop command will not enable looping again (the command
will show (disabled) on the OSD message if both loop points are set, but
ab-loop-count is 0).
--ordered-chapters, --no-ordered-chapters
Enabled by default. Disable support for Matroska ordered chapters. mpv will not
load or search for video segments from other files, and will also ignore any
chapter order specified for the main file.
--ordered-chapters-files=<playlist-file>
Loads the given file as playlist, and tries to use the files contained in it as
reference files when opening a Matroska file that uses ordered chapters. This
overrides the normal mechanism for loading referenced files by scanning the same
directory the main file is located in.
Useful for loading ordered chapter files that are not located on the local
filesystem, or if the referenced files are in different directories.
Note: a playlist can be as simple as a text file containing filenames separated by
newlines.
--chapters-file=<filename>
Load chapters from this file, instead of using the chapter metadata found in the
main file.
This accepts a media file (like mkv) or even a pseudo-format like ffmetadata and
uses its chapters to replace the current file's chapters. This doesn't work with
OGM or XML chapters directly.
--sstep=<sec>
Skip <sec> seconds after every frame.
NOTE:
Without --hr-seek, skipping will snap to keyframes.
--stop-playback-on-init-failure=<yes|no>
Stop playback if either audio or video fails to initialize (default: no). With no,
playback will continue in video-only or audio-only mode if one of them fails. This
doesn't affect playback of audio-only or video-only files.
--play-direction=<forward|+|backward|->
Control the playback direction (default: forward). Setting backward will attempt to
play the file in reverse direction, with decreasing playback time. If this is set
on playback starts, playback will start from the end of the file. If this is
changed at during playback, a hr-seek will be issued to change the direction.
+ and - are aliases for forward and backward.
The rest of this option description pertains to the backward mode.
NOTE:
Backward playback is extremely fragile. It may not always work, is much slower
than forward playback, and breaks certain other features. How well it works
depends mainly on the file being played. Generally, it will show good results
(or results at all) only if the stars align.
mpv, as well as most media formats, were designed for forward playback only.
Backward playback is bolted on top of mpv, and tries to make a medium effort to
make backward playback work. Depending on your use-case, another tool may work much
better.
Backward playback is not exactly a 1st class feature. Implementation tradeoffs were
made, that are bad for backward playback, but in turn do not cause disadvantages
for normal playback. Various possible optimizations are not implemented in order to
keep the complexity down. Normally, a media player is highly pipelined (future data
is prepared in separate threads, so it is available in realtime when the next stage
needs it), but backward playback will essentially stall the pipeline at various
random points.
For example, for intra-only codecs are trivially backward playable, and tools built
around them may make efficient use of them (consider video editors or camera
viewers). mpv won't be efficient in this case, because it uses its generic backward
playback algorithm, that on top of it is not very optimized.
If you just want to quickly go backward through the video and just show
"keyframes", just use forward playback, and hold down the left cursor key (which on
CLI with default config sends many small relative seek commands).
The implementation consists of mostly 3 parts:
• Backward demuxing. This relies on the demuxer cache, so the demuxer cache should
(or must, didn't test it) be enabled, and its size will affect performance. If
the cache is too small or too large, quadratic runtime behavior may result.
• Backward decoding. The decoder library used (libavcodec) does not support this.
It is emulated by feeding bits of data in forward, putting the result in a queue,
returning the queue data to the VO in reverse, and then starting over at an
earlier position. This can require buffering an extreme amount of decoded data,
and also completely breaks pipelining.
• Backward output. This is relatively simple, because the decoder returns the
frames in the needed order. However, this may cause various problems because
filters see audio and video going backward.
Known problems:
• It's fragile. If anything doesn't work, random non-useful behavior may occur. In
simple cases, the player will just play nonsense and artifacts. In other cases,
it may get stuck or heat the CPU. (Exceeding memory usage significantly beyond
the user-set limits would be a bug, though.)
• Performance and resource usage isn't good. In part this is inherent to backward
playback of normal media formats, and in parts due to implementation choices and
tradeoffs.
• This is extremely reliant on good demuxer behavior. Although backward demuxing
requires no special demuxer support, it is required that the demuxer performs
seeks reliably, fulfills some specific requirements about packet metadata, and
has deterministic behavior.
• Starting playback exactly from the end may or may not work, depending on seeking
behavior and file duration detection.
• Some container formats, audio, and video codecs are not supported due to their
behavior. There is no list, and the player usually does not detect them. Certain
live streams (including TV captures) may exhibit problems in particular, as well
as some lossy audio codecs. h264 intra-refresh is known not to work due to
problems with libavcodec. WAV and some other raw audio formats tend to have
problems - there are hacks for dealing with them, which may or may not work.
• Backward demuxing of subtitles is not supported. Subtitle display still works for
some external text subtitle formats. (These are fully read into memory, and only
backward display is needed.) Text subtitles that are cached in the subtitle
renderer also have a chance to be displayed correctly.
• Some features dealing with playback of broken or hard to deal with files will not
work fully (such as timestamp correction).
• If demuxer low level seeks (i.e. seeking the actual demuxer instead of just
within the demuxer cache) are performed by backward playback, the created seek
ranges may not join, because not enough overlap is achieved.
• Trying to use this with hardware video decoding will probably exhaust all your
GPU memory and then crash a thing or two. Or it will fail because
--hwdec-extra-frames will certainly be set too low.
• Stream recording is broken. --stream-record may keep working if you backward play
within a cached region only.
• Relative seeks may behave weird. Small seeks backward (towards smaller time, i.e.
seek -1) may not really seek properly, and audio will remain muted for a while.
Using hr-seek is recommended, which should have none of these problems.
• Some things are just weird. For example, while seek commands manipulate playback
time in the expected way (provided they work correctly), the framestep commands
are transposed. Backstepping will perform very expensive work to step forward by
1 frame.
Tuning:
• Remove all --vf/--af filters you have set. Disable hardware decoding. Disable
functions like SPDIF passthrough.
• Increasing --video-reversal-buffer might help if reversal queue overflow is
reported, which may happen in high bitrate video, or video with large GOP.
Hardware decoding mostly ignores this, and you need to increase
--hwdec-extra-frames instead (until you get playback without logged errors).
• The demuxer cache is essential for backward demuxing. Make sure to set
--cache=yes. The cache size might matter. If it's too small, a queue overflow
will be logged, and backward playback cannot continue, or it performs too many
low level seeks. If it's too large, implementation tradeoffs may cause general
performance issues. Use --demuxer-max-bytes to potentially increase the amount of
packets the demuxer layer can queue for reverse demuxing (basically it's the
--video-reversal-buffer equivalent for the demuxer layer).
• Setting --vd-queue-enable=yes can help a lot to make playback smooth (once it
works).
• --demuxer-backward-playback-step also factors into how many seeks may be
performed, and whether backward demuxing could break due to queue overflow. If
it's set too high, the backstep operation needs to search through more packets
all the time, even if the cache is large enough.
• Setting --demuxer-cache-wait may be useful to cache the entire file into the
demuxer cache. Set --demuxer-max-bytes to a large size to make sure it can read
the entire cache; --demuxer-max-back-bytes should also be set to a large size to
prevent that tries to trim the cache.
• If audio artifacts are audible, even though the AO does not underrun, increasing
--audio-backward-overlap might help in some cases.
--video-reversal-buffer=<bytesize>, --audio-reversal-buffer=<bytesize>
For backward decoding. Backward decoding decodes forward in steps, and then
reverses the decoder output. These options control the approximate maximum amount
of bytes that can be buffered. The main use of this is to avoid unbounded resource
usage; during normal backward playback, it's not supposed to hit the limit, and if
it does, it will drop frames and complain about it.
Use this option if you get reversal queue overflow errors during backward playback.
Increase the size until the warning disappears. Usually, the video buffer will
overflow first, especially if it's high resolution video.
This does not work correctly if video hardware decoding is used. The video frame
size will not include the referenced GPU and driver memory. Some hardware decoders
may also be limited by --hwdec-extra-frames.
How large the queue size needs to be depends entirely on the way the media was
encoded. Audio typically requires a very small buffer, while video can require
excessively large buffers.
(Technically, this allows the last frame to exceed the limit. Also, this does not
account for other buffered frames, such as inside the decoder or the video output.)
This does not affect demuxer cache behavior at all.
See --list-options for defaults and value range. <bytesize> options accept suffixes
such as KiB and MiB.
--video-backward-overlap=<auto|number>, --audio-backward-overlap=<auto|number>
Number of overlapping keyframe ranges to use for backward decoding (default: auto)
("keyframe" to be understood as in the mpv/ffmpeg specific meaning). Backward
decoding works by forward decoding in small steps. Some codecs cannot restart
decoding from any packet (even if it's marked as seek point), which becomes
noticeable with backward decoding (in theory this is a problem with seeking too,
but --hr-seek-demuxer-offset can fix it for seeking). In particular, MDCT based
audio codecs are affected.
The solution is to feed a previous packet to the decoder each time, and then
discard the output. This option controls how many packets to feed. The auto choice
is currently hardcoded to 0 for video, and uses 1 for lossy audio, 0 for lossless
audio. For some specific lossy audio codecs, this is set to 2.
--video-backward-overlap can potentially handle intra-refresh video, depending on
the exact conditions. You may have to use the --vd-lavc-show-all option as well.
--video-backward-batch=<number>, --audio-backward-batch=<number>
Number of keyframe ranges to decode at once when backward decoding (default: 1 for
video, 10 for audio). Another pointless tuning parameter nobody should use. This
should affect performance only. In theory, setting a number higher than 1 for audio
will reduce overhead due to less frequent backstep operations and less redundant
decoding work due to fewer decoded overlap frames (see --audio-backward-overlap).
On the other hand, it requires a larger reversal buffer, and could make playback
less smooth due to breaking pipelining (e.g. by decoding a lot, and then doing
nothing for a while).
It probably never makes sense to set --video-backward-batch. But in theory, it
could help with intra-only video codecs by reducing backstep operations.
--demuxer-backward-playback-step=<seconds>
Number of seconds the demuxer should seek back to get new packets during backward
playback (default: 60). This is useful for tuning backward playback, see
--play-direction for details.
Setting this to a very low value or 0 may make the player think seeking is broken,
or may make it perform multiple seeks.
Setting this to a high value may lead to quadratic runtime behavior.
Program Behavior
--help, --h
Show short summary of options.
You can also pass a string to this option, which will list all top-level options
which contain the string in the name, e.g. --h=scale for all options that contain
the word scale. The special string * lists all top-level options.
-v Increment verbosity level, one level for each -v found on the command line.
--version, -V
Print version string and exit.
--no-config
Do not load default configuration or any user files. This prevents loading of both
the user-level and system-wide mpv.conf and input.conf files. Other user files are
blocked as well, such as resume playback files and cache files. This option only
takes effect when used as a command line flag.
NOTE:
Files explicitly requested by command line options, like --include or
--use-filedir-conf, will still be loaded.
See also: --config-dir.
--list-options
Prints all available options.
--list-properties
Print a list of the available properties.
--list-protocols
Print a list of the supported protocols.
--log-file=<path>
Opens the given path for writing, and print log messages to it. Existing files will
be truncated. The log level is at least -v -v, but can be raised via --msg-level
(the option cannot lower it below the forced minimum log level).
A special case is the macOS bundle, it will create a log file at
~/Library/Logs/mpv.log by default.
--config-dir=<path>
Force a different configuration directory. If this is set, the given directory is
used to load configuration files, and all other configuration directories are
ignored. This means the global mpv configuration directory as well as per-user
directories are ignored, and overrides through environment variables (MPV_HOME) are
also ignored.
Note that the cache and state paths (~~/cache, ~~/state) are not considered
"configuration" and keep their auto-detection logic.
Note that the --no-config option takes precedence over this option.
--dump-stats=<filename>
Write certain statistics to the given file. The file is truncated on opening. The
file will contain raw samples, each with a timestamp. To make this file into a
readable, the script TOOLS/stats-conv.py can be used (which currently displays it
as a graph).
This option is useful for debugging only.
--idle=<no|yes|once>
Makes mpv wait idly instead of quitting when there is no file to play. Mostly
useful in input mode, where mpv can be controlled through input commands. (Default:
no)
once will only idle at start and let the player close once the first playlist has
finished playing back.
--include=<configuration-file>
Specify configuration file to be parsed after the default ones.
--load-scripts=<yes|no>
If set to no, don't auto-load scripts from the scripts configuration subdirectory
(usually ~/.config/mpv/scripts/). (Default: yes)
--script=<filename>, --scripts=file1.lua:file2.lua:...
Load a Lua script. The second option allows you to load multiple scripts by
separating them with the path separator (: on Unix, ; on Windows).
--scripts is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--script-opts=key1=value1,key2=value2,...
Set options for scripts. A script can query an option by key. If an option is used
and what semantics the option value has depends entirely on the loaded scripts.
Values not claimed by any scripts are ignored.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--merge-files
Pretend that all files passed to mpv are concatenated into a single, big file. This
uses timeline/EDL support internally.
--profile=<profile1,profile2,...>
Use the given profile(s), --profile=help displays a list of the defined profiles.
--reset-on-next-file=<all|option1,option2,...>
Normally, mpv will try to keep all settings when playing the next file on the
playlist, even if they were changed by the user during playback. (This behavior is
the opposite of MPlayer's, which tries to reset all settings when starting next
file.)
Default: Do not reset anything.
This can be changed with this option. It accepts a list of options, and mpv will
reset the value of these options on playback start to the initial value. The
initial value is either the default value, or as set by the config file or command
line.
The special name all resets as many options as possible.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Examples
• --reset-on-next-file=pause Reset pause mode when switching to the next file.
• --reset-on-next-file=fullscreen,speed Reset fullscreen and playback speed
settings if they were changed during playback.
• --reset-on-next-file=all Try to reset all settings that were changed during
playback.
--show-profile=<profile>
Show the description and content of a profile. Lists all profiles if no parameter
is provided.
--use-filedir-conf
Look for a file-specific configuration file in the same directory as the file that
is being played. See File-specific Configuration Files.
WARNING:
May be dangerous if playing from untrusted media.
--ytdl, --no-ytdl
Enable the youtube-dl hook-script. It will look at the input URL, and will play the
video located on the website. This works with many streaming sites, not just the
one that the script is named after. This requires a recent version of youtube-dl to
be installed on the system. (Enabled by default.)
If the script can't do anything with an URL, it will do nothing.
This accepts a set of options, which can be passed to it with the --script-opts
option (using ytdl_hook- as prefix):
try_ytdl_first=<yes|no>
If 'yes' will try parsing the URL with youtube-dl first, instead of the
default where it's only after mpv failed to open it. This mostly depends on
whether most of your URLs need youtube-dl parsing.
exclude=<URL1|URL2|...
A |-separated list of URL patterns which mpv should not use with youtube-dl.
The patterns are matched after the http(s):// part of the URL.
^ matches the beginning of the URL, $ matches its end, and you should use %
before any of the characters ^$()%|,.[]*+-? to match that character.
Examples
• --script-opts=ytdl_hook-exclude='^youtube%.com' will exclude any URL
that starts with http://youtube.com or https://youtube.com.
• --script-opts=ytdl_hook-exclude='%.mkv$|%.mp4$' will exclude any URL
that ends with .mkv or .mp4.
See more lua patterns here: https://www.lua.org/manual/5.1/manual.html#5.4.1
all_formats=<yes|no>
If 'yes' will attempt to add all formats found reported by youtube-dl
(default: no). Each format is added as a separate track. In addition, they
are delay-loaded, and actually opened only when a track is selected (this
should keep load times as low as without this option).
It adds average bitrate metadata, if available, which means you can use
--hls-bitrate to decide which track to select. (HLS used to be the only
format whose alternative quality streams were exposed in a similar way, thus
the option name.)
Tracks which represent formats that were selected by youtube-dl as default
will have the default flag set. This means mpv should generally still select
formats chosen with --ytdl-format by default.
Although this mechanism makes it possible to switch streams at runtime, it's
not suitable for this purpose for various technical reasons. (It's slow,
which can't be really fixed.) In general, this option is not useful, and was
only added to show that it's possible.
There are two cases that must be considered when doing quality/bandwidth
selection:
1. Completely separate audio and video streams (DASH-like). Each of these
streams contain either only audio or video, so you can mix and combine
audio/video bandwidths without restriction. This intuitively matches
best with the concept of selecting quality by track (what all_formats
is supposed to do).
2. Separate sets of muxed audio and video streams. Each version of the
media contains both an audio and video stream, and they are
interleaved. In order not to waste bandwidth, you should only select
one of these versions (if, for example, you select an audio stream,
then video will be downloaded, even if you selected video from a
different stream).
mpv will still represent them as separate tracks, but will set the
title of each track to muxed-N, where N is replaced with the
youtube-dl format ID of the originating stream.
Some sites will mix 1. and 2., but we assume that they do so for
compatibility reasons, and there is no reason to use them at all.
force_all_formats=<yes|no>
If set to 'yes', and all_formats is also set to 'yes', this will try to
represent all youtube-dl reported formats as tracks, even if mpv would
normally use the direct URL reported by it (default: yes).
It appears this normally makes a difference if youtube-dl works on a master
HLS playlist.
If this is set to 'no', this specific kind of stream is treated like
all_formats is set to 'no', and the stream selection as done by youtube-dl
(via --ytdl-format) is used.
thumbnails=<all|best|none>
Add thumbnails as video tracks (default: none).
Thumbnails get downloaded when they are added as tracks, so 'all' can have a
noticable impact on how long it takes to open the video when there are a lot
of thumbnails.
use_manifests=<yes|no>
Make mpv use the master manifest URL for formats like HLS and DASH, if
available, allowing for video/audio selection in runtime (default: no). It's
disabled ("no") by default for performance reasons.
ytdl_path=youtube-dl
Configure paths to youtube-dl's executable or a compatible fork's. The paths
should be separated by : on Unix and ; on Windows. mpv looks in order for
the configured paths in PATH and in mpv's config directory. The defaults
are "yt-dlp", "yt-dlp_x86" and "youtube-dl". On Windows the suffix extension
is not necessary, but only ".exe" is acceptable.
Why do the option names mix _ and -?
I have no idea.
--ytdl-format=<ytdl|best|worst|mp4|webm|...>
Video format/quality that is directly passed to youtube-dl. The possible values are
specific to the website and the video, for a given url the available formats can be
found with the command youtube-dl --list-formats URL. See youtube-dl's
documentation for available aliases. (Default: bestvideo+bestaudio/best)
The ytdl value does not pass a --format option to youtube-dl at all, and thus does
not override its default. Note that sometimes youtube-dl returns a format that mpv
cannot use, and in these cases the mpv default may work better.
--ytdl-raw-options=<key>=<value>[,<key>=<value>[,...]]
Pass arbitrary options to youtube-dl. Parameter and argument should be passed as a
key-value pair. Options without argument must include =.
There is no sanity checking so it's possible to break things (i.e. passing invalid
parameters to youtube-dl).
A proxy URL can be passed for youtube-dl to use it in parsing the website. This is
useful for geo-restricted URLs. After youtube-dl parsing, some URLs also require a
proxy for playback, so this can pass that proxy information to mpv. Take note that
SOCKS proxies aren't supported and https URLs also bypass the proxy. This is a
limitation in FFmpeg.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Example
• --ytdl-raw-options=username=user,password=pass
• --ytdl-raw-options=force-ipv6=
• --ytdl-raw-options=proxy=[http://127.0.0.1:3128]
• --ytdl-raw-options-append=proxy=http://127.0.0.1:3128
--js-memory-report=<yes|no>
Enable memory reporting for javascript scripts in the stats overlay. This is
disabled by default because it has an overhead and increases memory usage. This
option will only work if it is enabled before mpv is started.
--load-stats-overlay=<yes|no>
Enable the builtin script that shows useful playback information on a key binding
(default: yes). By default, the i key is used (I to make the overlay permanent).
--load-osd-console=<yes|no>
Enable the built-in script that shows a console on a key binding and lets you enter
commands (default: yes). The ` key is used to show the console by default, and ESC
to hide it again.
--load-auto-profiles=<yes|no|auto>
Enable the builtin script that does auto profiles (default: auto). See Conditional
auto profiles for details. auto will load the script, but immediately unload it if
there are no conditional profiles.
--player-operation-mode=<cplayer|pseudo-gui>
For enabling "pseudo GUI mode", which means that the defaults for some options are
changed. This option should not normally be used directly, but only by mpv
internally, or mpv-provided scripts, config files, or .desktop files. See PSEUDO
GUI MODE for details.
Watch Later
--save-position-on-quit
Always save the current playback position on quit. When this file is played again
later, the player will seek to the old playback position on start. This does not
happen if playback of a file is stopped in any other way than quitting. For
example, going to the next file in the playlist will not save the position, and
start playback at beginning the next time the file is played.
This behavior is disabled by default, but is always available when quitting the
player with Shift+Q.
See RESUMING PLAYBACK.
--watch-later-dir=<path>
The directory in which to store the "watch later" temporary files.
--watch-later-directory is an alias for --watch-later-dir.
If this option is unset, the files will be stored in a subdirectory named
"watch_later" underneath the local state directory (usually ~/.local/state/mpv/).
--no-resume-playback
Do not restore playback position from the watch_later configuration subdirectory
(usually ~/.config/mpv/watch_later/).
--resume-playback-check-mtime
Only restore the playback position from the watch_later configuration subdirectory
(usually ~/.config/mpv/watch_later/) if the file's modification time is the same as
at the time of saving. This may prevent skipping forward in files with the same
name which have different content. (Default: no)
--watch-later-options=option1,option2,...
The options that are saved in "watch later" files if they have been changed since
when mpv started. These values will be restored the next time the files are played.
Note that the playback position is saved via the start option.
When removing options, existing watch later data won't be modified and will still
be applied fully, but new watch later data won't contain these options.
See --help=watch-later-options for the list of the properties that are restored by
default.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Examples
• --watch-later-options-remove=sid The subtitle track selection will not be
restored.
• --watch-later-options-remove=volume --watch-later-options-remove=mute The
volume and mute state won't be saved to watch later files.
• --watch-later-options=start No option will be saved to watch later files,
except the playback position.
--write-filename-in-watch-later-config
Prepend the watch later config files with the name of the file they refer to. This
is simply written as comment on the top of the file.
WARNING:
This option may expose privacy-sensitive information and is thus disabled by
default.
--ignore-path-in-watch-later-config
Ignore path (i.e. use filename only) when using watch later feature. (Default:
disabled)
Video
--vo=<driver>
Specify the video output backend to be used. See VIDEO OUTPUT DRIVERS for details
and descriptions of available drivers.
--vd=<...>
Specify a priority list of video decoders to be used, according to their family and
name. See --ad for further details. Both of these options use the same syntax and
semantics; the only difference is that they operate on different codec lists.
NOTE:
See --vd=help for a full list of available decoders.
--vf=<filter1[=parameter1:parameter2:...],filter2,...>
Specify a list of video filters to apply to the video stream. See VIDEO FILTERS for
details and descriptions of the available filters. The option variants --vf-add,
--vf-pre, and --vf-clr exist to modify a previously specified list, but you should
not need these for typical use.
--untimed
Do not sleep when outputting video frames. Useful for benchmarks when used with
--no-audio.
--framedrop=<mode>
Skip displaying some frames to maintain A/V sync on slow systems, or playing high
framerate video on video outputs that have an upper framerate limit.
The argument selects the drop methods, and can be one of the following:
<no> Disable any frame dropping. Not recommended, for testing only.
<vo> Drop late frames on video output (default). This still decodes and filters
all frames, but doesn't render them on the VO. Drops are indicated in the
terminal status line as Dropped: field.
In audio sync. mode, this drops frames that are outdated at the time of
display. If the decoder is too slow, in theory all frames would have to be
dropped (because all frames are too late) - to avoid this, frame dropping
stops if the effective framerate is below 10 FPS.
In display-sync. modes (see --video-sync), this affects only how A/V drops
or repeats frames. If this mode is disabled, A/V desync will in theory not
affect video scheduling anymore (much like the display-resample-desync
mode). However, even if disabled, frames will still be skipped (i.e.
dropped) according to the ratio between video and display frequencies.
This is the recommended mode, and the default.
<decoder>
Old, decoder-based framedrop mode. (This is the same as --framedrop=yes in
mpv 0.5.x and before.) This tells the decoder to skip frames (unless they
are needed to decode future frames). May help with slow systems, but can
produce unwatchable choppy output, or even freeze the display completely.
This uses a heuristic which may not make sense, and in general cannot
achieve good results, because the decoder's frame dropping cannot be
controlled in a predictable manner. Not recommended.
Even if you want to use this, prefer decoder+vo for better results.
The --vd-lavc-framedrop option controls what frames to drop.
<decoder+vo>
Enable both modes. Not recommended. Better than just decoder mode.
NOTE:
--vo=vdpau has its own code for the vo framedrop mode. Slight differences to
other VOs are possible.
--video-latency-hacks=<yes|no>
Enable some things which tend to reduce video latency by 1 or 2 frames (default:
no). Note that this option might be removed without notice once the player's timing
code does not inherently need to do these things anymore. Using this option is
known to break other options such as interpolation, so it is not recommended to
enable this.
This does:
• Use the demuxer reported FPS for frame dropping. This avoids the player needing
to decode 1 frame in advance, lowering total latency in effect. This also means
that if the demuxer reported FPS is wrong, or the video filter chain changes FPS
(e.g. deinterlacing), then it could drop too many or not enough frames.
• Disable waiting for the first video frame. Normally the player waits for the
first video frame to be fully rendered before starting playback properly. Some
VOs will lazily initialize stuff when rendering the first frame, so if this is
not done, there is some likeliness that the VO has to drop some frames if
rendering the first frame takes longer than needed.
--display-fps-override=<fps>
Set the display FPS used with the --video-sync=display-* modes. By default, a
detected value is used. Keep in mind that setting an incorrect value (even if
slightly incorrect) can ruin video playback. On multi-monitor systems, there is a
chance that the detected value is from the wrong monitor.
Set this option only if you have reason to believe the automatically determined
value is wrong.
--hwdec=<api1,api2,...|no|auto|auto-safe|auto-copy>
Specify the hardware video decoding API that should be used if possible. Whether
hardware decoding is actually done depends on the video codec. If hardware decoding
is not possible, mpv will fall back on software decoding.
Hardware decoding is not enabled by default, to keep the out-of-the-box
configuration as reliable as possible. However, when using modern hardware,
hardware video decoding should work correctly, offering reduced CPU usage, and
possibly lower power consumption. On older systems, it may be necessary to use
hardware decoding due to insufficient CPU resources; and even on modern systems,
sufficiently complex content (eg: 4K60 AV1) may require it.
NOTE:
Use the Ctrl+h shortcut to toggle hardware decoding at runtime. It toggles this
option between auto-safe and no.
If you decide you want to use hardware decoding by default, the general
recommendation is to try out decoding with the command line option, and prove to
yourself that it works as desired for the content you care about. After that,
you can add it to your config file.
When testing, you should start by using hwdec=auto-safe as it will limit itself
to choosing from hwdecs that are actively supported by the development team. If
that doesn't result in working hardware decoding, you can try hwdec=auto to have
it attempt to load every possible hwdec, but if auto-safe didn't work, you will
probably need to know exactly which hwdec matches your hardware and read up on
that entry below.
If auto-safe or auto produced the desired results, we recommend just sticking
with that and only setting a specific hwdec in your config file if it is really
necessary.
If you use the Ubuntu package, keep in mind that their /etc/mpv/mpv.conf
contains hwdec=vaapi, which is less than ideal as it may not be the right choice
for your system, and it may end up using an inefficient wrapper library under
the covers. We recommend removing this line or deleting the file altogether.
NOTE:
Even if enabled, hardware decoding is still only white-listed for some codecs.
See --hwdec-codecs to enable hardware decoding in more cases.
Which method to choose?
• If you only want to enable hardware decoding at runtime, don't set the
parameter, or put hwdec=no into your mpv.conf (relevant on distros which
force-enable it by default, such as on Ubuntu). Use the Ctrl+h default binding
to enable it at runtime.
• If you're not sure, but want hardware decoding always enabled by default, put
hwdec=auto-safe into your mpv.conf, and acknowledge that this may cause
problems.
• If you want to test available hardware decoding methods, pass --hwdec=auto
--hwdec-codecs=all and look at the terminal output.
• If you're a developer, or want to perform elaborate tests, you may need any of
the other possible option values.
This option accepts a comma delimited list of api types, along with certain special
values:
no always use software decoding (default)
auto-safe
enable any whitelisted hw decoder (see below)
auto forcibly enable any hw decoder found (see below)
yes exactly the same as auto-safe
auto-copy
enable best hw decoder with copy-back (see below)
NOTE:
Special values can be mixed with api names. eg: vaapi,auto will try and use the
vaapi hwdec, and if that fails, will run through the normal auto logic.
Actively supported hwdecs:
d3d11va
requires --vo=gpu with --gpu-context=d3d11 or --gpu-context=angle (Windows
8+ only)
d3d11va-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Windows 8+ only)
videotoolbox
requires --vo=gpu (macOS 10.8 and up), or --vo=libmpv (iOS 9.0 and up)
videotoolbox-copy
copies video back into system RAM (macOS 10.8 or iOS 9.0 and up)
vaapi requires --vo=gpu, --vo=vaapi or --vo=dmabuf-wayland (Linux only)
vaapi-copy
copies video back into system RAM (Linux with some GPUs only)
nvdec requires --vo=gpu (Any platform CUDA is available)
nvdec-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Any platform CUDA is available)
drm requires --vo=gpu (Linux only)
drm-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Linux only)
vulkan requires --vo=gpu-next (Any platform with Vulkan Video Decoding)
vulkan-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Any platform with Vulkan Video Decoding)
Other hwdecs (only use if you know you have to):
dxva2 requires --vo=gpu with --gpu-context=d3d11, --gpu-context=angle or
--gpu-context=dxinterop (Windows only)
dxva2-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Windows only)
vdpau requires --vo=gpu with --gpu-context=x11, or --vo=vdpau (Linux only)
vdpau-copy
copies video back into system RAM (Linux with some GPUs only)
mediacodec
requires --vo=gpu --gpu-context=android or --vo=mediacodec_embed (Android
only)
mediacodec-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Android only)
mmal requires --vo=gpu (Raspberry Pi only - default if available)
mmal-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Raspberry Pi only)
cuda requires --vo=gpu (Any platform CUDA is available)
cuda-copy
copies video back to system RAM (Any platform CUDA is available)
crystalhd
copies video back to system RAM (Any platform supported by hardware)
rkmpp requires --vo=gpu (some RockChip devices only)
auto tries to automatically enable hardware decoding using the first available
method. This still depends what VO you are using. For example, if you are not using
--vo=gpu or --vo=vdpau, vdpau decoding will never be enabled. Also note that if the
first found method doesn't actually work, it will always fall back to software
decoding, instead of trying the next method (might matter on some Linux systems).
auto-safe is similar to auto, but allows only whitelisted methods that are
considered "safe". This is supposed to be a reasonable way to enable hardware
decdoding by default in a config file (even though you shouldn't do that anyway;
prefer runtime enabling with Ctrl+h). Unlike auto, this will not try to enable
unknown or known-to-be-bad methods. In addition, this may disable hardware decoding
in other situations when it's known to cause problems, but currently this mechanism
is quite primitive. (As an example for something that still causes problems:
certain combinations of HEVC and Intel chips on Windows tend to cause mpv to crash,
most likely due to driver bugs.)
auto-copy-safe selects the union of methods selected with auto-safe and auto-copy.
auto-copy selects only modes that copy the video data back to system memory after
decoding. This selects modes like vaapi-copy (and so on). If none of these work,
hardware decoding is disabled. This mode is usually guaranteed to incur no
additional quality loss compared to software decoding (assuming modern codecs and
an error free video stream), and will allow CPU processing with video filters. This
mode works with all video filters and VOs.
Because these copy the decoded video back to system RAM, they're often less
efficient than the direct modes, and may not help too much over software decoding
if you are short on CPU resources.
NOTE:
Most non-copy methods only work with the OpenGL GPU backend. Currently, only the
vaapi, nvdec, cuda and vulkan methods work with Vulkan.
The vaapi mode, if used with --vo=gpu, requires Mesa 11, and most likely works with
Intel and AMD GPUs only. It also requires the opengl EGL backend.
nvdec and nvdec-copy are the newest, and recommended method to do hardware decoding
on Nvidia GPUs.
cuda and cuda-copy are an older implementation of hardware decoding on Nvidia GPUs
that uses Nvidia's bitstream parsers rather than FFmpeg's. This can lead to
feature deficiencies, such as incorrect playback of HDR content, and
nvdec/nvdec-copy should always be preferred unless you specifically need Nvidia's
deinterlacing algorithms. To use this deinterlacing you must pass the option:
vd-lavc-o=deint=[weave|bob|adaptive]. Pass weave (or leave the option unset) to
not attempt any deinterlacing.
Quality reduction with hardware decoding
In theory, hardware decoding does not reduce video quality (at least for
the codecs h264 and HEVC). However, due to restrictions in video output
APIs, as well as bugs in the actual hardware decoders, there can be some
loss, or even blatantly incorrect results. This has largely ceased to be
a problem with modern hardware, but there is a lot of hardware out there,
so caveat emptor. Known problems are discussed below, but the list cannot
be considered exhaustive, as even hwdecs that work well on certain
hardware generations may be problematic on other ones.
In some cases, RGB conversion is forced, which means the RGB conversion
is performed by the hardware decoding API, instead of the shaders used by
--vo=gpu. This means certain colorspaces may not display correctly, and
certain filtering (such as debanding) cannot be applied in an ideal way.
This will also usually force the use of low quality chroma scalers
instead of the one specified by --cscale. In other cases, hardware
decoding can also reduce the bit depth of the decoded image, which can
introduce banding or precision loss for 10-bit files.
vdpau always does RGB conversion in hardware, which does not support
newer colorspaces like BT.2020 correctly. However, vdpau doesn't support
10 bit or HDR encodings, so these limitations are unlikely to be
relevant.
dxva2 is not safe. It appears to always use BT.601 for forced RGB
conversion, but actual behavior depends on the GPU drivers. Some drivers
appear to convert to limited range RGB, which gives a faded appearance.
In addition to driver-specific behavior, global system settings might
affect this additionally. This can give incorrect results even with
completely ordinary video sources.
rpi always uses the hardware overlay renderer, even with --vo=gpu.
mediacodec is not safe. It forces RGB conversion (not with -copy) and how
well it handles non-standard colorspaces is not known. In the rare cases
where 10-bit is supported the bit depth of the output will be reduced to
8.
cuda should usually be safe, but depending on how a file/stream has been
mixed, it has been reported to corrupt the timestamps causing glitched,
flashing frames. It can also sometimes cause massive framedrops for
unknown reasons. Caution is advised, and nvdec should always be
preferred.
crystalhd is not safe. It always converts to 4:2:2 YUV, which may be
lossy, depending on how chroma sub-sampling is done during conversion. It
also discards the top left pixel of each frame for some reason.
If you run into any weird decoding issues, frame glitches or
discoloration, and you have --hwdec turned on, the first thing you should
try is disabling it.
--gpu-hwdec-interop=<auto|all|no|name>
This option is for troubleshooting hwdec interop issues. Since it's a debugging
option, its semantics may change at any time.
This is useful for the gpu and libmpv VOs for selecting which hwdec interop context
to use exactly. Effectively it also can be used to block loading of certain
backends.
If set to auto (default), the behavior depends on the VO: for gpu, it does nothing,
and the interop context is loaded on demand (when the decoder probes for --hwdec
support). For libmpv, which has has no on-demand loading, this is equivalent to
all.
The empty string is equivalent to auto.
If set to all, it attempts to load all interop contexts at GL context creation
time.
Other than that, a specific backend can be set, and the list of them can be queried
with help (mpv CLI only).
Runtime changes to this are ignored (the current option value is used whenever the
renderer is created).
--hwdec-extra-frames=<N>
Number of GPU frames hardware decoding should preallocate (default: see
--list-options output). If this is too low, frame allocation may fail during
decoding, and video frames might get dropped and/or corrupted. Setting it too high
simply wastes GPU memory and has no advantages.
This value is used only for hardware decoding APIs which require preallocating
surfaces (known examples include d3d11va and vaapi). For other APIs, frames are
allocated as needed. The details depend on the libavcodec implementations of the
hardware decoders.
The required number of surfaces depends on dynamic runtime situations. The default
is a fixed value that is thought to be sufficient for most uses. But in certain
situations, it may not be enough.
--hwdec-image-format=<name>
Set the internal pixel format used by hardware decoding via --hwdec (default no).
The special value no selects an implementation specific standard format. Most
decoder implementations support only one format, and will fail to initialize if the
format is not supported.
Some implementations might support multiple formats. In particular, videotoolbox is
known to require uyvy422 for good performance on some older hardware. d3d11va can
always use yuv420p, which uses an opaque format, with likely no advantages.
--cuda-decode-device=<auto|0..>
Choose the GPU device used for decoding when using the cuda or nvdec hwdecs with
the OpenGL GPU backend, and with the cuda-copy or nvdec-copy hwdecs in all cases.
For the OpenGL GPU backend, the default device used for decoding is the one being
used to provide gpu output (and in the vast majority of cases, only one GPU will be
present).
For the copy hwdecs, the default device will be the first device enumerated by the
CUDA libraries - however that is done.
For the Vulkan GPU backend, decoding must always happen on the display device, and
this option has no effect.
--vaapi-device=<device file>
Choose the DRM device for vaapi-copy. This should be the path to a DRM device file.
(Default: /dev/dri/renderD128)
--panscan=<0.0-1.0>
Enables pan-and-scan functionality (cropping the sides of e.g. a 16:9 video to make
it fit a 4:3 display without black bands). The range controls how much of the image
is cropped. May not work with all video output drivers.
This option has no effect if --video-unscaled option is used.
--video-aspect-override=<ratio|no>
Override video aspect ratio, in case aspect information is incorrect or missing in
the file being played.
These values have special meaning:
0 disable aspect ratio handling, pretend the video has square pixels
no same as 0
-1 use the video stream or container aspect (default)
But note that handling of these special values might change in the future.
Examples
• --video-aspect-override=4:3 or --video-aspect-override=1.3333
• --video-aspect-override=16:9 or --video-aspect-override=1.7777
• --no-video-aspect-override or --video-aspect-override=no
--video-aspect-method=<bitstream|container>
This sets the default video aspect determination method (if the aspect is _not_
overridden by the user with --video-aspect-override or others).
container
Strictly prefer the container aspect ratio. This is apparently the default
behavior with VLC, at least with Matroska. Note that if the container has no
aspect ratio set, the behavior is the same as with bitstream.
bitstream
Strictly prefer the bitstream aspect ratio, unless the bitstream aspect
ratio is not set. This is apparently the default behavior with XBMC/kodi, at
least with Matroska.
The current default for mpv is container.
Normally you should not set this. Try the various choices if you encounter video
that has the wrong aspect ratio in mpv, but seems to be correct in other players.
--video-unscaled=<no|yes|downscale-big>
Disable scaling of the video. If the window is larger than the video, black bars
are added. Otherwise, the video is cropped, unless the option is set to
downscale-big, in which case the video is fit to window. The video still can be
influenced by the other --video-... options. This option disables the effect of
--panscan.
Note that the scaler algorithm may still be used, even if the video isn't scaled.
For example, this can influence chroma conversion. The video will also still be
scaled in one dimension if the source uses non-square pixels (e.g. anamorphic
widescreen DVDs).
This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
--video-pan-x=<value>, --video-pan-y=<value>
Moves the displayed video rectangle by the given value in the X or Y direction. The
unit is in fractions of the size of the scaled video (the full size, even if parts
of the video are not visible due to panscan or other options).
For example, displaying a video fullscreen on a 1920x1080 screen with
--video-pan-x=-0.1 would move the video 192 pixels to the left and
--video-pan-y=-0.1 would move the video 108 pixels up.
This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
--video-rotate=<0-359|no>
Rotate the video clockwise, in degrees. If no is given, the video is never rotated,
even if the file has rotation metadata. (The rotation value is added to the
rotation metadata, which means the value 0 would rotate the video according to the
rotation metadata.)
When using hardware decoding without copy-back, only 90° steps work, while software
decoding and hardware decoding methods that copy the video back to system memory
support all values between 0 and 359.
--video-crop=<[W[xH]][+x+y]>, --video-crop=<x:y>
Crop the video by starting at the x, y offset for w, h pixels. The crop is applied
to the source video rectangle (before anamorphic stretch) by the VO. A crop
rectangle that is not within the video rectangle will be ignored. This works with
hwdec, unlike the equivalent 'lavfi-crop'. When offset is omitted, the central area
will be cropped. Setting the crop to empty one --video-crop=0x0+0+0 overrides
container crop and disables cropping. Setting the crop to --video-crop="" disables
manual cropping and restores the container crop if it's specified.
--video-zoom=<value>
Adjust the video display scale factor by the given value. The parameter is given
log 2. For example, --video-zoom=0 is unscaled, --video-zoom=1 is twice the size,
--video-zoom=-2 is one fourth of the size, and so on.
This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
--video-scale-x=<value>, --video-scale-y=<value>
Multiply the video display size with the given value (default: 1.0). If a
non-default value is used, this will be different from the window size, so video
will be either cut off, or black bars are added.
This value is multiplied with the value derived from --video-zoom and the normal
video aspect ratio. This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
--video-align-x=<-1-1>, --video-align-y=<-1-1>
Moves the video rectangle within the black borders, which are usually added to pad
the video to screen if video and screen aspect ratios are different.
--video-align-y=-1 would move the video to the top of the screen (leaving a border
only on the bottom), a value of 0 centers it (default), and a value of 1 would put
the video at the bottom of the screen.
If video and screen aspect match perfectly, these options do nothing.
This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
--video-margin-ratio-left=<val>, --video-margin-ratio-right=<val>,
--video-margin-ratio-top=<val>, --video-margin-ratio-bottom=<val>
Set extra video margins on each border (default: 0). Each value is a ratio of the
window size, using a range 0.0-1.0. For example, setting the option
--video-margin-ratio-right=0.2 at a window size of 1000 pixels will add a 200
pixels border on the right side of the window.
The video is "boxed" by these margins. The window size is not changed. In
particular it does not enlarge the window, and the margins will cause the video to
be downscaled by default. This may or may not change in the future.
The margins are applied after 90° video rotation, but before any other video
transformations.
This option is disabled if the --no-keepaspect option is used.
Subtitles still may use the margins, depending on --sub-use-margins and similar
options.
These options were created for the OSC. Some odd decisions, such as making the
margin values a ratio (instead of pixels), were made for the sake of the OSC. It's
possible that these options may be replaced by ones that are more generally useful.
The behavior of these options may change to fit OSC requirements better, too.
--correct-pts, --no-correct-pts
--no-correct-pts switches mpv to a mode where video timing is determined using a
fixed framerate value (either using the --container-fps-override option, or using
file information). Sometimes, files with very broken timestamps can be played
somewhat well in this mode. Note that video filters, subtitle rendering, seeking
(including hr-seeks and backstepping), and audio synchronization can be completely
broken in this mode.
--container-fps-override=<float>
Override video framerate. Useful if the original value is wrong or missing.
NOTE:
Works in --no-correct-pts mode only.
--deinterlace=<yes|no>
Enable or disable interlacing (default: no). Interlaced video shows ugly comb-like
artifacts, which are visible on fast movement. Enabling this typically inserts the
yadif video filter in order to deinterlace the video, or lets the video output
apply deinterlacing if supported.
This behaves exactly like the deinterlace input property (usually mapped to d).
Keep in mind that this will conflict with manually inserted deinterlacing filters,
unless you take care. (Since mpv 0.27.0, even the hardware deinterlace filters will
conflict. Also since that version, --deinterlace=auto was removed, which used to
mean that the default interlacing option of possibly inserted video filters was
used.)
Note that this will make video look worse if it's not actually interlaced.
--frames=<number>
Play/convert only first <number> video frames, then quit.
--frames=0 loads the file, but immediately quits before initializing playback.
(Might be useful for scripts which just want to determine some file properties.)
For audio-only playback, any value greater than 0 will quit playback immediately
after initialization. The value 0 works as with video.
--video-output-levels=<outputlevels>
RGB color levels used with YUV to RGB conversion. Normally, output devices such as
PC monitors use full range color levels. However, some TVs and video monitors
expect studio RGB levels. Providing full range output to a device expecting studio
level input results in crushed blacks and whites, the reverse in dim gray blacks
and dim whites.
Not all VOs support this option. Some will silently ignore it.
Available color ranges are:
auto automatic selection (equals to full range) (default)
limited
limited range (16-235 per component), studio levels
full full range (0-255 per component), PC levels
NOTE:
It is advisable to use your graphics driver's color range option instead, if
available.
--hwdec-codecs=<codec1,codec2,...|all>
Allow hardware decoding for a given list of codecs only. The special value all
always allows all codecs.
You can get the list of allowed codecs with mpv --vd=help. Remove the prefix, e.g.
instead of lavc:h264 use h264.
By default, this is set to h264,vc1,hevc,vp8,vp9,av1. Note that the hardware
acceleration special codecs like h264_vdpau are not relevant anymore, and in fact
have been removed from Libav in this form.
This is usually only needed with broken GPUs, where a codec is reported as
supported, but decoding causes more problems than it solves.
Example
mpv --hwdec=vdpau --vo=vdpau --hwdec-codecs=h264,mpeg2video
Enable vdpau decoding for h264 and mpeg2 only.
--vd-lavc-check-hw-profile=<yes|no>
Check hardware decoder profile (default: yes). If no is set, the highest profile of
the hardware decoder is unconditionally selected, and decoding is forced even if
the profile of the video is higher than that. The result is most likely broken
decoding, but may also help if the detected or reported profiles are somehow
incorrect.
--vd-lavc-software-fallback=<yes|no|N>
Fallback to software decoding if the hardware-accelerated decoder fails (default:
3). If this is a number, then fallback will be triggered if N frames fail to decode
in a row. 1 is equivalent to yes.
Setting this to a higher number might break the playback start fallback: if a
fallback happens, parts of the file will be skipped, approximately by to the number
of packets that could not be decoded. Values below an unspecified count will not
have this problem, because mpv retains the packets.
--vd-lavc-film-grain=<auto|cpu|gpu>
Enables film grain application on the GPU. If video decoding is done on the CPU,
doing film grain application on the GPU can speed up decoding. This option can
also help hardware decoding, as it can reduce the number of frame copies done.
By default, it's set to auto, so if the VO supports film grain application, then it
will be treated as gpu. If the VO does not support this, then it will be treated as
cpu, regardless of the setting. Currently, only gpu-next supports film grain
application.
--vd-lavc-dr=<auto|yes|no>
Enable direct rendering (default: auto). If this is set to yes, the video will be
decoded directly to GPU video memory (or staging buffers). This can speed up video
upload, and may help with large resolutions or slow hardware. This works only with
the following VOs:
• gpu: requires at least OpenGL 4.4 or Vulkan.
• libmpv: The libmpv render API has optional support.
The auto option will try to guess whether DR can improve performance on your
particular hardware. Currently this enables it on AMD or NVIDIA if using OpenGL or
unconditionally if using Vulkan.
Using video filters of any kind that write to the image data (or output newly
allocated frames) will silently disable the DR code path.
--vd-lavc-bitexact
Only use bit-exact algorithms in all decoding steps (for codec testing).
--vd-lavc-fast (MPEG-1/2 and H.264 only)
Enable optimizations which do not comply with the format specification and
potentially cause problems, like simpler dequantization, simpler motion
compensation, assuming use of the default quantization matrix, assuming YUV 4:2:0
and skipping a few checks to detect damaged bitstreams.
--vd-lavc-o=<key>=<value>[,<key>=<value>[,...]]
Pass AVOptions to libavcodec decoder. Note, a patch to make the o= unneeded and
pass all unknown options through the AVOption system is welcome. A full list of
AVOptions can be found in the FFmpeg manual.
Some options which used to be direct options can be set with this mechanism, like
bug, gray, idct, ec, vismv, skip_top (was st), skip_bottom (was sb), debug.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Example
--vd-lavc-o=debug=pict
--vd-lavc-show-all=<yes|no>
Show even broken/corrupt frames (default: no). If this option is set to no,
libavcodec won't output frames that were either decoded before an initial keyframe
was decoded, or frames that are recognized as corrupted.
--vd-lavc-skiploopfilter=<skipvalue> (H.264, HEVC only)
Skips the loop filter (AKA deblocking) during decoding. Since the filtered frame is
supposed to be used as reference for decoding dependent frames, this has a worse
effect on quality than not doing deblocking on e.g. MPEG-2 video. But at least for
high bitrate HDTV, this provides a big speedup with little visible quality loss.
Codecs other than H.264 or HEVC may have partial support for this option (often
only all and none).
<skipvalue> can be one of the following:
none Never skip.
default
Skip useless processing steps (e.g. 0 size packets in AVI).
nonref Skip frames that are not referenced (i.e. not used for decoding other
frames, the error cannot "build up").
bidir Skip B-Frames.
nonkey Skip all frames except keyframes.
all Skip all frames.
--vd-lavc-skipidct=<skipvalue> (MPEG-1/2/4 only)
Skips the IDCT step. This degrades quality a lot in almost all cases (see
skiploopfilter for available skip values).
--vd-lavc-skipframe=<skipvalue>
Skips decoding of frames completely. Big speedup, but jerky motion and sometimes
bad artifacts (see skiploopfilter for available skip values).
--vd-lavc-framedrop=<skipvalue>
Set framedropping mode used with --framedrop (see skiploopfilter for available skip
values).
--vd-lavc-threads=<N>
Number of threads to use for decoding. Whether threading is actually supported
depends on codec (default: 0). 0 means autodetect number of cores on the machine
and use that, up to the maximum of 16. You can set more than 16 threads manually.
--vd-lavc-assume-old-x264=<yes|no>
Assume the video was encoded by an old, buggy x264 version (default: no).
Normally, this is autodetected by libavcodec. But if the bitstream contains no x264
version info (or it was somehow skipped), and the stream was in fact encoded by an
old x264 version (build 150 or earlier), and if the stream uses 4:4:4 chroma, then
libavcodec will by default show corrupted video. This option sets the libavcodec
x264_build option to 150, which means that if the stream contains no version info,
or was not encoded by x264 at all, it assumes it was encoded by the old version.
Enabling this option is pretty safe if you want your broken files to work, but in
theory this can break on streams not encoded by x264, or if a stream encoded by a
newer x264 version contains no version info.
--vd-apply-cropping
Certain video codecs support cropping, meaning that only a sub-rectangle of the
decoded frame is intended for display. This option controls how cropping is handled
by libavcodec. Cropping during decoding has certain limitations with regards to
alignment and hardware decoding. If this option is enabled, decoder will apply the
crop, else VO will handle it. Enabled by default.
--swapchain-depth=<N>
Allow up to N in-flight frames. This essentially controls the frame latency.
Increasing the swapchain depth can improve pipelining and prevent missed vsyncs,
but increases visible latency. This option only mandates an upper limit, the
implementation can use a lower latency than requested internally. A setting of 1
means that the VO will wait for every frame to become visible before starting to
render the next frame. (Default: 3)
Audio
--audio-pitch-correction=<yes|no>
If this is enabled (default), playing with a speed different from normal
automatically inserts the scaletempo2 audio filter. You can insert filters besides
scaletempo2 and modify their params using Conditional auto profiles:
[af_insert]
profile-cond=speed ~= 1
profile-restore=copy
af-add=scaletempo2=search-interval=50 # Insert filter and params here.
Filters set this way replace the scaletempo2 default, instead of overlapping with
it. If there are multiple audio filters inserted that can do pitch correction, then
only the last one in the filter chain is used. For details on the specifics of
each available filter, see the audio filter section.
--audio-device=<name>
Use the given audio device. This consists of the audio output name, e.g. alsa,
followed by /, followed by the audio output specific device name. The default value
for this option is auto, which tries every audio output in preference order with
the default device.
You can list audio devices with --audio-device=help. This outputs the device name
in quotes, followed by a description. The device name is what you have to pass to
the --audio-device option. The list of audio devices can be retrieved by API by
using the audio-device-list property.
While the option normally takes one of the strings as indicated by the methods
above, you can also force the device for most AOs by building it manually. For
example name/foobar forces the AO name to use the device foobar. However, the --ao
option will strictly force a specific AO. To avoid confusion, don't use --ao and
--audio-device together.
Example for ALSA
MPlayer and mplayer2 required you to replace any ',' with '.' and any ':'
with '=' in the ALSA device name. For example, to use the device named
dmix:default, you had to do:
-ao alsa:device=dmix=default
In mpv you could instead use:
--audio-device=alsa/dmix:default
--audio-exclusive=<yes|no>
Enable exclusive output mode. In this mode, the system is usually locked out, and
only mpv will be able to output audio.
This only works for some audio outputs, such as wasapi, coreaudio and pipewire.
Other audio outputs silently ignore this option. They either have no concept of
exclusive mode, or the mpv side of the implementation is missing.
--audio-fallback-to-null=<yes|no>
If no audio device can be opened, behave as if --ao=null was given. This is useful
in combination with --audio-device: instead of causing an error if the selected
device does not exist, the client API user (or a Lua script) could let playback
continue normally, and check the current-ao and audio-device-list properties to
make high-level decisions about how to continue.
--ao=<driver>
Specify the audio output drivers to be used. See AUDIO OUTPUT DRIVERS for details
and descriptions of available drivers.
--af=<filter1[=parameter1:parameter2:...],filter2,...>
Specify a list of audio filters to apply to the audio stream. See AUDIO FILTERS for
details and descriptions of the available filters. The option variants --af-add,
--af-pre, and --af-clr exist to modify a previously specified list, but you should
not need these for typical use.
--audio-spdif=<codecs>
List of codecs for which compressed audio passthrough should be used. This works
for both classic S/PDIF and HDMI.
Possible codecs are ac3, dts, dts-hd, eac3, truehd. Multiple codecs can be
specified by separating them with ,. dts refers to low bitrate DTS core, while
dts-hd refers to DTS MA (receiver and OS support varies). If both dts and dts-hd
are specified, it behaves equivalent to specifying dts-hd only.
In earlier mpv versions you could use --ad to force the spdif wrapper. This does
not work anymore.
Warning
There is not much reason to use this. HDMI supports uncompressed
multichannel PCM, and mpv supports lossless DTS-HD decoding via FFmpeg's
new DCA decoder (based on libdcadec).
--ad=<decoder1,decoder2,...[-]>
Specify a priority list of audio decoders to be used, according to their decoder
name. When determining which decoder to use, the first decoder that matches the
audio format is selected. If that is unavailable, the next decoder is used.
Finally, it tries all other decoders that are not explicitly selected or rejected
by the option.
- at the end of the list suppresses fallback on other available decoders not on the
--ad list. + in front of an entry forces the decoder. Both of these should not
normally be used, because they break normal decoder auto-selection! Both of these
methods are deprecated.
Examples
--ad=mp3float
Prefer the FFmpeg/Libav mp3float decoder over all other MP3 decoders.
--ad=help
List all available decoders.
Warning
Enabling compressed audio passthrough (AC3 and DTS via SPDIF/HDMI) with
this option is not possible. Use --audio-spdif instead.
--volume=<value>
Set the startup volume. 0 means silence, 100 means no volume reduction or
amplification. Negative values can be passed for compatibility, but are treated as
0.
Since mpv 0.18.1, this always controls the internal mixer (aka "softvol").
--replaygain=<no|track|album>
Adjust volume gain according to replaygain values stored in the file metadata. With
--replaygain=no (the default), perform no adjustment. With --replaygain=track,
apply track gain. With --replaygain=album, apply album gain if present and fall
back to track gain otherwise.
--replaygain-preamp=<db>
Pre-amplification gain in dB to apply to the selected replaygain gain (default: 0).
--replaygain-clip=<yes|no>
Prevent clipping caused by replaygain by automatically lowering the gain (default).
Use --replaygain-clip=no to disable this.
--replaygain-fallback=<db>
Gain in dB to apply if the file has no replay gain tags. This option is always
applied if the replaygain logic is somehow inactive. If this is applied, no other
replaygain options are applied.
--audio-delay=<sec>
Audio delay in seconds (positive or negative float value). Positive values delay
the audio, and negative values delay the video.
--mute=<yes|no|auto>
Set startup audio mute status (default: no).
auto is a deprecated possible value that is equivalent to no.
See also: --volume.
--softvol=<no|yes|auto>
Deprecated/unfunctional. Before mpv 0.18.1, this used to control whether to use the
volume controls of the audio output driver or the internal mpv volume filter.
The current behavior is that softvol is always enabled, i.e. as if this option is
set to yes. The other behaviors are not available anymore, although auto almost
matches current behavior in most cases.
The no behavior is still partially available through the ao-volume and ao-mute
properties. But there are no options to reset these.
--audio-demuxer=<[+]name>
Use this audio demuxer type when using --audio-file. Use a '+' before the name to
force it; this will skip some checks. Give the demuxer name as printed by
--audio-demuxer=help.
--ad-lavc-ac3drc=<level>
Select the Dynamic Range Compression level for AC-3 audio streams. <level> is a
float value ranging from 0 to 1, where 0 means no compression (which is the
default) and 1 means full compression (make loud passages more silent and vice
versa). Values up to 6 are also accepted, but are purely experimental. This option
only shows an effect if the AC-3 stream contains the required range compression
information.
The standard mandates that DRC is enabled by default, but mpv (and some other
players) ignore this for the sake of better audio quality.
--ad-lavc-downmix=<yes|no>
Whether to request audio channel downmixing from the decoder (default: no). Some
decoders, like AC-3, AAC and DTS, can remix audio on decoding. The requested number
of output channels is set with the --audio-channels option. Useful for playing
surround audio on a stereo system.
--ad-lavc-threads=<0-16>
Number of threads to use for decoding. Whether threading is actually supported
depends on codec. As of this writing, it's supported for some lossless codecs only.
0 means autodetect number of cores on the machine and use that, up to the maximum
of 16 (default: 1).
--ad-lavc-o=<key>=<value>[,<key>=<value>[,...]]
Pass AVOptions to libavcodec decoder. Note, a patch to make the o= unneeded and
pass all unknown options through the AVOption system is welcome. A full list of
AVOptions can be found in the FFmpeg manual.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--ad-spdif-dtshd=<yes|no>, --dtshd, --no-dtshd
If DTS is passed through, use DTS-HD.
Warning
This and enabling passthrough via --ad are deprecated in favor of using
--audio-spdif=dts-hd.
--audio-channels=<auto-safe|auto|layouts>
Control which audio channels are output (e.g. surround vs. stereo). There are the
following possibilities:
•
--audio-channels=auto-safe
Use the system's preferred channel layout. If there is none (such as when
accessing a hardware device instead of the system mixer), force stereo.
Some audio outputs might simply accept any layout and do downmixing on
their own.
This is the default.
•
--audio-channels=auto
Send the audio device whatever it accepts, preferring the audio's original
channel layout. Can cause issues with HDMI (see the warning below).
•
--audio-channels=layout1,layout2,...
List of ,-separated channel layouts which should be allowed. Technically,
this only adjusts the filter chain output to the best matching layout in
the list, and passes the result to the audio API. It's possible that the
audio API will select a different channel layout.
Using this mode is recommended for direct hardware output, especially over
HDMI (see HDMI warning below).
•
--audio-channels=<stereo|mono>
Force a downmix to stereo or mono. These are special-cases of the previous
item. (See paragraphs below for implications.)
If a list of layouts is given, each item can be either an explicit channel layout
name (like 5.1), or a channel number. Channel numbers refer to default layouts,
e.g. 2 channels refer to stereo, 6 refers to 5.1.
See --audio-channels=help output for defined default layouts. This also lists
speaker names, which can be used to express arbitrary channel layouts (e.g.
fl-fr-lfe is 2.1).
If the list of channel layouts has only 1 item, the decoder is asked to produce
according output. This sometimes triggers decoder-downmix, which might be different
from the normal mpv downmix. (Only some decoders support remixing audio, like AC-3,
AAC or DTS. You can use --ad-lavc-downmix=no to make the decoder always output its
native layout.) One consequence is that --audio-channels=stereo triggers decoder
downmix, while auto or auto-safe never will, even if they end up selecting stereo.
This happens because the decision whether to use decoder downmix happens long
before the audio device is opened.
If the channel layout of the media file (i.e. the decoder) and the AO's channel
layout don't match, mpv will attempt to insert a conversion filter. You may need
to change the channel layout of the system mixer to achieve your desired output as
mpv does not have control over it. Another work-around for this on some AOs is to
use --audio-exclusive=yes to circumvent the system mixer entirely.
Warning
Using auto can cause issues when using audio over HDMI. The OS will
typically report all channel layouts that _can_ go over HDMI, even if the
receiver does not support them. If a receiver gets an unsupported channel
layout, random things can happen, such as dropping the additional
channels, or adding noise.
You are recommended to set an explicit whitelist of the layouts you want.
For example, most A/V receivers connected via HDMI and that can do 7.1
would be served by: --audio-channels=7.1,5.1,stereo
--audio-display=<no|embedded-first|external-first>
Determines whether to display cover art when playing audio files and with what
priority. It will display the first image found, and additional images are
available as video tracks.
no Disable display of video entirely when playing audio files.
embedded-first
Display embedded images and external cover art, giving priority to embedded
images (default).
external-first
Display embedded images and external cover art, giving priority to external
files.
This option has no influence on files with normal video tracks.
--audio-files=<files>
Play audio from an external file while viewing a video.
This is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--audio-file=<file>
CLI/config file only alias for --audio-files-append. Each use of this option will
add a new audio track. The details are similar to how --sub-file works.
--audio-format=<format>
Select the sample format used for output from the audio filter layer to the sound
card. The values that <format> can adopt are listed below in the description of the
format audio filter.
--audio-samplerate=<Hz>
Select the output sample rate to be used (of course sound cards have limits on
this). If the sample frequency selected is different from that of the current
media, the lavrresample audio filter will be inserted into the audio filter layer
to compensate for the difference.
--gapless-audio=<no|yes|weak>
Try to play consecutive audio files with no silence or disruption at the point of
file change. Default: weak.
no Disable gapless audio.
yes The audio device is opened using parameters chosen for the first file played
and is then kept open for gapless playback. This means that if the first
file for example has a low sample rate, then the following files may get
resampled to the same low sample rate, resulting in reduced sound quality.
If you play files with different parameters, consider using options such as
--audio-samplerate and --audio-format to explicitly select what the shared
output format will be.
weak Normally, the audio device is kept open (using the format it was first
initialized with). If the audio format the decoder output changes, the audio
device is closed and reopened. This means that you will normally get gapless
audio with files that were encoded using the same settings, but might not be
gapless in other cases. The exact conditions under which the audio device
is kept open is an implementation detail, and can change from version to
version. Currently, the device is kept even if the sample format changes,
but the sample formats are convertible. If video is still going on when
there is still audio, trying to use gapless is also explicitly given up.
NOTE:
This feature is implemented in a simple manner and relies on audio output device
buffering to continue playback while moving from one file to another. If
playback of the new file starts slowly, for example because it is played from a
remote network location or because you have specified cache settings that
require time for the initial cache fill, then the buffered audio may run out
before playback of the new file can start.
--initial-audio-sync, --no-initial-audio-sync
When starting a video file or after events such as seeking, mpv will by default
modify the audio stream to make it start from the same timestamp as video, by
either inserting silence at the start or cutting away the first samples. Disabling
this option makes the player behave like older mpv versions did: video and audio
are both started immediately even if their start timestamps differ, and then video
timing is gradually adjusted if necessary to reach correct synchronization later.
--volume-max=<100.0-1000.0>
Set the maximum amplification level in percent (default: 130). A value of 130 will
allow you to adjust the volume up to about double the normal level.
--audio-file-auto=<no|exact|fuzzy|all>, --no-audio-file-auto
Load additional audio files matching the video filename. The parameter specifies
how external audio files are matched.
no Don't automatically load external audio files (default).
exact Load the media filename with audio file extension.
fuzzy Load all audio files containing the media filename.
all Load all audio files in the current and --audio-file-paths directories.
--audio-file-auto-exts=ext1,ext2,...
Audio file extentions to try and match when using audio-file-auto.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
--audio-file-paths=<path1:path2:...>
Equivalent to --sub-file-paths option, but for auto-loaded audio files.
This is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--audio-client-name=<name>
The application name the player reports to the audio API. Can be useful if you want
to force a different audio profile (e.g. with PulseAudio), or to set your own
application name when using libmpv.
--audio-buffer=<seconds>
Set the audio output minimum buffer. The audio device might actually create a
larger buffer if it pleases. If the device creates a smaller buffer, additional
audio is buffered in an additional software buffer.
Making this larger will make soft-volume and other filters react slower, introduce
additional issues on playback speed change, and block the player on audio format
changes. A smaller buffer might lead to audio dropouts.
This option should be used for testing only. If a non-default value helps
significantly, the mpv developers should be contacted.
Default: 0.2 (200 ms).
--audio-stream-silence=<yes|no>
Cash-grab consumer audio hardware (such as A/V receivers) often ignore initial
audio sent over HDMI. This can happen every time audio over HDMI is stopped and
resumed. In order to compensate for this, you can enable this option to not to stop
and restart audio on seeks, and fill the gaps with silence. Likewise, when pausing
playback, audio is not stopped, and silence is played while paused. Note that if no
audio track is selected, the audio device will still be closed immediately.
Not all AOs support this.
Warning
This modifies certain subtle player behavior, like A/V-sync and underrun
handling. Enabling this option is strongly discouraged.
--audio-wait-open=<secs>
This makes sense for use with --audio-stream-silence=yes. If this option is given,
the player will wait for the given amount of seconds after opening the audio device
before sending actual audio data to it. Useful if your expensive hardware discards
the first 1 or 2 seconds of audio data sent to it. If --audio-stream-silence=yes is
not set, this option will likely just waste time.
Subtitles
NOTE:
Changing styling and position does not work with all subtitles. Image-based subtitles
(DVD, Bluray/PGS, DVB) cannot changed for fundamental reasons. Subtitles in ASS format
are normally not changed intentionally, but overriding them can be controlled with
--sub-ass-override.
--sub-demuxer=<[+]name>
Force subtitle demuxer type for --sub-file. Give the demuxer name as printed by
--sub-demuxer=help.
--sub-delay=<sec>
Delays subtitles by <sec> seconds. Can be negative.
--sub-files=<file-list>, --sub-file=<filename>
Add a subtitle file to the list of external subtitles.
If you use --sub-file only once, this subtitle file is displayed by default.
If --sub-file is used multiple times, the subtitle to use can be switched at
runtime by cycling subtitle tracks. It's possible to show two subtitles at once:
use --sid to select the first subtitle index, and --secondary-sid to select the
second index. (The index is printed on the terminal output after the --sid= in the
list of streams.)
--sub-files is a path list option (see List Options for details), and can take
multiple file names separated by : (Unix) or ; (Windows), while --sub-file takes a
single filename, but can be used multiple times to add multiple files. Technically,
--sub-file is a CLI/config file only alias for --sub-files-append.
--secondary-sid=<ID|auto|no>
Select a secondary subtitle stream. This is similar to --sid. If a secondary
subtitle is selected, it will be rendered as toptitle (i.e. on the top of the
screen) alongside the normal subtitle, and provides a way to render two subtitles
at once.
There are some caveats associated with this feature. For example, bitmap subtitles
will always be rendered in their usual position, so selecting a bitmap subtitle as
secondary subtitle will result in overlapping subtitles. Secondary subtitles are
never shown on the terminal if video is disabled.
NOTE:
Styling and interpretation of any formatting tags is disabled for the secondary
subtitle. Internally, the same mechanism as --no-sub-ass is used to strip the
styling.
NOTE:
If the main subtitle stream contains formatting tags which display the subtitle
at the top of the screen, it will overlap with the secondary subtitle. To
prevent this, you could use --no-sub-ass to disable styling in the main subtitle
stream.
--sub-scale=<0-100>
Factor for the text subtitle font size (default: 1).
NOTE:
This affects ASS subtitles as well, and may lead to incorrect subtitle
rendering. Use with care, or use --sub-font-size instead.
--sub-scale-by-window=<yes|no>
Whether to scale subtitles with the window size (default: yes). If this is
disabled, changing the window size won't change the subtitle font size.
Like --sub-scale, this can break ASS subtitles.
--sub-scale-with-window=<yes|no>
Make the subtitle font size relative to the window, instead of the video. This is
useful if you always want the same font size, even if the video doesn't cover the
window fully, e.g. because screen aspect and window aspect mismatch (and the player
adds black bars).
Default: yes.
This option is misnamed. The difference to the confusingly similar sounding option
--sub-scale-by-window is that --sub-scale-with-window still scales with the
approximate window size, while the other option disables this scaling.
Affects plain text subtitles only (or ASS if --sub-ass-override is set high
enough).
--sub-ass-scale-with-window=<yes|no>
Like --sub-scale-with-window, but affects subtitles in ASS format only. Like
--sub-scale, this can break ASS subtitles.
Default: no.
--embeddedfonts=<yes|no>
Use fonts embedded in Matroska container files and ASS scripts (default: yes).
These fonts can be used for SSA/ASS subtitle rendering.
--sub-pos=<0-150>
Specify the position of subtitles on the screen. The value is the vertical position
of the subtitle in % of the screen height. 100 is the original position, which is
often not the absolute bottom of the screen, but with some margin between the
bottom and the subtitle. Values above 100 move the subtitle further down.
Warning
Text subtitles (as opposed to image subtitles) may be cut off if the
value of the option is above 100. This is a libass restriction.
This affects ASS subtitles as well, and may lead to incorrect subtitle
rendering in addition to the problem above.
Using --sub-margin-y can achieve this in a better way.
--sub-speed=<0.1-10.0>
Multiply the subtitle event timestamps with the given value. Can be used to fix the
playback speed for frame-based subtitle formats. Affects text subtitles only.
Example
--sub-speed=25/23.976 plays frame based subtitles which have been loaded
assuming a framerate of 23.976 at 25 FPS.
--sub-ass-style-overrides=<[Style.]Param=Value[,...]>
Override some style or script info parameters.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Examples
• --sub-ass-style-overrides=FontName=Arial,Default.Bold=1
• --sub-ass-style-overrides=PlayResY=768
NOTE:
Using this option may lead to incorrect subtitle rendering.
--sub-ass-hinting=<none|light|normal|native>
Set font hinting type. <type> can be:
none no hinting (default)
light FreeType autohinter, light mode
normal FreeType autohinter, normal mode
native font native hinter
Warning
Enabling hinting can lead to mispositioned text (in situations it's
supposed to match up video background), or reduce the smoothness of
animations with some badly authored ASS scripts. It is recommended to not
use this option, unless really needed.
--sub-ass-line-spacing=<value>
Set line spacing value for SSA/ASS renderer.
--sub-ass-shaper=<simple|complex>
Set the text layout engine used by libass.
simple uses Fribidi only, fast, doesn't render some languages correctly
complex
uses HarfBuzz, slower, wider language support
complex is the default. If libass hasn't been compiled against HarfBuzz, libass
silently reverts to simple.
--sub-ass-styles=<filename>
Load all SSA/ASS styles found in the specified file and use them for rendering text
subtitles. The syntax of the file is exactly like the [V4 Styles] / [V4+ Styles]
section of SSA/ASS.
NOTE:
Using this option may lead to incorrect subtitle rendering.
--sub-ass-override=<yes|no|force|scale|strip>
Control whether user style overrides should be applied. Note that all of these
overrides try to be somewhat smart about figuring out whether or not a subtitle is
considered a "sign".
no Render subtitles as specified by the subtitle scripts, without overrides.
yes Apply all the --sub-ass-* style override options. Changing the default for
any of these options can lead to incorrect subtitle rendering (default).
force Like yes, but also force all --sub-* options. Can break rendering easily.
scale Like yes, but also apply --sub-scale.
strip Radically strip all ASS tags and styles from the subtitle. This is
equivalent to the old --no-ass / --no-sub-ass options.
This also controls some bitmap subtitle overrides, as well as HTML tags in formats
like SRT, despite the name of the option.
--sub-ass-force-margins
Enables placing toptitles and subtitles in black borders when they are available,
if the subtitles are in the ASS format.
Default: no.
--sub-use-margins
Enables placing toptitles and subtitles in black borders when they are available,
if the subtitles are in a plain text format (or ASS if --sub-ass-override is set
high enough).
Default: yes.
--sub-ass-vsfilter-aspect-compat=<yes|no>
Stretch SSA/ASS subtitles when playing anamorphic videos for compatibility with
traditional VSFilter behavior. This switch has no effect when the video is stored
with square pixels.
The renderer historically most commonly used for the SSA/ASS subtitle formats,
VSFilter, had questionable behavior that resulted in subtitles being stretched too
if the video was stored in anamorphic format that required scaling for display.
This behavior is usually undesirable and newer VSFilter versions may behave
differently. However, many existing scripts compensate for the stretching by
modifying things in the opposite direction. Thus, if such scripts are displayed
"correctly", they will not appear as intended. This switch enables emulation of
the old VSFilter behavior (undesirable but expected by many existing scripts).
Enabled by default.
--sub-ass-vsfilter-blur-compat=<yes|no>
Scale \blur tags by video resolution instead of script resolution (enabled by
default). This is bug in VSFilter, which according to some, can't be fixed anymore
in the name of compatibility.
Note that this uses the actual video resolution for calculating the offset scale
factor, not what the video filter chain or the video output use.
--sub-ass-vsfilter-color-compat=<basic|full|force-601|no>
Mangle colors like (xy-)vsfilter do (default: basic). Historically, VSFilter was
not color space aware. This was no problem as long as the color space used for SD
video (BT.601) was used. But when everything switched to HD (BT.709), VSFilter was
still converting RGB colors to BT.601, rendered them into the video frame, and
handled the frame to the video output, which would use BT.709 for conversion to
RGB. The result were mangled subtitle colors. Later on, bad hacks were added on top
of the ASS format to control how colors are to be mangled.
basic Handle only BT.601->BT.709 mangling, if the subtitles seem to indicate that
this is required (default).
full Handle the full YCbCr Matrix header with all video color spaces supported by
libass and mpv. This might lead to bad breakages in corner cases and is not
strictly needed for compatibility (hopefully), which is why this is not
default.
force-601
Force BT.601->BT.709 mangling, regardless of subtitle headers or video color
space.
no Disable color mangling completely. All colors are RGB.
Choosing anything other than no will make the subtitle color depend on the video
color space, and it's for example in theory not possible to reuse a subtitle script
with another video file. The --sub-ass-override option doesn't affect how this
option is interpreted.
--stretch-dvd-subs=<yes|no>
Stretch DVD subtitles when playing anamorphic videos for better looking fonts on
badly mastered DVDs. This switch has no effect when the video is stored with square
pixels - which for DVD input cannot be the case though.
Many studios tend to use bitmap fonts designed for square pixels when authoring
DVDs, causing the fonts to look stretched on playback on DVD players. This option
fixes them, however at the price of possibly misaligning some subtitles (e.g. sign
translations).
Disabled by default.
--stretch-image-subs-to-screen=<yes|no>
Stretch DVD and other image subtitles to the screen, ignoring the video margins.
This has a similar effect as --sub-use-margins for text subtitles, except that the
text itself will be stretched, not only just repositioned. (At least in general it
is unavoidable, as an image bitmap can in theory consist of a single bitmap
covering the whole screen, and the player won't know where exactly the text parts
are located.)
This option does not display subtitles correctly. Use with care.
Disabled by default.
--image-subs-video-resolution=<yes|no>
Override the image subtitle resolution with the video resolution (default: no).
Normally, the subtitle canvas is fit into the video canvas (e.g. letterboxed).
Setting this option uses the video size as subtitle canvas size. Can be useful to
test broken subtitles, which often happen when the video was trancoded, while
attempting to keep the old subtitles.
--sub-ass, --no-sub-ass
Render ASS subtitles natively (enabled by default).
NOTE:
This has been deprecated by --sub-ass-override=strip. You also may need
--embeddedfonts=no to get the same behavior. Also, using
--sub-ass-override=style should give better results without breaking subtitles
too much.
If --no-sub-ass is specified, all tags and style declarations are stripped and
ignored on display. The subtitle renderer uses the font style as specified by the
--sub- options instead.
NOTE:
Using --no-sub-ass may lead to incorrect or completely broken rendering of
ASS/SSA subtitles. It can sometimes be useful to forcibly override the styling
of ASS subtitles, but should be avoided in general.
--sub-auto=<no|exact|fuzzy|all>, --no-sub-auto
Load additional subtitle files matching the video filename. The parameter specifies
how external subtitle files are matched. exact is enabled by default.
no Don't automatically load external subtitle files.
exact Load the media filename with subtitle file extension and possibly language
suffixes (default).
fuzzy Load all subs containing the media filename.
all Load all subs in the current and --sub-file-paths directories.
--sub-auto-exts=ext1,ext2,...
Subtitle extentions to try and match when using --sub-auto. Note that modifying
this list will also affect what mpv recognizes as subtitles when using drag and
drop.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
--sub-codepage=<codepage>
You can use this option to specify the subtitle codepage. uchardet will be used to
guess the charset. (If mpv was not compiled with uchardet, then utf-8 is the
effective default.)
The default value for this option is auto, which enables autodetection.
The following steps are taken to determine the final codepage, in order:
• if the specific codepage has a +, use that codepage
• if the data looks like UTF-8, assume it is UTF-8
• if --sub-codepage is set to a specific codepage, use that
• run uchardet, and if successful, use that
• otherwise, use UTF-8-BROKEN
Examples
• --sub-codepage=latin2 Use Latin 2 if input is not UTF-8.
• --sub-codepage=+cp1250 Always force recoding to cp1250.
The pseudo codepage UTF-8-BROKEN is used internally. If it's set, subtitles are
interpreted as UTF-8 with "Latin 1" as fallback for bytes which are not valid UTF-8
sequences. iconv is never involved in this mode.
NOTE:
This works for text subtitle files only. Other types of subtitles (in particular
subtitles in mkv files) are always assumed to be UTF-8.
--sub-stretch-durations=<yes|no>
Stretch a subtitle duration so it ends when the next one starts. Should help with
subtitles which erroneously have zero durations.
NOTE:
Only applies to text subtitles.
--sub-fix-timing=<yes|no>
Adjust subtitle timing is to remove minor gaps or overlaps between subtitles (if
the difference is smaller than 210 ms, the gap or overlap is removed).
--sub-forced-events-only=<yes|no>
Enabling this displays only forced events within subtitle streams. Only some bitmap
subtitle formats (such as DVD or PGS) are capable of having a mixture of forced and
unforced events within the stream. Enabling this on text subtitles will cause no
subtitles to be displayed (default: no).
--sub-fps=<rate>
Specify the framerate of the subtitle file (default: video fps). Affects text
subtitles only.
NOTE:
<rate> > video fps speeds the subtitles up for frame-based subtitle files and
slows them down for time-based ones.
See also: --sub-speed.
--sub-gauss=<0.0-3.0>
Apply Gaussian blur to image subtitles (default: 0). This can help to make
pixelated DVD/Vobsubs look nicer. A value other than 0 also switches to software
subtitle scaling. Might be slow.
NOTE:
Never applied to text subtitles.
--sub-gray
Convert image subtitles to grayscale. Can help to make yellow DVD/Vobsubs look
nicer.
NOTE:
Never applied to text subtitles.
--sub-file-paths=<path-list>
Specify extra directories to search for subtitles matching the video. Multiple
directories can be separated by ":" (";" on Windows). Paths can be relative or
absolute. Relative paths are interpreted relative to video file directory. If the
file is a URL, only absolute paths and sub configuration subdirectory will be
scanned.
Example
Assuming that /path/to/video/video.avi is played and
--sub-file-paths=sub:subtitles is specified, mpv searches for subtitle
files in these directories:
• /path/to/video/
• /path/to/video/sub/
• /path/to/video/subtitles/
• the sub configuration subdirectory (usually ~/.config/mpv/sub/)
This is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--sub-visibility, --no-sub-visibility
Can be used to disable display of subtitles, but still select and decode them.
--secondary-sub-visibility, --no-secondary-sub-visibility
Can be used to disable display of secondary subtitles, but still select and decode
them.
--sub-clear-on-seek
(Obscure, rarely useful.) Can be used to play broken mkv files with duplicate
ReadOrder fields. ReadOrder is the first field in a Matroska-style ASS subtitle
packets. It should be unique, and libass uses it for fast elimination of
duplicates. This option disables caching of subtitles across seeks, so after a seek
libass can't eliminate subtitle packets with the same ReadOrder as earlier packets.
--teletext-page=<1-999>
This works for dvb_teletext subtitle streams, and if FFmpeg has been compiled with
support for it.
--sub-past-video-end
After the last frame of video, if this option is enabled, subtitles will continue
to update based on audio timestamps. Otherwise, the subtitles for the last video
frame will stay onscreen.
Default: disabled
--sub-font=<name>
Specify font to use for subtitles that do not themselves specify a particular font.
The default is sans-serif.
Examples
• --sub-font='Bitstream Vera Sans'
• --sub-font='Comic Sans MS'
NOTE:
The --sub-font option (and many other style related --sub- options) are ignored
when ASS-subtitles are rendered, unless the --no-sub-ass option is specified.
This used to support fontconfig patterns. Starting with libass 0.13.0, this
stopped working.
--sub-font-size=<size>
Specify the sub font size. The unit is the size in scaled pixels at a window height
of 720. The actual pixel size is scaled with the window height: if the window
height is larger or smaller than 720, the actual size of the text increases or
decreases as well.
Default: 55.
--sub-back-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for sub text background. You can use
--sub-shadow-offset to change its size relative to the text.
--sub-blur=<0..20.0>
Gaussian blur factor. 0 means no blur applied (default).
--sub-bold=<yes|no>
Format text on bold.
--sub-italic=<yes|no>
Format text on italic.
--sub-border-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for the sub font border.
--sub-border-size=<size>
Size of the sub font border in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for details). A
value of 0 disables borders.
Default: 3.
--sub-color=<color>
Specify the color used for unstyled text subtitles.
The color is specified in the form r/g/b, where each color component is specified
as number in the range 0.0 to 1.0. It's also possible to specify the transparency
by using r/g/b/a, where the alpha value 0 means fully transparent, and 1.0 means
opaque. If the alpha component is not given, the color is 100% opaque.
Passing a single number to the option sets the sub to gray, and the form gray/a
lets you specify alpha additionally.
Examples
• --sub-color=1.0/0.0/0.0 set sub to opaque red
• --sub-color=1.0/0.0/0.0/0.75 set sub to opaque red with 75% alpha
• --sub-color=0.5/0.75 set sub to 50% gray with 75% alpha
Alternatively, the color can be specified as a RGB hex triplet in the form #RRGGBB,
where each 2-digit group expresses a color value in the range 0 (00) to 255 (FF).
For example, #FF0000 is red. This is similar to web colors. Alpha is given with
#AARRGGBB.
Examples
• --sub-color='#FF0000' set sub to opaque red
• --sub-color='#C0808080' set sub to 50% gray with 75% alpha
--sub-margin-x=<size>
Left and right screen margin for the subs in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for
details).
This option specifies the distance of the sub to the left, as well as at which
distance from the right border long sub text will be broken.
Default: 25.
--sub-margin-y=<size>
Top and bottom screen margin for the subs in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for
details).
This option specifies the vertical margins of unstyled text subtitles. If you just
want to raise the vertical subtitle position, use --sub-pos.
Default: 22.
--sub-align-x=<left|center|right>
Control to which corner of the screen text subtitles should be aligned to (default:
center).
Never applied to ASS subtitles, except in --no-sub-ass mode. Likewise, this does
not apply to image subtitles.
--sub-align-y=<top|center|bottom>
Vertical position (default: bottom). Details see --sub-align-x.
--sub-justify=<auto|left|center|right>
Control how multi line subs are justified irrespective of where they are aligned
(default: auto which justifies as defined by --sub-align-x). Left justification is
recommended to make the subs easier to read as it is easier for the eyes.
--sub-ass-justify=<yes|no>
Applies justification as defined by --sub-justify on ASS subtitles if
--sub-ass-override is not set to no. Default: no.
--sub-shadow-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for sub text shadow.
NOTE:
ignored when --sub-back-color is specified (or more exactly: when that option is
not set to completely transparent).
--sub-shadow-offset=<size>
Displacement of the sub text shadow in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for
details). A value of 0 disables shadows.
Default: 0.
--sub-spacing=<size>
Horizontal sub font spacing in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for details).
This value is added to the normal letter spacing. Negative values are allowed.
Default: 0.
--sub-filter-sdh=<yes|no>
Applies filter removing subtitle additions for the deaf or hard-of-hearing (SDH).
This is intended for English, but may in part work for other languages too. The
intention is that it can be always enabled so may not remove all parts added. It
removes speaker labels (like MAN:), upper case text in parentheses and any text in
brackets.
Default: no.
--sub-filter-sdh-harder=<yes|no>
Do harder SDH filtering (if enabled by --sub-filter-sdh). Will also remove speaker
labels and text within parentheses using both lower and upper case letters.
Default: no.
--sub-filter-regex-...=...
Set a list of regular expressions to match on text subtitles, and remove any lines
that match (default: empty). This is a string list option. See List Options for
details. Normally, you should use --sub-filter-regex-append=<regex>, where each
option use will append a new regular expression, without having to fight escaping
problems.
List items are matched in order. If a regular expression matches, the process is
stopped, and the subtitle line is discarded. The text matched against is, by
default, the Text field of ASS events (if the subtitle format is different, it is
always converted). This may include formatting tags. Matching is case-insensitive,
but how this is done depends on the libc, and most likely works in ASCII only. It
does not work on bitmap/image subtitles. Unavailable on inferior OSes (requires
POSIX regex support).
Example
--sub-filter-regex-append=opensubtitles\.org filters some ads.
Technically, using a list for matching is redundant, since you could just use a
single combined regular expression. But it helps with diagnosis, ease of use, and
temporarily disabling or enabling individual filters.
WARNING:
This is experimental. The semantics most likely will change, and if you use
this, you should be prepared to update the option later. Ideas include replacing
the regexes with a very primitive and small subset of sed, or some method to
control case-sensitivity.
--sub-filter-jsre-...=...
Same as --sub-filter-regex but with JavaScript regular expressions.
Shares/affected-by all --sub-filter-regex-* control options (see below), and also
experimental. Requires only JavaScript support.
--sub-filter-regex-plain=<yes|no>
Whether to first convert the ASS "Text" field to plain-text (default: no). This
strips ASS tags and applies ASS directives, like \N to new-line. If the result is
multi-line then the regexp anchors ^ and $ match each line, but still any match
discards all lines.
--sub-filter-regex-warn=<yes|no>
Log dropped lines with warning log level, instead of verbose (default: no).
Helpful for testing.
--sub-filter-regex-enable=<yes|no>
Whether to enable regex filtering (default: yes). Note that if no regexes are added
to the --sub-filter-regex list, setting this option to yes has no effect. It's
meant to easily disable or enable filtering temporarily.
--sub-create-cc-track=<yes|no>
For every video stream, create a closed captions track (default: no). The only
purpose is to make the track available for selection at the start of playback,
instead of creating it lazily. This applies only to ATSC A53 Part 4 Closed Captions
(displayed by mpv as subtitle tracks using the codec eia_608). The CC track is
marked "default" and selected according to the normal subtitle track selection
rules. You can then use --sid to explicitly select the correct track too.
If the video stream contains no closed captions, or if no video is being decoded,
the CC track will remain empty and will not show any text.
--sub-font-provider=<auto|none|fontconfig>
Which libass font provider backend to use (default: auto). auto will attempt to use
the native font provider: fontconfig on Linux, CoreText on macOS, DirectWrite on
Windows. fontconfig forces fontconfig, if libass was built with support (if not, it
behaves like none).
The none font provider effectively disables system fonts. It will still attempt to
use embedded fonts (unless --embeddedfonts=no is set; this is the same behavior as
with all other font providers), subfont.ttf if provided, and fonts in the fonts
sub-directory if provided. (The fallback is more strict than that of other font
providers, and if a font name does not match, it may prefer not to render any text
that uses the missing font.)
--sub-fonts-dir=<path>
Font files in this directory are used by mpv/libass for subtitles. Useful if you do
not want to install fonts to your system. Note that files in this directory are
loaded into memory before being used by mpv. If you have a lot of fonts, consider
using fonts.conf (see FILES section) to include additional mpv user settings.
If this option is not specified, ~~/fonts will be used by default.
Window
--title=<string>
Set the window title. This is used for the video window, and if possible, also sets
the audio stream title.
Properties are expanded. (See Property Expansion.)
WARNING:
There is a danger of this causing significant CPU usage, depending on the
properties used. Changing the window title is often a slow operation, and if the
title changes every frame, playback can be ruined.
--screen=<default|0-32>
In multi-monitor configurations (i.e. a single desktop that spans across multiple
displays), this option tells mpv which screen to display the video on.
Note (X11)
This option does not work properly with all window managers. In these
cases, you can try to use --geometry to position the window explicitly.
It's also possible that the window manager provides native features to
control which screens application windows should use.
Note (Wayland)
This option does not actually work on wayland since window placement is
not allowed. However setting this option does influence mpv's initial
guess at finding an output which may be useful for options like
--geometry or --autofit which depend on the monitor resolution.
See also --fs-screen.
--screen-name=<string>
In multi-monitor configurations, this option tells mpv which screen to display the
video on based on the screen name from the video backend. The same caveats in the
--screen option also apply here. This option is ignored and does nothing if
--screen is explicitly set.
--fullscreen, --fs
Fullscreen playback.
--fs-screen=<all|current|0-32>
In multi-monitor configurations (i.e. a single desktop that spans across multiple
displays), this option tells mpv which screen to go fullscreen to. If current is
used mpv will fallback on what the user provided with the screen option.
Note (X11)
This option works properly only with window managers which understand the
EWMH _NET_WM_FULLSCREEN_MONITORS hint.
Note (macOS)
all does not work on macOS and will behave like current.
See also --screen.
--fs-screen-name=<string>
In multi-monitor configurations, this option tells mpv which screen to go
fullscreen to based on the screen name from the video backend. The same caveats in
the --fs-screen option also apply here. This option is ignored and does nothing if
--fs-screen is explicitly set.
--keep-open=<yes|no|always>
Do not terminate when playing or seeking beyond the end of the file, and there is
no next file to be played (and --loop is not used). Instead, pause the player.
When trying to seek beyond end of the file, the player will attempt to seek to the
last frame.
Normally, this will act like set pause yes on EOF, unless the --keep-open-pause=no
option is set.
The following arguments can be given:
no If the current file ends, go to the next file or terminate. (Default.)
yes Don't terminate if the current file is the last playlist entry. Equivalent
to --keep-open without arguments.
always Like yes, but also applies to files before the last playlist entry. This
means playback will never automatically advance to the next file.
NOTE:
This option is not respected when using --frames. Explicitly skipping to the
next file if the binding uses force will terminate playback as well.
Also, if errors or unusual circumstances happen, the player can quit anyway.
Since mpv 0.6.0, this doesn't pause if there is a next file in the playlist, or the
playlist is looped. Approximately, this will pause when the player would normally
exit, but in practice there are corner cases in which this is not the case (e.g.
mpv --keep-open file.mkv /dev/null will play file.mkv normally, then fail to open
/dev/null, then exit). (In mpv 0.8.0, always was introduced, which restores the old
behavior.)
--keep-open-pause=<yes|no>
If set to no, instead of pausing when --keep-open is active, just stop at end of
file and continue playing forward when you seek backwards until end where it stops
again. Default: yes.
--image-display-duration=<seconds|inf>
If the current file is an image, play the image for the given amount of seconds
(default: 1). inf means the file is kept open forever (until the user stops
playback manually).
Unlike --keep-open, the player is not paused, but simply continues playback until
the time has elapsed. (It should not use any resources during "playback".)
This affects image files, which are defined as having only 1 video frame and no
audio. The player may recognize certain non-images as images, for example if
--length is used to reduce the length to 1 frame, or if you seek to the last frame.
This option does not affect the framerate used for mf:// or --merge-files. For
that, use --mf-fps instead.
Setting --image-display-duration hides the OSC and does not track playback time on
the command-line output, and also does not duplicate the image frame when encoding.
To force the player into "dumb mode" and actually count out seconds, or to
duplicate the image when encoding, you need to use --demuxer=lavf
--demuxer-lavf-o=loop=1, and use --length or --frames to stop after a particular
time.
--force-window=<yes|no|immediate>
Create a video output window even if there is no video. This can be useful when
pretending that mpv is a GUI application. Currently, the window always has the size
640x480, and is subject to --geometry, --autofit, and similar options.
WARNING:
The window is created only after initialization (to make sure default window
placement still works if the video size is different from the --force-window
default window size). This can be a problem if initialization doesn't work
perfectly, such as when opening URLs with bad network connection, or opening
broken video files. The immediate mode can be used to create the window always
on program start, but this may cause other issues.
--taskbar-progress, --no-taskbar-progress
(Windows only) Enable/disable playback progress rendering in taskbar (Windows 7 and
above).
Enabled by default.
--snap-window
(Windows only) Snap the player window to screen edges.
--drag-and-drop=<no|auto|replace|append>
(X11, Wayland and Windows only) Controls the default behavior of drag and drop on
platforms that support this. auto will obey what the underlying os/platform gives
mpv. Typically, holding shift during the drag and drop will append the item to the
playlist. Otherwise, it will completely replace it. replace and append always force
replacing and appending to the playlist respectively. no disables all drag and drop
behavior.
--ontop
Makes the player window stay on top of other windows.
On Windows, if combined with fullscreen mode, this causes mpv to be treated as
exclusive fullscreen window that bypasses the Desktop Window Manager.
--ontop-level=<window|system|desktop|level>
(macOS only) Sets the level of an ontop window (default: window).
window On top of all other windows.
system On top of system elements like Taskbar, Menubar and Dock.
desktop
On top of the Desktop behind windows and Desktop icons.
level A level as integer.
--focus-on-open, --no-focus-on-open
(macOS only) Focus the video window on creation and makes it the front most window.
This is on by default.
--window-corners=<default|donotround|round|roundsmall>
(Windows only) Set the preference for window corner rounding.
default
Let the system decide whether or not to round window corners
donotround
Never round window corners
round Round the corners if appropriate
roundsmall
Round the corners if appropriate, with a small radius
--border, --no-border
Play video with window border and decorations. Since this is on by default, use
--no-border to disable the standard window decorations.
--title-bar, --no-title-bar
(Windows only) Play video with the window title bar. Since this is on by default,
use --no-title-bar to hide the title bar. The --no-border option takes precedence.
--on-all-workspaces
(X11 and macOS only) Show the video window on all virtual desktops.
--geometry=<[W[xH]][+-x+-y][/WS]>, --geometry=<x:y>
Adjust the initial window position or size. W and H set the window size in pixels.
x and y set the window position, measured in pixels from the top-left corner of the
screen to the top-left corner of the image being displayed. If a percentage sign
(%) is given after the argument, it turns the value into a percentage of the screen
size in that direction. Positions are specified similar to the standard X11
--geometry option format, in which e.g. +10-50 means "place 10 pixels from the left
border and 50 pixels from the lower border" and "--20+-10" means "place 20 pixels
beyond the right and 10 pixels beyond the top border". A trailing / followed by an
integer denotes on which workspace (virtual desktop) the window should appear (X11
only).
If an external window is specified using the --wid option, this option is ignored.
The coordinates are relative to the screen given with --screen for the video output
drivers that fully support --screen.
NOTE:
Generally only supported by GUI VOs. Ignored for encoding.
Note (macOS)
On macOS, the origin of the screen coordinate system is located on the
bottom-left corner. For instance, 0:0 will place the window at the
bottom-left of the screen.
Note (X11)
This option does not work properly with all window managers.
Examples
50:40 Places the window at x=50, y=40.
50%:50%
Places the window in the middle of the screen.
100%:100%
Places the window at the bottom right corner of the screen.
50% Sets the window width to half the screen width. Window height is set so
that the window has the video aspect ratio.
50%x50%
Forces the window width and height to half the screen width and height.
Will show black borders to compensate for the video aspect ratio (with
most VOs and without --no-keepaspect).
50%+10+10/2
Sets the window to half the screen widths, and positions it 10 pixels
below/left of the top left corner of the screen, on the second workspace.
See also --autofit and --autofit-larger for fitting the window into a given size
without changing aspect ratio.
--autofit=<[W[xH]]>
Set the initial window size to a maximum size specified by WxH, without changing
the window's aspect ratio. The size is measured in pixels, or if a number is
followed by a percentage sign (%), in percents of the screen size.
This option never changes the aspect ratio of the window. If the aspect ratio
mismatches, the window's size is reduced until it fits into the specified size.
Window position is not taken into account, nor is it modified by this option (the
window manager still may place the window differently depending on size). Use
--geometry to change the window position. Its effects are applied after this
option.
See --geometry for details how this is handled with multi-monitor setups.
Use --autofit-larger instead if you just want to limit the maximum size of the
window, rather than always forcing a window size.
Use --geometry if you want to force both window width and height to a specific
size.
NOTE:
Generally only supported by GUI VOs. Ignored for encoding.
Examples
70% Make the window width 70% of the screen size, keeping aspect ratio.
1000 Set the window width to 1000 pixels, keeping aspect ratio.
70%x60%
Make the window as large as possible, without being wider than 70% of the
screen width, or higher than 60% of the screen height.
--autofit-larger=<[W[xH]]>
This option behaves exactly like --autofit, except the window size is only changed
if the window would be larger than the specified size.
Example
90%x80%
If the video is larger than 90% of the screen width or 80% of the screen
height, make the window smaller until either its width is 90% of the
screen, or its height is 80% of the screen.
--autofit-smaller=<[W[xH]]>
This option behaves exactly like --autofit, except that it sets the minimum size of
the window (just as --autofit-larger sets the maximum).
Example
500x500
Make the window at least 500 pixels wide and 500 pixels high (depending
on the video aspect ratio, the width or height will be larger than 500 in
order to keep the aspect ratio the same).
--window-scale=<factor>
Resize the video window to a multiple (or fraction) of the video size. This option
is applied before --autofit and other options are applied (so they override this
option).
For example, --window-scale=0.5 would show the window at half the video size.
--window-minimized=<yes|no>
Whether the video window is minimized or not. Setting this will minimize, or
unminimize, the video window if the current VO supports it. Note that some VOs may
support minimization while not supporting unminimization (eg: Wayland).
Whether this option and --window-maximized work on program start or at runtime, and
whether they're (at runtime) updated to reflect the actual window state, heavily
depends on the VO and the windowing system. Some VOs simply do not implement them
or parts of them, while other VOs may be restricted by the windowing systems
(especially Wayland).
--window-maximized=<yes|no>
Whether the video window is maximized or not. Setting this will maximize, or
unmaximize, the video window if the current VO supports it. See --window-minimized
for further remarks.
--cursor-autohide=<number|no|always>
Make mouse cursor automatically hide after given number of milliseconds (default:
1000 ms). no will disable cursor autohide. always means the cursor will stay
hidden.
--cursor-autohide-fs-only
If this option is given, the cursor is always visible in windowed mode. In
fullscreen mode, the cursor is shown or hidden according to --cursor-autohide.
--force-rgba-osd-rendering
Change how some video outputs render the OSD and text subtitles. This does not
change appearance of the subtitles and only has performance implications. For VOs
which support native ASS rendering (like gpu, vdpau, direct3d), this can be
slightly faster or slower, depending on GPU drivers and hardware. For other VOs,
this just makes rendering slower.
--force-render
Forces mpv to always render frames regardless of the visibility of the window.
Currently only affects X11 and Wayland VOs since they are the only ones that have
this optimization (i.e. everything else always renders regardless of visibility).
--force-window-position
Forcefully move mpv's video output window to default location whenever there is a
change in video parameters, video stream or file. This used to be the default
behavior. Currently only affects X11 and SDL VOs.
--auto-window-resize=<yes|no>
(Wayland, Win32, and X11) By default, mpv will automatically resize itself if the
video's size changes (i.e. advancing forward in a playlist). Setting this to no
disables this behavior so the window size never changes automatically. This option
does not have any impact on the --autofit or --geometry options.
--no-keepaspect, --keepaspect
--no-keepaspect will always stretch the video to window size, and will disable the
window manager hints that force the window aspect ratio. (Ignored in fullscreen
mode.)
--no-keepaspect-window, --keepaspect-window
--keepaspect-window (the default) will lock the window size to the video aspect.
--no-keepaspect-window disables this behavior, and will instead add black bars if
window aspect and video aspect mismatch. Whether this actually works depends on the
VO backend. (Ignored in fullscreen mode.)
--monitoraspect=<ratio>
Set the aspect ratio of your monitor or TV screen. A value of 0 disables a previous
setting (e.g. in the config file). Overrides the --monitorpixelaspect setting if
enabled.
See also --monitorpixelaspect and --video-aspect-override.
Examples
• --monitoraspect=4:3 or --monitoraspect=1.3333
• --monitoraspect=16:9 or --monitoraspect=1.7777
--hidpi-window-scale, --no-hidpi-window-scale
(macOS, Windows, X11, and Wayland only) Scale the window size according to the
backing scale factor (default: yes). On regular HiDPI resolutions the window opens
with double the size but appears as having the same size as on non-HiDPI
resolutions.
--native-fs, --no-native-fs
(macOS only) Uses the native fullscreen mechanism of the OS (default: yes).
--monitorpixelaspect=<ratio>
Set the aspect of a single pixel of your monitor or TV screen (default: 1). A value
of 1 means square pixels (correct for (almost?) all LCDs). See also --monitoraspect
and --video-aspect-override.
--stop-screensaver=<yes|no|always>
Turns off the screensaver (or screen blanker and similar mechanisms) at startup and
turns it on again on exit (default: yes). When using yes, the screensaver will
re-enable when playback is not active. always will always disable the screensaver.
Note that stopping the screensaver is only possible if a video output is available
(i.e. there is an open mpv window).
This is not supported on all video outputs or platforms. Sometimes it is
implemented, but does not work (especially with Linux "desktops"). Read the
Disabling Screensaver section very carefully.
--wid=<ID>
This tells mpv to attach to an existing window. If a VO is selected that supports
this option, it will use that window for video output. mpv will scale the video to
the size of this window, and will add black bars to compensate if the aspect ratio
of the video is different.
On X11, the ID is interpreted as a Window on X11. Unlike MPlayer/mplayer2, mpv
always creates its own window, and sets the wid window as parent. The window will
always be resized to cover the parent window fully. The value 0 is interpreted
specially, and mpv will draw directly on the root window.
On win32, the ID is interpreted as HWND. Pass it as value cast to uint32_t (all
Windows handles are 32-bit), this is important as mpv will not accept negative
values. mpv will create its own window and set the wid window as parent, like with
X11.
On macOS/Cocoa, the ID is interpreted as NSView*. Pass it as value cast to
intptr_t. mpv will create its own sub-view. Because macOS does not support window
embedding of foreign processes, this works only with libmpv, and will crash when
used from the command line.
On Android, the ID is interpreted as android.view.Surface. Pass it as a value cast
to intptr_t. Use with --vo=mediacodec_embed and --hwdec=mediacodec for direct
rendering using MediaCodec, or with --vo=gpu --gpu-context=android (with or without
--hwdec=mediacodec).
--no-window-dragging
Don't move the window when clicking on it and moving the mouse pointer.
--x11-name=<string>
Set the window class name for X11-based video output methods.
--x11-netwm=<yes|no|auto>
(X11 only) Control the use of NetWM protocol features.
This may or may not help with broken window managers. This provides some
functionality that was implemented by the now removed --fstype option. Actually,
it is not known to the developers to which degree this option was needed, so
feedback is welcome.
Specifically, yes will force use of NetWM fullscreen support, even if not
advertised by the WM. This can be useful for WMs that are broken on purpose, like
XMonad. (XMonad supposedly doesn't advertise fullscreen support, because Flash uses
it. Apparently, applications which want to use fullscreen anyway are supposed to
either ignore the NetWM support hints, or provide a workaround. Shame on XMonad for
deliberately breaking X protocols (as if X isn't bad enough already).
By default, NetWM support is autodetected (auto).
This option might be removed in the future.
--x11-bypass-compositor=<yes|no|fs-only|never>
If set to yes, then ask the compositor to unredirect the mpv window (default:
fs-only). This uses the _NET_WM_BYPASS_COMPOSITOR hint.
fs-only asks the window manager to disable the compositor only in fullscreen mode.
no sets _NET_WM_BYPASS_COMPOSITOR to 0, which is the default value as declared by
the EWMH specification, i.e. no change is done.
never asks the window manager to never disable the compositor.
--x11-present=<no|auto|yes>
Whether or not to use presentation statistics from X11's presentation extension
(default: auto).
mpv asks X11 for present events which it then may use for more accurate frame
presentation. This only has an effect if --video-sync=display-... is being used.
The auto option enumerates XRandr providers for autodetection. If amd, radeon,
intel, or nouveau (the standard x86 Mesa drivers) is found and nvidia is NOT found,
presentation feedback is enabled. Other drivers are not assumed to work, so they
are not enabled automatically.
yes or no can still be passed regardless to enable/disable this mechanism in case
there is good/bad behavior with whatever your combination of hardware/drivers/etc.
happens to be.
--x11-wid-title --no-x11-wid-title
Whether or not to set the window title when mpv is embedded on X11 (default: no).
Disc Devices
--cdda-device=<path>
Specify the CD device for CDDA playback (default: /dev/cdrom).
--dvd-device=<path>
Specify the DVD device or .iso filename (default: /dev/dvd). You can also specify a
directory that contains files previously copied directly from a DVD (with e.g.
vobcopy).
Example
mpv dvd:// --dvd-device=/path/to/dvd/
--bluray-device=<path>
(Blu-ray only) Specify the Blu-ray disc location. Must be a directory with Blu-ray
structure.
Example
mpv bd:// --bluray-device=/path/to/bd/
--cdda-...
These options can be used to tune the CD Audio reading feature of mpv.
--cdda-speed=<value>
Set CD spin speed.
--cdda-paranoia=<0-2>
Set paranoia level. Values other than 0 seem to break playback of anything but the
first track.
0 disable checking (default)
1 overlap checking only
2 full data correction and verification
--cdda-sector-size=<value>
Set atomic read size.
--cdda-overlap=<value>
Force minimum overlap search during verification to <value> sectors.
--cdda-toc-offset=<value>
Add <value> sectors to the values reported when addressing tracks. May be
negative.
--cdda-skip=<yes|no>
(Never) accept imperfect data reconstruction.
--cdda-cdtext=<yes|no>
Print CD text. This is disabled by default, because it ruins performance with
CD-ROM drives for unknown reasons.
--dvd-speed=<speed>
Try to limit DVD speed (default: 0, no change). DVD base speed is 1385 kB/s, so an
8x drive can read at speeds up to 11080 kB/s. Slower speeds make the drive more
quiet. For watching DVDs, 2700 kB/s should be quiet and fast enough. mpv resets the
speed to the drive default value on close. Values of at least 100 mean speed in
kB/s. Values less than 100 mean multiples of 1385 kB/s, i.e. --dvd-speed=8 selects
11080 kB/s.
NOTE:
You need write access to the DVD device to change the speed.
--dvd-angle=<ID>
Some DVDs contain scenes that can be viewed from multiple angles. This option
tells mpv which angle to use (default: 1).
Equalizer
--brightness=<-100-100>
Adjust the brightness of the video signal (default: 0). Not supported by all video
output drivers.
--contrast=<-100-100>
Adjust the contrast of the video signal (default: 0). Not supported by all video
output drivers.
--saturation=<-100-100>
Adjust the saturation of the video signal (default: 0). You can get grayscale
output with this option. Not supported by all video output drivers.
--gamma=<-100-100>
Adjust the gamma of the video signal (default: 0). Not supported by all video
output drivers.
--hue=<-100-100>
Adjust the hue of the video signal (default: 0). You can get a colored negative of
the image with this option. Not supported by all video output drivers.
Demuxer
--demuxer=<[+]name>
Force demuxer type. Use a '+' before the name to force it; this will skip some
checks. Give the demuxer name as printed by --demuxer=help.
--demuxer-lavf-analyzeduration=<value>
Maximum length in seconds to analyze the stream properties.
--demuxer-lavf-probe-info=<yes|no|auto|nostreams>
Whether to probe stream information (default: auto). Technically, this controls
whether libavformat's avformat_find_stream_info() function is called. Usually it's
safer to call it, but it can also make startup slower.
The auto choice (the default) tries to skip this for a few know-safe whitelisted
formats, while calling it for everything else.
The nostreams choice only calls it if and only if the file seems to contain no
streams after opening (helpful in cases when calling the function is needed to
detect streams at all, such as with FLV files).
--demuxer-lavf-probescore=<1-100>
Minimum required libavformat probe score. Lower values will require less data to be
loaded (makes streams start faster), but makes file format detection less reliable.
Can be used to force auto-detected libavformat demuxers, even if libavformat
considers the detection not reliable enough. (Default: 26.)
--demuxer-lavf-allow-mimetype=<yes|no>
Allow deriving the format from the HTTP MIME type (default: yes). Set this to no in
case playing things from HTTP mysteriously fails, even though the same files work
from local disk.
This is default in order to reduce latency when opening HTTP streams.
--demuxer-lavf-format=<name>
Force a specific libavformat demuxer.
--demuxer-lavf-hacks=<yes|no>
By default, some formats will be handled differently from other formats by
explicitly checking for them. Most of these compensate for weird or imperfect
behavior from libavformat demuxers. Passing no disables these. For debugging and
testing only.
--demuxer-lavf-o=<key>=<value>[,<key>=<value>[,...]]
Pass AVOptions to libavformat demuxer.
Note, a patch to make the o= unneeded and pass all unknown options through the
AVOption system is welcome. A full list of AVOptions can be found in the FFmpeg
manual. Note that some options may conflict with mpv options.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Example
--demuxer-lavf-o=fflags=+ignidx
--demuxer-lavf-probesize=<value>
Maximum amount of data to probe during the detection phase. In the case of MPEG-TS
this value identifies the maximum number of TS packets to scan.
--demuxer-lavf-buffersize=<value>
Size of the stream read buffer allocated for libavformat in bytes (default: 32768).
Lowering the size could lower latency. Note that libavformat might reallocate the
buffer internally, or not fully use all of it.
--demuxer-lavf-linearize-timestamps=<yes|no|auto>
Attempt to linearize timestamp resets in demuxed streams (default: auto). This was
tested only for single audio streams. It's unknown whether it works correctly for
video (but likely won't). Note that the implementation is slightly incorrect either
way, and will introduce a discontinuity by about 1 codec frame size.
The auto mode enables this for OGG audio stream. This covers the common and
annoying case of OGG web radio streams. Some of these will reset timestamps to 0
every time a new song begins. This breaks the mpv seekable cache, which can't deal
with timestamp resets. Note that FFmpeg/libavformat's seeking API can't deal with
this either; it's likely that if this option breaks this even more, while if it's
disabled, you can at least seek within the first song in the stream. Well, you
won't get anything useful either way if the seek is outside of mpv's cache.
--demuxer-lavf-propagate-opts=<yes|no>
Propagate FFmpeg-level options to recursively opened connections (default: yes).
This is needed because FFmpeg will apply these settings to nested AVIO contexts
automatically. On the other hand, this could break in certain situations - it's the
FFmpeg API, you just can't win.
This affects in particular the --timeout option and anything passed with
--demuxer-lavf-o.
If this option is deemed unnecessary at some point in the future, it will be
removed without notice.
--demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll=<yes|index|no>
Try harder to show embedded soft subtitles when seeking somewhere. Normally, it can
happen that the subtitle at the seek target is not shown due to how some container
file formats are designed. The subtitles appear only if seeking before or exactly
to the position a subtitle first appears. To make this worse, subtitles are often
timed to appear a very small amount before the associated video frame, so that
seeking to the video frame typically does not demux the subtitle at that position.
Enabling this option makes the demuxer start reading data a bit before the seek
target, so that subtitles appear correctly. Note that this makes seeking slower,
and is not guaranteed to always work. It only works if the subtitle is close enough
to the seek target.
Works with the internal Matroska demuxer only. Always enabled for absolute and
hr-seeks, and this option changes behavior with relative or imprecise seeks only.
You can use the --demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll-secs option to specify how much data
the demuxer should pre-read at most in order to find subtitle packets that may
overlap. Setting this to 0 will effectively disable this preroll mechanism. Setting
a very large value can make seeking very slow, and an extremely large value would
completely reread the entire file from start to seek target on every seek - seeking
can become slower towards the end of the file. The details are messy, and the value
is actually rounded down to the cluster with the previous video keyframe.
Some files, especially files muxed with newer mkvmerge versions, have information
embedded that can be used to determine what subtitle packets overlap with a seek
target. In these cases, mpv will reduce the amount of data read to a minimum.
(Although it will still read all data between the cluster that contains the first
wanted subtitle packet, and the seek target.) If the index choice (which is the
default) is specified, then prerolling will be done only if this information is
actually available. If this method is used, the maximum amount of data to skip can
be additionally controlled by --demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll-secs-index (it still
uses the value of the option without -index if that is higher).
See also --hr-seek-demuxer-offset option. This option can achieve a similar effect,
but only if hr-seek is active. It works with any demuxer, but makes seeking much
slower, as it has to decode audio and video data instead of just skipping over it.
--demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll-secs=<value>
See --demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll.
--demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll-secs-index=<value>
See --demuxer-mkv-subtitle-preroll.
--demuxer-mkv-probe-start-time=<yes|no>
Check the start time of Matroska files (default: yes). This simply reads the first
cluster timestamps and assumes it is the start time. Technically, this also reads
the first timestamp, which may increase latency by one frame (which may be relevant
for live streams).
--demuxer-mkv-probe-video-duration=<yes|no|full>
When opening the file, seek to the end of it, and check what timestamp the last
video packet has, and report that as file duration. This is strictly for
compatibility with Haali only. In this mode, it's possible that opening will be
slower (especially when playing over http), or that behavior with broken files is
much worse. So don't use this option.
The yes mode merely uses the index and reads a small number of blocks from the end
of the file. The full mode actually traverses the entire file and can make a
reliable estimate even without an index present (such as partial files).
--demuxer-rawaudio-channels=<value>
Number of channels (or channel layout) if --demuxer=rawaudio is used (default:
stereo).
--demuxer-rawaudio-format=<value>
Sample format for --demuxer=rawaudio (default: s16le). Use
--demuxer-rawaudio-format=help to get a list of all formats.
--demuxer-rawaudio-rate=<value>
Sample rate for --demuxer=rawaudio (default: 44 kHz).
--demuxer-rawvideo-fps=<value>
Rate in frames per second for --demuxer=rawvideo (default: 25.0).
--demuxer-rawvideo-w=<value>, --demuxer-rawvideo-h=<value>
Image dimension in pixels for --demuxer=rawvideo.
Example
Play a raw YUV sample:
mpv sample-720x576.yuv --demuxer=rawvideo \
--demuxer-rawvideo-w=720 --demuxer-rawvideo-h=576
--demuxer-rawvideo-format=<value>
Color space (fourcc) in hex or string for --demuxer=rawvideo (default: YV12).
--demuxer-rawvideo-mp-format=<value>
Color space by internal video format for --demuxer=rawvideo. Use
--demuxer-rawvideo-mp-format=help for a list of possible formats.
--demuxer-rawvideo-codec=<value>
Set the video codec instead of selecting the rawvideo codec when using
--demuxer=rawvideo. This uses the same values as codec names in --vd (but it does
not accept decoder names).
--demuxer-rawvideo-size=<value>
Frame size in bytes when using --demuxer=rawvideo.
--demuxer-max-bytes=<bytesize>
This controls how much the demuxer is allowed to buffer ahead. The demuxer will
normally try to read ahead as much as necessary, or as much is requested with
--demuxer-readahead-secs. The option can be used to restrict the maximum readahead.
This limits excessive readahead in case of broken files or desynced playback. The
demuxer will stop reading additional packets as soon as one of the limits is
reached. (The limits still can be slightly overstepped due to technical reasons.)
Set these limits higher if you get a packet queue overflow warning, and you think
normal playback would be possible with a larger packet queue.
See --list-options for defaults and value range. <bytesize> options accept suffixes
such as KiB and MiB.
--demuxer-max-back-bytes=<bytesize>
This controls how much past data the demuxer is allowed to preserve. This is useful
only if the cache is enabled.
Unlike the forward cache, there is no control how many seconds are actually cached
- it will simply use as much memory this option allows. Setting this option to 0
will strictly disable any back buffer, but this will lead to the situation that the
forward seek range starts after the current playback position (as it removes past
packets that are seek points).
If the end of the file is reached, the remaining unused forward buffer space is
"donated" to the backbuffer (unless the backbuffer size is set to 0, or
--demuxer-donate-buffer is set to no). This still limits the total cache usage to
the sum of the forward and backward cache, and effectively makes better use of the
total allowed memory budget. (The opposite does not happen: free backward buffer is
never "donated" to the forward buffer.)
Keep in mind that other buffers in the player (like decoders) will cause the
demuxer to cache "future" frames in the back buffer, which can skew the impression
about how much data the backbuffer contains.
See --list-options for defaults and value range.
--demuxer-donate-buffer=<yes|no>
Whether to let the back buffer use part of the forward buffer (default: yes). If
set to yes, the "donation" behavior described in the option description for
--demuxer-max-back-bytes is enabled. This means the back buffer may use up memory
up to the sum of the forward and back buffer options, minus the active size of the
forward buffer. If set to no, the options strictly limit the forward and back
buffer sizes separately.
Note that if the end of the file is reached, the buffered data stays the same, even
if you seek back within the cache. This is because the back buffer is only reduced
when new data is read.
--demuxer-seekable-cache=<yes|no|auto>
Debugging option to control whether seeking can use the demuxer cache (default:
auto). Normally you don't ever need to set this; the default auto does the right
thing and enables cache seeking it if --cache is set to yes (or is implied yes if
--cache=auto).
If enabled, short seek offsets will not trigger a low level demuxer seek (which
means for example that slow network round trips or FFmpeg seek bugs can be
avoided). If a seek cannot happen within the cached range, a low level seek will be
triggered. Seeking outside of the cache will start a new cached range, but can
discard the old cache range if the demuxer exhibits certain unsupported behavior.
The special value auto means yes in the same situation as --cache-secs is used
(i.e. when the stream appears to be a network stream or the stream cache is
enabled).
--demuxer-thread=<yes|no>
Run the demuxer in a separate thread, and let it prefetch a certain amount of
packets (default: yes). Having this enabled leads to smoother playback, enables
features like prefetching, and prevents that stuck network freezes the player. On
the other hand, it can add overhead, or the background prefetching can hog CPU
resources.
Disabling this option is not recommended. Use it for debugging only.
--demuxer-termination-timeout=<seconds>
Number of seconds the player should wait to shutdown the demuxer (default: 0.1).
The player will wait up to this much time before it closes the stream layer
forcefully. Forceful closing usually means the network I/O is given no chance to
close its connections gracefully (of course the OS can still close TCP connections
properly), and might result in annoying messages being logged, and in some cases,
confused remote servers.
This timeout is usually only applied when loading has finished properly. If loading
is aborted by the user, or in some corner cases like removing external tracks
sourced from network during playback, forceful closing is always used.
--demuxer-readahead-secs=<seconds>
If --demuxer-thread is enabled, this controls how much the demuxer should buffer
ahead in seconds (default: 1). As long as no packet has a timestamp difference
higher than the readahead amount relative to the last packet returned to the
decoder, the demuxer keeps reading.
Note that enabling the cache (such as --cache=yes, or if the input is considered a
network stream, and --cache=auto is used), this option is mostly ignored.
(--cache-secs will override this. Technically, the maximum of both options is
used.)
The main purpose of this option is to limit the readhead for local playback, since
a large readahead value is not overly useful in this case.
(This value tends to be fuzzy, because many file formats don't store linear
timestamps.)
--demuxer-hysteresis-secs=<seconds>
Once the demuxer limit is reached (--demuxer-max-bytes, --demuxer-readahead-secs or
--cache-secs), this value can be used to specify a hysteresis before the demuxer
will buffer ahead again. This specifies the maximum number of seconds from the
current playback position that needs to be remaining in the cache before the
demuxer will continue buffering ahead.
For example, with a value of 10 seconds specified, the demuxer will buffer ahead up
to the demuxer limit and won't start buffering ahead again until there is only 10
seconds of content left in the cache.
This can provide significant power savings and reduce load by making the demuxer
only buffer ahead in chunks at a time rather than buffering ahead nonstop to keep
the cache filled.
If you want to save power and reduce load, configure this to a small number that's
much lower than --cache-secs or --demuxer-readahead-secs. If it takes a long time
to buffer anything at all for a given stream (like when reading from a very slow
disk is involved), then the hysteresis value should be larger to compensate.
The default value is 0 seconds, which disables the caching hysteresis. A value of
10 seconds probably works well for most usecases.
--prefetch-playlist=<yes|no>
Prefetch next playlist entry while playback of the current entry is ending
(default: no).
This does not prefill the cache with the video data of the next URL. Prefetching
video data is supported only for the current playlist entry, and depends on the
demuxer cache settings (on by default). This merely opens the URL of the next
playlist entry as soon the current URL is fully read.
This does not work with URLs resolved by the youtube-dl wrapper, and it won't.
This can give subtly wrong results if per-file options are used, or if options are
changed in the time window between prefetching start and next file played.
This can occasionally make wrong prefetching decisions. For example, it can't
predict whether you go backwards in the playlist, and assumes you won't edit the
playlist.
Highly experimental.
--force-seekable=<yes|no>
If the player thinks that the media is not seekable (e.g. playing from a pipe, or
it's an http stream with a server that doesn't support range requests), seeking
will be disabled. This option can forcibly enable it. For seeks within the cache,
there's a good chance of success.
--demuxer-cache-wait=<yes|no>
Before starting playback, read data until either the end of the file was reached,
or the demuxer cache has reached maximum capacity. Only once this is done, playback
starts. This intentionally happens before the initial seek triggered with --start.
This does not change any runtime behavior after the initial caching. This option is
useless if the file cannot be cached completely.
--rar-list-all-volumes=<yes|no>
When opening multi-volume rar files, open all volumes to create a full list of
contained files (default: no). If disabled, only the archive entries whose headers
are located within the first volume are listed (and thus played when opening a .rar
file with mpv). Doing so speeds up opening, and the typical idiotic use-case of
playing uncompressed multi-volume rar files that contain a single media file is
made faster.
Opening is still slow, because for unknown, idiotic, and unnecessary reasons
libarchive opens all volumes anyway when playing the main file, even though mpv
iterated no archive entries yet.
--directory-mode=<auto|lazy|recursive|ignore>
When opening a directory, open subdirectories lazily, recursively or not at all.
The default is auto, which behaves like recursive with --shuffle, and like lazy
otherwise.
Input
--native-keyrepeat
Use system settings for keyrepeat delay and rate, instead of --input-ar-delay and
--input-ar-rate. (Whether this applies depends on the VO backend and how it handles
keyboard input. Does not apply to terminal input.)
--input-ar-delay
Delay in milliseconds before we start to autorepeat a key (0 to disable).
--input-ar-rate
Number of key presses to generate per second on autorepeat.
--input-conf=<filename>
Specify input configuration file other than the default location in the mpv
configuration directory (usually ~/.config/mpv/input.conf).
--no-input-default-bindings
Disable default-level ("weak") key bindings. These are bindings which config files
like input.conf can override. It currently affects the builtin key bindings, and
keys which scripts bind using mp.add_key_binding (but not mp.add_forced_key_binding
because this overrides input.conf).
--no-input-builtin-bindings
Disable loading of built-in key bindings during start-up. This option is applied
only during (lib)mpv initialization, and if used then it will not be not possible
to enable them later. May be useful to libmpv clients.
--input-cmdlist
Prints all commands that can be bound to keys.
--input-doubleclick-time=<milliseconds>
Time in milliseconds to recognize two consecutive button presses as a double-click
(default: 300).
--input-keylist
Prints all keys that can be bound to commands.
--input-key-fifo-size=<2-65000>
Specify the size of the FIFO that buffers key events (default: 7). If it is too
small, some events may be lost. The main disadvantage of setting it to a very large
value is that if you hold down a key triggering some particularly slow command then
the player may be unresponsive while it processes all the queued commands.
--input-test
Input test mode. Instead of executing commands on key presses, mpv will show the
keys and the bound commands on the OSD. Has to be used with a dummy video, and the
normal ways to quit the player will not work (key bindings that normally quit will
be shown on OSD only, just like any other binding). See INPUT.CONF.
--input-terminal, --no-input-terminal
--no-input-terminal prevents the player from reading key events from standard
input. Useful when reading data from standard input. This is automatically enabled
when - is found on the command line. There are situations where you have to set it
manually, e.g. if you open /dev/stdin (or the equivalent on your system), use stdin
in a playlist or intend to read from stdin later on via the loadfile or loadlist
input commands.
--input-ipc-server=<filename>
Enable the IPC support and create the listening socket at the given path.
On Linux and Unix, the given path is a regular filesystem path. On Windows, named
pipes are used, so the path refers to the pipe namespace (\\.\pipe\<name>). If the
\\.\pipe\ prefix is missing, mpv will add it automatically before creating the
pipe, so --input-ipc-server=/tmp/mpv-socket and
--input-ipc-server=\\.\pipe\tmp\mpv-socket are equivalent for IPC on Windows.
See JSON IPC for details.
--input-ipc-client=fd://<N>
Connect a single IPC client to the given FD. This is somewhat similar to
--input-ipc-server, except no socket is created, and instead the passed FD is
treated like a socket connection received from accept(). In practice, you could
pass either a FD created by socketpair(), or a pipe. In both cases, you must sure
the FD is actually inherited by mpv (do not set the POSIX CLOEXEC flag).
The player quits when the connection is closed.
This is somewhat similar to the removed --input-file option, except it supports
only integer FDs, and cannot open actual paths.
Example
--input-ipc-client=fd://123
NOTE:
Does not and will not work on Windows.
WARNING:
Writing to the input-ipc-server option at runtime will start another instance of
an IPC client handler for the input-ipc-client option, because initialization is
bundled, and this thing is stupid. This is a bug. Writing to input-ipc-client at
runtime will start another IPC client handler for the new value, without
stopping the old one, even if the FD value is the same (but the string is
different e.g. due to whitespace). This is not a bug.
--input-gamepad=<yes|no>
Enable/disable SDL2 Gamepad support. Disabled by default.
--input-cursor, --no-input-cursor
Permit mpv to receive pointer events reported by the video output driver. Necessary
to use the OSC, or to select the buttons in DVD menus. Support depends on the VO
in use.
--input-cursor-passthrough, --no-input-cursor-passthrough
(X11 and Wayland only) Tell the backend windowing system to allow pointer events to
passthrough the mpv window. This allows windows under mpv to instead receive
pointer events as if the mpv window was never there.
--input-media-keys=<yes|no>
On systems where mpv can choose between receiving media keys or letting the system
handle them - this option controls whether mpv should receive them.
Default: yes (except for libmpv). macOS and Windows only, because elsewhere mpv
doesn't have a choice - the system decides whether to send media keys to mpv. For
instance, on X11 or Wayland, system-wide media keys are not implemented. Whether
media keys work when the mpv window is focused is implementation-defined.
--input-right-alt-gr, --no-input-right-alt-gr
(Cocoa and Windows only) Use the right Alt key as Alt Gr to produce special
characters. If disabled, count the right Alt as an Alt modifier key. Enabled by
default.
--input-vo-keyboard=<yes|no>
Disable all keyboard input on for VOs which can't participate in proper keyboard
input dispatching. May not affect all VOs. Generally useful for embedding only.
On X11, a sub-window with input enabled grabs all keyboard input as long as it is
1. a child of a focused window, and 2. the mouse is inside of the sub-window. It
can steal away all keyboard input from the application embedding the mpv window,
and on the other hand, the mpv window will receive no input if the mouse is outside
of the mpv window, even though mpv has focus. Modern toolkits work around this
weird X11 behavior, but naively embedding foreign windows breaks it.
The only way to handle this reasonably is using the XEmbed protocol, which was
designed to solve these problems. GTK provides GtkSocket, which supports XEmbed. Qt
doesn't seem to provide anything working in newer versions.
If the embedder supports XEmbed, input should work with default settings and with
this option disabled. Note that input-default-bindings is disabled by default in
libmpv as well - it should be enabled if you want the mpv default key bindings.
OSD
--osc, --no-osc
Whether to load the on-screen-controller (default: yes).
--no-osd-bar, --osd-bar
Disable display of the OSD bar.
You can configure this on a per-command basis in input.conf using osd- prefixes,
see Input Command Prefixes. If you want to disable the OSD completely, use
--osd-level=0.
--osd-on-seek=<no,bar,msg,msg-bar>
Set what is displayed on the OSD during seeks. The default is bar.
You can configure this on a per-command basis in input.conf using osd- prefixes,
see Input Command Prefixes.
--osd-duration=<time>
Set the duration of the OSD messages in ms (default: 1000).
--osd-font=<name>
Specify font to use for OSD. The default is sans-serif.
Examples
• --osd-font='Bitstream Vera Sans'
• --osd-font='Comic Sans MS'
--osd-font-size=<size>
Specify the OSD font size. See --sub-font-size for details.
Default: 55.
--osd-msg1=<string>
Show this string as message on OSD with OSD level 1 (visible by default). The
message will be visible by default, and as long as no other message covers it, and
the OSD level isn't changed (see --osd-level). Expands properties; see Property
Expansion.
--osd-msg2=<string>
Similar to --osd-msg1, but for OSD level 2. If this is an empty string (default),
then the playback time is shown.
--osd-msg3=<string>
Similar to --osd-msg1, but for OSD level 3. If this is an empty string (default),
then the playback time, duration, and some more information is shown.
This is used for the show-progress command (by default mapped to P), and when
seeking if enabled with --osd-on-seek or by osd- prefixes in input.conf (see Input
Command Prefixes).
--osd-status-msg is a legacy equivalent (but with a minor difference).
--osd-status-msg=<string>
Show a custom string during playback instead of the standard status text. This
overrides the status text used for --osd-level=3, when using the show-progress
command (by default mapped to P), and when seeking if enabled with --osd-on-seek or
osd- prefixes in input.conf (see Input Command Prefixes). Expands properties. See
Property Expansion.
This option has been replaced with --osd-msg3. The only difference is that this
option implicitly includes ${osd-sym-cc}. This option is ignored if --osd-msg3 is
not empty.
--osd-playing-msg=<string>
Show a message on OSD when playback starts. The string is expanded for properties,
e.g. --osd-playing-msg='file: ${filename}' will show the message file: followed by
a space and the currently played filename.
See Property Expansion.
--osd-playing-msg-duration=<time>
Set the duration of osd-playing-msg in ms. If this is unset, osd-playing-msg stays
on screen for the duration of osd-duration.
--osd-bar-align-x=<-1-1>
Position of the OSD bar. -1 is far left, 0 is centered, 1 is far right. Fractional
values (like 0.5) are allowed.
--osd-bar-align-y=<-1-1>
Position of the OSD bar. -1 is top, 0 is centered, 1 is bottom. Fractional values
(like 0.5) are allowed.
--osd-bar-w=<1-100>
Width of the OSD bar, in percentage of the screen width (default: 75). A value of
50 means the bar is half the screen wide.
--osd-bar-h=<0.1-50>
Height of the OSD bar, in percentage of the screen height (default: 3.125).
--osd-back-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for OSD text background.
--osd-blur=<0..20.0>
Gaussian blur factor. 0 means no blur applied (default).
--osd-bold=<yes|no>
Format text on bold.
--osd-italic=<yes|no>
Format text on italic.
--osd-border-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for the OSD font border.
--osd-border-size=<size>
Size of the OSD font border in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for details). A
value of 0 disables borders.
Default: 3.
--osd-color=<color>
Specify the color used for OSD. See --sub-color for details.
--osd-fractions
Show OSD times with fractions of seconds (in millisecond precision). Useful to see
the exact timestamp of a video frame.
--osd-level=<0-3>
Specifies which mode the OSD should start in.
0 OSD completely disabled (subtitles only)
1 enabled (shows up only on user interaction)
2 enabled + current time visible by default
3 enabled + --osd-status-msg (current time and status by default)
--osd-margin-x=<size>
Left and right screen margin for the OSD in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for
details).
This option specifies the distance of the OSD to the left, as well as at which
distance from the right border long OSD text will be broken.
Default: 25.
--osd-margin-y=<size>
Top and bottom screen margin for the OSD in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for
details).
This option specifies the vertical margins of the OSD.
Default: 22.
--osd-align-x=<left|center|right>
Control to which corner of the screen OSD should be aligned to (default: left).
--osd-align-y=<top|center|bottom>
Vertical position (default: top). Details see --osd-align-x.
--osd-scale=<factor>
OSD font size multiplier, multiplied with --osd-font-size value.
--osd-scale-by-window=<yes|no>
Whether to scale the OSD with the window size (default: yes). If this is disabled,
--osd-font-size and other OSD options that use scaled pixels are always in actual
pixels. The effect is that changing the window size won't change the OSD font size.
--osd-shadow-color=<color>
See --sub-color. Color used for OSD shadow.
NOTE:
ignored when --osd-back-color is specified (or more exactly: when that option is
not set to completely transparent).
--osd-shadow-offset=<size>
Displacement of the OSD shadow in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for details).
A value of 0 disables shadows.
Default: 0.
--osd-spacing=<size>
Horizontal OSD/sub font spacing in scaled pixels (see --sub-font-size for details).
This value is added to the normal letter spacing. Negative values are allowed.
Default: 0.
--video-osd=<yes|no>
Enabled OSD rendering on the video window (default: yes). This can be used in
situations where terminal OSD is preferred. If you just want to disable all OSD
rendering, use --osd-level=0.
It does not affect subtitles or overlays created by scripts (in particular, the OSC
needs to be disabled with --no-osc).
This option is somewhat experimental and could be replaced by another mechanism in
the future.
--osd-font-provider=<...>
See --sub-font-provider for details and accepted values. Note that unlike
subtitles, OSD never uses embedded fonts from media files.
--osd-fonts-dir=<path>
See --sub-fonts-dir for details. Defaults to ~~/fonts.
Screenshot
--screenshot-format=<type>
Set the image file type used for saving screenshots.
Available choices:
png PNG
jpg JPEG (default)
jpeg JPEG (alias for jpg)
webp WebP
jxl JPEG XL
avif AVIF
--screenshot-tag-colorspace=<yes|no>
Tag screenshots with the appropriate colorspace (default: yes).
Note that not all formats support this. When it is unsupported, or when this option
is disabled, screenshots will be converted to sRGB before being written.
--screenshot-high-bit-depth=<yes|no>
If possible, write screenshots with a bit depth similar to the source video
(default: yes). This is interesting in particular for PNG, as this sometimes
triggers writing 16 bit PNGs with huge file sizes. This will also include an unused
alpha channel in the resulting files if 16 bit is used.
--screenshot-template=<template>
Specify the filename template used to save screenshots. The template specifies the
filename without file extension, and can contain format specifiers, which will be
substituted when taking a screenshot. By default, the template is mpv-shot%n,
which results in filenames like mpv-shot0012.png for example.
The template can start with a relative or absolute path, in order to specify a
directory location where screenshots should be saved.
If the final screenshot filename points to an already existing file, the file will
not be overwritten. The screenshot will either not be saved, or if the template
contains %n, saved using different, newly generated filename.
Allowed format specifiers:
%[#][0X]n
A sequence number, padded with zeros to length X (default: 04). E.g.
passing the format %04n will yield 0012 on the 12th screenshot. The number
is incremented every time a screenshot is taken or if the file already
exists. The length X must be in the range 0-9. With the optional # sign, mpv
will use the lowest available number. For example, if you take three
screenshots--0001, 0002, 0003--and delete the first two, the next two
screenshots will not be 0004 and 0005, but 0001 and 0002 again.
%f Filename of the currently played video.
%F Same as %f, but strip the file extension, including the dot.
%x Directory path of the currently played video. If the video is not on the
filesystem (but e.g. http://), this expand to an empty string.
%X{fallback}
Same as %x, but if the video file is not on the filesystem, return the
fallback string inside the {...}.
%p Current playback time, in the same format as used in the OSD. The result is
a string of the form "HH:MM:SS". For example, if the video is at the time
position 5 minutes and 34 seconds, %p will be replaced with "00:05:34".
%P Similar to %p, but extended with the playback time in milliseconds. It is
formatted as "HH:MM:SS.mmm", with "mmm" being the millisecond part of the
playback time.
NOTE:
This is a simple way for getting unique per-frame timestamps. (Frame
numbers would be more intuitive, but are not easily implementable because
container formats usually use time stamps for identifying frames.)
%wX Specify the current playback time using the format string X. %p is like
%wH:%wM:%wS, and %P is like %wH:%wM:%wS.%wT.
Valid format specifiers:
%wH hour (padded with 0 to two digits)
%wh hour (not padded)
%wM minutes (00-59)
%wm total minutes (includes hours, unlike %wM)
%wS seconds (00-59)
%ws total seconds (includes hours and minutes)
%wf like %ws, but as float
%wT milliseconds (000-999)
%tX Specify the current local date/time using the format X. This format
specifier uses the UNIX strftime() function internally, and inserts the
result of passing "%X" to strftime. For example, %tm will insert the number
of the current month as number. You have to use multiple %tX specifiers to
build a full date/time string.
%{prop[:fallback text]}
Insert the value of the input property 'prop'. E.g. %{filename} is the same
as %f. If the property does not exist or is not available, an error text is
inserted, unless a fallback is specified.
%% Replaced with the % character itself.
--screenshot-dir=<path>
Store screenshots in this directory. This path is joined with the filename
generated by --screenshot-template. If the template filename is already absolute,
the directory is ignored.
--screenshot-directory is an alias for --screenshot-dir.
If the directory does not exist, it is created on the first screenshot. If it is
not a directory, an error is generated when trying to write a screenshot.
This option is not set by default, and thus will write screenshots to the directory
from which mpv was started. In pseudo-gui mode (see PSEUDO GUI MODE), this is set
to the desktop.
--screenshot-jpeg-quality=<0-100>
Set the JPEG quality level. Higher means better quality. The default is 90.
--screenshot-jpeg-source-chroma=<yes|no>
Write JPEG files with the same chroma subsampling as the video (default: yes). If
disabled, the libjpeg default is used.
--screenshot-png-compression=<0-9>
Set the PNG compression level. Higher means better compression. This will affect
the file size of the written screenshot file and the time it takes to write a
screenshot. Too high compression might occupy enough CPU time to interrupt
playback. The default is 7.
--screenshot-png-filter=<0-5>
Set the filter applied prior to PNG compression. 0 is none, 1 is "sub", 2 is "up",
3 is "average", 4 is "Paeth", and 5 is "mixed". This affects the level of
compression that can be achieved. For most images, "mixed" achieves the best
compression ratio, hence it is the default.
--screenshot-webp-lossless=<yes|no>
Write lossless WebP files. --screenshot-webp-quality is ignored if this is set. The
default is no.
--screenshot-webp-quality=<0-100>
Set the WebP quality level. Higher means better quality. The default is 75.
--screenshot-webp-compression=<0-6>
Set the WebP compression level. Higher means better compression, but takes more CPU
time. Note that this also affects the screenshot quality when used with lossy WebP
files. The default is 4.
--screenshot-jxl-distance=<0-15>
Set the JPEG XL Butteraugli distance. Lower means better quality. Lossless is 0.0,
and 1.0 is approximately equivalent to JPEG quality 90 for photographic content.
Use 0.1 for "visually lossless" screenshots. The default is 1.0.
--screenshot-jxl-effort=<1-9>
Set the JPEG XL compression effort. Higher effort (usually) means better
compression, but takes more CPU time. The default is 4.
--screenshot-avif-encoder=<encoder>
Specify the AV1 encoder to be used by libavcodec for encoding avif screenshots.
Default: libaom-av1
--screenshot-avif-pixfmt=<format>
Specify the pixel format to the libavcodec encoder.
Default: yuv420p
--screenshot-avif-opts=key1=value1,key2=value2,...
Specifies libavcodec options for selected encoder. For more information, consult
the FFmpeg documentation.
Default: usage=allintra,crf=32,cpu-used=8,tune=ssim
Note: the default is only guaranteed to work with the libaom-av1 encoder. Above
options may not be valid and or optimal for other encoders.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Example
"--screenshot-avif-opts=crf=32,aq-mode=complexity"
sets the crf to 32 and quantization (aq-mode) to complexity based.
--screenshot-sw=<yes|no>
Whether to use software rendering for screenshots (default: no).
If set to no, the screenshot will be rendered by the current VO (only vo_gpu or
vo_gpu_next currently). The advantage is that this will (probably) always show up
as in the video window, because the same code is used for rendering. But since the
renderer needs to be reinitialized, this can be slow and interrupt playback.
If set to yes, the software scaler is used to convert the video to RGB (or whatever
the target screenshot requires). In this case, conversion will run in a separate
thread and will probably not interrupt playback. The software renderer may lack
some capabilities, such as HDR rendering. If window mode is used, the image will
also be scaled in software which may not accurately reflect the actual visible
result.
Software Scaler
--sws-scaler=<name>
Specify the software scaler algorithm to be used with --vf=scale. This also affects
video output drivers which lack hardware acceleration, e.g. x11. See also
--vf=scale.
To get a list of available scalers, run --sws-scaler=help.
Default: bicubic.
--sws-lgb=<0-100>
Software scaler Gaussian blur filter (luma). See --sws-scaler.
--sws-cgb=<0-100>
Software scaler Gaussian blur filter (chroma). See --sws-scaler.
--sws-ls=<-100-100>
Software scaler sharpen filter (luma). See --sws-scaler.
--sws-cs=<-100-100>
Software scaler sharpen filter (chroma). See --sws-scaler.
--sws-chs=<h>
Software scaler chroma horizontal shifting. See --sws-scaler.
--sws-cvs=<v>
Software scaler chroma vertical shifting. See --sws-scaler.
--sws-bitexact=<yes|no>
Unknown functionality (default: no). Consult libswscale source code. The primary
purpose of this, as far as libswscale API goes), is to produce exactly the same
output for the same input on all platforms (output has the same "bits" everywhere,
thus "bitexact"). Typically disables optimizations.
--sws-fast=<yes|no>
Allow optimizations that help with performance, but reduce quality (default: no).
VOs like drm and x11 will benefit a lot from using --sws-fast. You may need to set
other options, like --sws-scaler. The builtin sws-fast profile sets this option and
some others to gain performance for reduced quality. Also see --sws-allow-zimg.
--sws-allow-zimg=<yes|no>
Allow using zimg (if the component using the internal swscale wrapper explicitly
allows so) (default: yes). In this case, zimg may be used, if the internal zimg
wrapper supports the input and output formats. It will silently or noisily fall
back to libswscale if one of these conditions does not apply.
If zimg is used, the other --sws- options are ignored, and the --zimg- options are
used instead.
If the internal component using the swscale wrapper hooks up logging correctly, a
verbose priority log message will indicate whether zimg is being used.
Most things which need software conversion can make use of this.
NOTE:
Do note that zimg may be slower than libswscale. Usually, it's faster on x86
platforms, but slower on ARM (due to lack of ARM specific optimizations). The
mpv zimg wrapper uses unoptimized repacking for some formats, for which zimg
cannot be blamed.
--zimg-scaler=<point|bilinear|bicubic|spline16|spline36|lanczos>
Zimg luma scaler to use (default: lanczos).
--zimg-scaler-param-a=<default|float>, --zimg-scaler-param-b=<default|float>
Set scaler parameters. By default, these are set to the special string default,
which maps to a scaler-specific default value. Ignored if the scaler is not
tunable.
lanczos
--zimg-scaler-param-a is the number of taps.
bicubic
a and b are the bicubic b and c parameters.
--zimg-scaler-chroma=...
Same as --zimg-scaler, for for chroma interpolation (default: bilinear).
--zimg-scaler-chroma-param-a, --zimg-scaler-chroma-param-b
Same as --zimg-scaler-param-a / --zimg-scaler-param-b, for chroma.
--zimg-dither=<no|ordered|random|error-diffusion>
Dithering (default: random).
--zimg-threads=<auto|integer>
Set the maximum number of threads to use for scaling (default: auto). auto uses
the number of logical cores on the current machine. Note that the scaler may use
less threads (or even just 1 thread) depending on stuff. Passing a value of 1
disables threading and always scales the image in a single operation. Higher thread
counts waste resources, but make it typically faster.
Note that some zimg git versions had bugs that will corrupt the output if threads
are used.
--zimg-fast=<yes|no>
Allow optimizations that help with performance, but reduce quality (default: yes).
Currently, this may simplify gamma conversion operations.
Audio Resampler
This controls the default options of any resampling done by mpv (but not within
libavfilter, within the system audio API resampler, or any other places).
It also sets the defaults for the lavrresample audio filter.
--audio-resample-filter-size=<length>
Length of the filter with respect to the lower sampling rate. (default: 16)
--audio-resample-phase-shift=<count>
Log2 of the number of polyphase entries. (..., 10->1024, 11->2048, 12->4096, ...)
(default: 10->1024)
--audio-resample-cutoff=<cutoff>
Cutoff frequency (0.0-1.0), default set depending upon filter length.
--audio-resample-linear=<yes|no>
If set then filters will be linearly interpolated between polyphase entries.
(default: no)
--audio-normalize-downmix=<yes|no>
Enable/disable normalization if surround audio is downmixed to stereo (default:
no). If this is disabled, downmix can cause clipping. If it's enabled, the output
might be too quiet. It depends on the source audio.
Technically, this changes the normalize suboption of the lavrresample audio filter,
which performs the downmixing.
If downmix happens outside of mpv for some reason, or in the decoder (decoder
downmixing), or in the audio output (system mixer), this has no effect.
--audio-resample-max-output-size=<length>
Limit maximum size of audio frames filtered at once, in ms (default: 40). The
output size size is limited in order to make resample speed changes react faster.
This is necessary especially if decoders or filters output very large frame sizes
(like some lossless codecs or some DRC filters). This option does not affect the
resampling algorithm in any way.
For testing/debugging only. Can be removed or changed any time.
--audio-swresample-o=<string>
Set AVOptions on the SwrContext or AVAudioResampleContext. These should be
documented by FFmpeg or Libav.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Terminal
--quiet
Make console output less verbose; in particular, prevents the status line (i.e. AV:
3.4 (00:00:03.37) / 5320.6 ...) from being displayed. Particularly useful on slow
terminals or broken ones which do not properly handle carriage return (i.e. \r).
See also: --really-quiet and --msg-level.
--really-quiet
Display even less output and status messages than with --quiet.
--no-terminal, --terminal
Disable any use of the terminal and stdin/stdout/stderr. This completely silences
any message output.
Unlike --really-quiet, this disables input and terminal initialization as well.
--no-msg-color
Disable colorful console output on terminals.
--msg-level=<module1=level1,module2=level2,...>
Control verbosity directly for each module. The all module changes the verbosity of
all the modules. The verbosity changes from this option are applied in order from
left to right, and each item can override a previous one.
Run mpv with --msg-level=all=trace to see all messages mpv outputs. You can use the
module names printed in the output (prefixed to each line in [...]) to limit the
output to interesting modules.
This also affects --log-file, and in certain cases libmpv API logging.
NOTE:
Some messages are printed before the command line is parsed and are therefore
not affected by --msg-level. To control these messages, you have to use the
MPV_VERBOSE environment variable; see ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES for details.
Available levels:
no complete silence
fatal fatal messages only
error error messages
warn warning messages
info informational messages
status status messages (default)
v verbose messages
debug debug messages
trace very noisy debug messages
Example
mpv --msg-level=ao/sndio=no
Completely silences the output of ao_sndio, which uses the log prefix
[ao/sndio].
mpv --msg-level=all=warn,ao/alsa=error
Only show warnings or worse, and let the ao_alsa output show errors only.
--term-osd=<auto|no|force>
Control whether OSD messages are shown on the console when no video output is
available (default: auto).
auto use terminal OSD if no video output active
no disable terminal OSD
force use terminal OSD even if video output active
The auto mode also enables terminal OSD if --video-osd=no was set.
--term-osd-bar, --no-term-osd-bar
Enable printing a progress bar under the status line on the terminal. (Disabled by
default.)
--term-osd-bar-chars=<string>
Customize the --term-osd-bar feature. The string is expected to consist of 5
characters (start, left space, position indicator, right space, end). You can use
Unicode characters, but note that double- width characters will not be treated
correctly.
Default: [-+-].
--term-playing-msg=<string>
Print out a string after starting playback. The string is expanded for properties,
e.g. --term-playing-msg='file: ${filename}' will print the string file: followed by
a space and the currently played filename.
See Property Expansion.
--term-remaining-playtime, --no-term-remaining-playtime
When printing out the time on the terminal, show the remaining time adjusted by
playback speed. Default: yes
--term-status-msg=<string>
Print out a custom string during playback instead of the standard status line.
Expands properties. See Property Expansion.
--term-title=<string>
Set the terminal title. Currently, this simply concatenates the escape sequence
setting the window title with the provided (property expanded) string. This will
mess up if the expanded string contain bytes that end the escape sequence, or if
the terminal does not understand the sequence. The latter probably includes the
regrettable win32.
Expands properties. See Property Expansion.
--msg-module
Prepend module name to each console message.
--msg-time
Prepend timing information to each console message. The time is in seconds since
the player process was started (technically, slightly later actually), using a
monotonic time source depending on the OS. This is CLOCK_MONOTONIC on sane UNIX
variants.
Cache
--cache=<yes|no|auto>
Decide whether to use network cache settings (default: auto).
If enabled, use up to --cache-secs for the cache size (but still limited to
--demuxer-max-bytes), and make the cached data seekable (if possible). If
disabled, --cache-pause and related are implicitly disabled.
The auto choice enables this depending on whether the stream is thought to involve
network accesses or other slow media (this is an imperfect heuristic).
Before mpv 0.30.0, this used to accept a number, which specified the size of the
cache in kilobytes. Use e.g. --cache --demuxer-max-bytes=123k instead.
--no-cache
Turn off input stream caching. See --cache.
--cache-secs=<seconds>
How many seconds of audio/video to prefetch if the cache is active. This overrides
the --demuxer-readahead-secs option if and only if the cache is enabled and the
value is larger. The default value is set to something very high, so the actually
achieved readahead will usually be limited by the value of the --demuxer-max-bytes
option. Setting this option is usually only useful for limiting readahead.
--cache-on-disk=<yes|no>
Write packet data to a temporary file, instead of keeping them in memory. This
makes sense only with --cache. If the normal cache is disabled, this option is
ignored.
The cache file is append-only. Even if the player appears to prune data, the file
space freed by it is not reused. The cache file is deleted when playback is closed.
Note that packet metadata is still kept in memory. --demuxer-max-bytes and related
options are applied to metadata only. The size of this metadata varies, but 50 MB
per hour of media is typical. The cache statistics will report this metadats size,
instead of the size of the cache file. If the metadata hits the size limits, the
metadata is pruned (but not the cache file).
When the media is closed, the cache file is deleted. A cache file is generally
worthless after the media is closed, and it's hard to retrieve any media data from
it (it's not supported by design).
If the option is enabled at runtime, the cache file is created, but old data will
remain in the memory cache. If the option is disabled at runtime, old data remains
in the disk cache, and the cache file is not closed until the media is closed. If
the option is disabled and enabled again, it will continue to use the cache file
that was opened first.
--demuxer-cache-dir=<path>
Directory where to create temporary files. Cache is stored in the system's cache
directory (usually ~/.cache/mpv) if this is unset.
Currently, this is used for --cache-on-disk only.
--cache-pause=<yes|no>
Whether the player should automatically pause when the cache runs out of data and
stalls decoding/playback (default: yes). If enabled, it will pause and unpause once
more data is available, aka "buffering".
--cache-pause-wait=<seconds>
Number of seconds the packet cache should have buffered before starting playback
again if "buffering" was entered (default: 1). This can be used to control how long
the player rebuffers if --cache-pause is enabled, and the demuxer underruns. If the
given time is higher than the maximum set with --cache-secs or
--demuxer-readahead-secs, or prefetching ends before that for some other reason
(like file end or maximum configured cache size reached), playback resumes earlier.
--cache-pause-initial=<yes|no>
Enter "buffering" mode before starting playback (default: no). This can be used to
ensure playback starts smoothly, in exchange for waiting some time to prefetch
network data (as controlled by --cache-pause-wait). For example, some common
behavior is that playback starts, but network caches immediately underrun when
trying to decode more data as playback progresses.
Another thing that can happen is that the network prefetching is so CPU demanding
(due to demuxing in the background) that playback drops frames at first. In these
cases, it helps enabling this option, and setting --cache-secs and
--cache-pause-wait to roughly the same value.
This option also triggers when playback is restarted after seeking.
--demuxer-cache-unlink-files=<immediate|whendone|no>
Whether or when to unlink cache files (default: immediate). This affects cache
files which are inherently temporary, and which make no sense to remain on disk
after the player terminates. This is a debugging option.
immediate
Unlink cache file after they were created. The cache files won't be visible
anymore, even though they're in use. This ensures they are guaranteed to be
removed from disk when the player terminates, even if it crashes.
whendone
Delete cache files after they are closed.
no Don't delete cache files. They will consume disk space without having a use.
Currently, this is used for --cache-on-disk only.
--stream-buffer-size=<bytesize>
Size of the low level stream byte buffer (default: 128KB). This is used as buffer
between demuxer and low level I/O (e.g. sockets). Generally, this can be very
small, and the main purpose is similar to the internal buffer FILE in the C
standard library will have.
Half of the buffer is always used for guaranteed seek back, which is important for
unseekable input.
There are known cases where this can help performance to set a large buffer:
1. mp4 files. libavformat may trigger many small seeks in both directions,
depending on how the file was muxed.
2. Certain network filesystems, which do not have a cache, and where small reads
can be inefficient.
In other cases, setting this to a large value can reduce performance.
Usually, read accesses are at half the buffer size, but it may happen that accesses
are done alternating with smaller and larger sizes (this is due to the internal
ring buffer wrap-around).
See --list-options for defaults and value range. <bytesize> options accept suffixes
such as KiB and MiB.
--vd-queue-enable=<yes|no>, --ad-queue-enable
Enable running the video/audio decoder on a separate thread (default: no). If
enabled, the decoder is run on a separate thread, and a frame queue is put between
decoder and higher level playback logic. The size of the frame queue is defined by
the other options below.
This is probably quite pointless. libavcodec already has multithreaded decoding
(enabled by default), which makes this largely unnecessary. It might help in some
corner cases with high bandwidth video that is slow to decode (in these cases
libavcodec would block the playback logic, while using a decoding thread would
distribute the decoding time evenly without affecting the playback logic). In other
situations, it will simply make seeking slower and use significantly more memory.
The queue size is restricted by the other --vd-queue-... options. The final queue
size is the minimum as indicated by the option with the lowest limit. Each
decoder/track has its own queue that may use the full configured queue size.
Most queue options can be changed at runtime. --vd-queue-enable itself (and the
audio equivalent) update only if decoding is completely reinitialized. However,
setting --vd-queue-max-samples=1 should almost lead to the same behavior as
--vd-queue-enable=no, so that value can be used for effectively runtime
enabling/disabling the queue.
This should not be used with hardware decoding. It is possible to enable this for
audio, but it makes even less sense.
--vd-queue-max-bytes=<bytesize>, --ad-queue-max-bytes
Maximum approximate allowed size of the queue. If exceeded, decoding will be
stopped. The maximum size can be exceeded by about 1 frame.
See --list-options for defaults and value range. <bytesize> options accept suffixes
such as KiB and MiB.
--vd-queue-max-samples=<int>, --ad-queue-max-samples
Maximum number of frames (video) or samples (audio) of the queue. The audio size
may be exceeded by about 1 frame.
See --list-options for defaults and value range.
--vd-queue-max-secs=<seconds>, --ad-queue-max-secs
Maximum number of seconds of media in the queue. The special value 0 means no limit
is set. The queue size may be exceeded by about 2 frames. Timestamp resets may lead
to random queue size usage.
See --list-options for defaults and value range.
Network
--user-agent=<string>
Use <string> as user agent for HTTP streaming.
--cookies, --no-cookies
Support cookies when making HTTP requests. Disabled by default.
--cookies-file=<filename>
Read HTTP cookies from <filename>. The file is assumed to be in Netscape format.
--http-header-fields=<field1,field2>
Set custom HTTP fields when accessing HTTP stream.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Example
mpv --http-header-fields='Field1: value1','Field2: value2' \
http://localhost:1234
Will generate HTTP request:
GET / HTTP/1.0
Host: localhost:1234
User-Agent: MPlayer
Icy-MetaData: 1
Field1: value1
Field2: value2
Connection: close
--http-proxy=<proxy>
URL of the HTTP/HTTPS proxy. If this is set, the http_proxy environment is ignored.
The no_proxy environment variable is still respected. This option is silently
ignored if it does not start with http://. Proxies are not used for https URLs.
Setting this option does not try to make the ytdl script use the proxy.
--tls-ca-file=<filename>
Certificate authority database file for use with TLS. (Silently fails with older
FFmpeg or Libav versions.)
--tls-verify
Verify peer certificates when using TLS (e.g. with https://...). (Silently fails
with older FFmpeg or Libav versions.)
--tls-cert-file
A file containing a certificate to use in the handshake with the peer.
--tls-key-file
A file containing the private key for the certificate.
--referrer=<string>
Specify a referrer path or URL for HTTP requests.
--network-timeout=<seconds>
Specify the network timeout in seconds (default: 60 seconds). This affects at least
HTTP. The special value 0 uses the FFmpeg/Libav defaults. If a protocol is used
which does not support timeouts, this option is silently ignored.
WARNING:
This breaks the RTSP protocol, because of inconsistent FFmpeg API regarding its
internal timeout option. Not only does the RTSP timeout option accept different
units (seconds instead of microseconds, causing mpv to pass it huge values), it
will also overflow FFmpeg internal calculations. The worst is that merely
setting the option will put RTSP into listening mode, which breaks any client
uses. At time of this writing, the fix was not made effective yet. For this
reason, this option is ignored (or should be ignored) on RTSP URLs. You can
still set the timeout option directly with --demuxer-lavf-o.
--rtsp-transport=<lavf|udp|udp_multicast|tcp|http>
Select RTSP transport method (default: tcp). This selects the underlying network
transport when playing rtsp://... URLs. The value lavf leaves the decision to
libavformat.
--hls-bitrate=<no|min|max|<rate>>
If HLS streams are played, this option controls what streams are selected by
default. The option allows the following parameters:
no Don't do anything special. Typically, this will simply pick the first
audio/video streams it can find.
min Pick the streams with the lowest bitrate.
max Same, but highest bitrate. (Default.)
Additionally, if the option is a number, the stream with the highest rate equal or
below the option value is selected.
The bitrate as used is sent by the server, and there's no guarantee it's actually
meaningful.
DVB
--dvbin-prog=<string>
This defines the program to tune to. Usually, you may specify this by using a
stream URI like "dvb://ZDF HD", but you can tune to a different channel by writing
to this property at runtime. Also see dvbin-channel-switch-offset for more useful
channel switching functionality.
--dvbin-card=<0-15>
Specifies using card number 0-15 (default: 0).
--dvbin-file=<filename>
Instructs mpv to read the channels list from <filename>. The default is in the mpv
configuration directory (usually ~/.config/mpv) with the filename
channels.conf.{sat,ter,cbl,atsc,isdbt} (based on your card type) or channels.conf
as a last resort. Please note that using specific file name with card type is
recommended, since the legacy channel format is not fully standardized so
autodetection of the delivery system may fail otherwise. For DVB-S/2 cards, a VDR
1.7.x format channel list is recommended as it allows tuning to DVB-S2 channels,
enabling subtitles and decoding the PMT (which largely improves the demuxing).
Classic mplayer format channel lists are still supported (without these
improvements), and for other card types, only limited VDR format channel list
support is implemented (patches welcome). For channels with dynamic PID switching
or incomplete channels.conf, --dvbin-full-transponder or the magic PID 8192 are
recommended.
--dvbin-timeout=<1-30>
Maximum number of seconds to wait when trying to tune a frequency before giving up
(default: 30).
--dvbin-full-transponder=<yes|no>
Apply no filters on program PIDs, only tune to frequency and pass full transponder
to demuxer. The player frontend selects the streams from the full TS in this case,
so the program which is shown initially may not match the chosen channel.
Switching between the programs is possible by cycling the program property. This
is useful to record multiple programs on a single transponder, or to work around
issues in the channels.conf. It is also recommended to use this for channels which
switch PIDs on-the-fly, e.g. for regional news.
Default: no
--dvbin-channel-switch-offset=<integer>
This value is not meant for setting via configuration, but used in channel
switching. An input.conf can cycle this value up and down to perform channel
switching. This number effectively gives the offset to the initially tuned to
channel in the channel list.
An example input.conf could contain: H cycle dvbin-channel-switch-offset up, K
cycle dvbin-channel-switch-offset down
ALSA audio output options
--alsa-device=<device>
Deprecated, use --audio-device (requires alsa/ prefix).
--alsa-resample=yes
Enable ALSA resampling plugin. (This is disabled by default, because some drivers
report incorrect audio delay in some cases.)
--alsa-mixer-device=<device>
Set the mixer device used with ao-volume (default: default).
--alsa-mixer-name=<name>
Set the name of the mixer element (default: Master). This is for example PCM or
Master.
--alsa-mixer-index=<number>
Set the index of the mixer channel (default: 0). Consider the output of "amixer
scontrols", then the index is the number that follows the name of the element.
--alsa-non-interleaved
Allow output of non-interleaved formats (if the audio decoder uses this format).
Currently disabled by default, because some popular ALSA plugins are utterly broken
with non-interleaved formats.
--alsa-ignore-chmap
Don't read or set the channel map of the ALSA device - only request the required
number of channels, and then pass the audio as-is to it. This option most likely
should not be used. It can be useful for debugging, or for static setups with a
specially engineered ALSA configuration (in this case you should always force the
same layout with --audio-channels, or it will work only for files which use the
layout implicit to your ALSA device).
--alsa-buffer-time=<microseconds>
Set the requested buffer time in microseconds. A value of 0 skips requesting
anything from the ALSA API. This and the --alsa-periods option uses the ALSA near
functions to set the requested parameters. If doing so results in an empty
configuration set, setting these parameters is skipped.
Both options control the buffer size. A low buffer size can lead to higher CPU
usage and audio dropouts, while a high buffer size can lead to higher latency in
volume changes and other filtering.
--alsa-periods=<number>
Number of periods requested from the ALSA API. See --alsa-buffer-time for further
remarks.
GPU renderer options
The following video options are currently all specific to --vo=gpu, --vo=libmpv and
--vo=gpu-next, which are the only VOs that implement them.
--scale=<filter>
The filter function to use when upscaling video.
bilinear
Bilinear hardware texture filtering (fastest, very low quality). This is the
default when using the fast profile.
lanczos
Lanczos scaling. Provides good balance between quality and performance.
This is the default for scale. The number of taps can be controlled with
scale-radius, but is best left unchanged.
(This filter is an alias for sinc-windowed sinc)
ewa_lanczos
Elliptic weighted average Lanczos scaling. Also known as Jinc. Relatively
slow, but very good quality. The radius can be controlled with scale-radius.
Increasing the radius makes the filter sharper but adds more ringing.
(This filter is an alias for jinc-windowed jinc)
ewa_lanczossharp
A slightly sharpened version of ewa_lanczos. This is the default when using
the high-quality profile.
ewa_lanczos4sharpest
Very sharp scaler, but also slightly slower than ewa_lanczossharp. Prone to
ringing, so it's recommended to combine this with an anti-ringing shader. On
--vo=gpu-next, setting this filter enables built-in anti-ringing, so no
extra action needs to be taken.
mitchell
Mitchell-Netravali. The B and C parameters can be set with --scale-param1
and --scale-param2.
hermite
Hermite spline. Similar to bicubic but with B set to 0.0. This filter has
the special property of having a support of radius 1.0, making it very fast
in comparison, but prone to blocking. This is the default for --dscale.
catmull_rom
Catmull-Rom. A Cubic filter in the same vein as mitchell, where the B and C
parameters are 0.0 and 0.5 respectively. This filter is sharper than
mitchell, but it results in more ringing.
oversample
A version of nearest neighbour that (naively) oversamples pixels, so that
pixels overlapping edges get linearly interpolated instead of rounded. This
essentially removes the small imperfections and judder artifacts caused by
nearest-neighbour interpolation, in exchange for adding some blur. This can
also be used for frame mixing, where it is commonly known as "smoothmotion"
(see --tscale).
linear A --tscale filter.
There are some more filters, but most are not as useful. For a complete list, pass
help as value, e.g.:
mpv --scale=help
--cscale=<filter>
As --scale, but for interpolating chroma information. If the image is not
subsampled, this option is ignored entirely. If this option is unset, the filter
implied by --scale will be applied.
--dscale=<filter>
Like --scale, but apply these filters on downscaling instead.
--tscale=<filter>
The filter used for interpolating the temporal axis (frames). This is only used if
--interpolation is enabled. The only valid choices for --tscale are separable
convolution filters (use --tscale=help to get a list). The default is oversample.
Common --tscale choices include oversample, linear, catmull_rom, mitchell,
gaussian, or bicubic. These are listed in increasing order of
smoothness/blurriness, with bicubic being the smoothest/blurriest and oversample
being the sharpest/least smooth.
--scale-param1=<value>, --scale-param2=<value>, --cscale-param1=<value>,
--cscale-param2=<value>, --dscale-param1=<value>, --dscale-param2=<value>,
--tscale-param1=<value>, --tscale-param2=<value>
Set filter parameters. By default, these are set to the special string default,
which maps to a scaler-specific default value. Ignored if the filter is not
tunable. Currently, this affects the following filter parameters:
bicubic
Spline parameters (B and C). Defaults to B=1 and C=0.
gaussian
Scale parameter (t). Increasing this makes the result blurrier. Defaults to
1.
oversample
Minimum distance to an edge before interpolation is used. Setting this to 0
will always interpolate edges, whereas setting it to 0.5 will never
interpolate, thus behaving as if the regular nearest neighbour algorithm was
used. Defaults to 0.0.
--scale-blur=<value>, --cscale-blur=<value>, --dscale-blur=<value>, --tscale-blur=<value>
Kernel scaling factor (also known as a blur factor). Decreasing this makes the
result sharper, increasing it makes it blurrier (default 0). If set to 0, the
kernel's preferred blur factor is used. Note that setting this too low (eg. 0.5)
leads to bad results. It's generally recommended to stick to values between 0.8 and
1.2.
--scale-clamp=<0.0-1.0>, --cscale-clamp, --dscale-clamp, --tscale-clamp
Specifies a weight bias to multiply into negative coefficients. Specifying
--scale-clamp=1 has the effect of removing negative weights completely, thus
effectively clamping the value range to [0-1]. Values between 0.0 and 1.0 can be
specified to apply only a moderate diminishment of negative weights. This is
especially useful for --tscale, where it reduces excessive ringing artifacts in the
temporal domain (which typically manifest themselves as short flashes or fringes of
black, mostly around moving edges) in exchange for potentially adding more blur.
The default for --tscale-clamp is 1.0, the others default to 0.0.
--scale-taper=<value>, --scale-wtaper=<value>, --dscale-taper=<value>,
--dscale-wtaper=<value>, --cscale-taper=<value>, --cscale-wtaper=<value>,
--tscale-taper=<value>, --tscale-wtaper=<value>
Kernel/window taper factor. Increasing this flattens the filter function. Value
range is 0 to 1. A value of 0 (the default) means no flattening, a value of 1 makes
the filter completely flat (equivalent to a box function). Values in between mean
that some portion will be flat and the actual filter function will be squeezed into
the space in between.
--scale-radius=<value>, --cscale-radius=<value>, --dscale-radius=<value>,
--tscale-radius=<value>
Set radius for tunable filters, must be a float number between 0.5 and 16.0.
Defaults to the filter's preferred radius if not specified. Doesn't work for every
scaler and VO combination.
Note that depending on filter implementation details and video scaling ratio, the
radius that actually being used might be different (most likely being increased a
bit).
--scale-antiring=<value>, --cscale-antiring=<value>, --dscale-antiring=<value>,
--tscale-antiring=<value>
Set the antiringing strength. This tries to eliminate ringing, but can introduce
other artifacts in the process. Must be a float number between 0.0 and 1.0. The
default value of 0.0 disables antiringing entirely.
Note that this doesn't affect the special filters bilinear and bicubic_fast, nor
does it affect any polar (EWA) scalers.
--scale-window=<window>, --cscale-window=<window>, --dscale-window=<window>,
--tscale-window=<window>
(Advanced users only) Choose a custom windowing function for the kernel. Defaults
to the filter's preferred window if unset. Use --scale-window=help to get a list of
supported windowing functions.
--scale-wparam=<window>, --cscale-wparam=<window>, --cscale-wparam=<window>,
--tscale-wparam=<window>
(Advanced users only) Configure the parameter for the window function given by
--scale-window etc. By default, these are set to the special string default, which
maps to a window-specific default value. Ignored if the window is not tunable.
Currently, this affects the following window parameters:
kaiser Window parameter (alpha). Defaults to 6.33.
blackman
Window parameter (alpha). Defaults to 0.16.
gaussian
Scale parameter (t). Increasing this makes the window wider. Defaults to 1.
--scaler-resizes-only
Disable the scaler if the video image is not resized. In that case, bilinear is
used instead of whatever is set with --scale. Bilinear will reproduce the source
image perfectly if no scaling is performed. Enabled by default. Note that this
option never affects --cscale.
--correct-downscaling
When using convolution based filters, extend the filter size when downscaling.
Increases quality, but reduces performance while downscaling. Enabled by default.
This will perform slightly sub-optimally for anamorphic video (but still better
than without it) since it will extend the size to match only the milder of the
scale factors between the axes.
Note: this option is ignored when using bilinear downscaling with --vo=gpu.
--linear-downscaling
Scale in linear light when downscaling. It should only be used with a --fbo-format
that has at least 16 bit precision. This option has no effect on HDR content.
Enabled by default.
--linear-upscaling
Scale in linear light when upscaling. Like --linear-downscaling, it should only be
used with a --fbo-format that has at least 16 bits precisions. This is not usually
recommended except for testing/specific purposes. Users are advised to either
enable --sigmoid-upscaling or keep both options disabled (i.e. scaling in gamma
light).
--sigmoid-upscaling
When upscaling, use a sigmoidal color transform to avoid emphasizing ringing
artifacts. Enabled by default. This is incompatible with and replaces
--linear-upscaling. (Note that sigmoidization also requires linearization, so the
LINEAR rendering step fires in both cases)
--sigmoid-center
The center of the sigmoid curve used for --sigmoid-upscaling, must be a float
between 0.0 and 1.0. Defaults to 0.75 if not specified.
--sigmoid-slope
The slope of the sigmoid curve used for --sigmoid-upscaling, must be a float
between 1.0 and 20.0. Defaults to 6.5 if not specified.
--interpolation
Reduce stuttering caused by mismatches in the video fps and display refresh rate
(also known as judder).
WARNING:
This requires setting the --video-sync option to one of the display- modes, or
it will be silently disabled. This was not required before mpv 0.14.0.
This essentially attempts to interpolate the missing frames by convoluting the
video along the temporal axis. The filter used can be controlled using the --tscale
setting.
--interpolation-threshold=<0..1,-1>
Threshold below which frame ratio interpolation gets disabled (default: 0.01). This
is calculated as abs(disphz/vfps - 1) < threshold, where vfps is the speed-adjusted
video FPS, and disphz the display refresh rate. (The speed-adjusted video FPS is
roughly equal to the normal video FPS, but with slowdown and speedup applied. This
matters if you use --video-sync=display-resample to make video run synchronously to
the display FPS, or if you change the speed property.)
The default is intended to enable interpolation in scenarios where retiming with
the --video-sync=display-* cannot adjust the speed of the video sufficiently for
smooth playback. For example if a video is 60.00 FPS and your display refresh rate
is 59.94 Hz, interpolation will never be activated, since the mismatch is within 1%
of the refresh rate. The default also handles the scenario when mpv cannot
determine the container FPS, such as during certain live streams, and may
dynamically toggle interpolation on and off. In this scenario, the default would be
to not use interpolation but rather to allow --video-sync=display-* to retime the
video to match display refresh rate. See --video-sync-max-video-change for more
information about how mpv will retime video.
Also note that if you use e.g. --video-sync=display-vdrop, small deviations in the
rate can disable interpolation and introduce a discontinuity every other minute.
Set this to -1 to disable this logic.
--interpolation-preserve
Preserve the previous frames' interpolated results even when renderer parameters
are changed - with the exception of options related to cropping and video
placement, which always invalidate the cache. Enabling this option makes dynamic
updates of renderer settings slightly smoother at the cost of slightly higher
latency in response to such changes. Defaults to on. (Only affects --vo=gpu-next,
note that --vo=gpu always invalidates interpolated frames)
--opengl-pbo
Enable use of PBOs. On some drivers this can be faster, especially if the source
video size is huge (e.g. so called "4K" video). On other drivers it might be slower
or cause latency issues.
--dither-depth=<N|no|auto>
Set dither target depth to N. Default: auto.
no Disable any dithering done by mpv.
auto Automatic selection. If output bit depth cannot be detected, 8 bits per
component are assumed.
8 Dither to 8 bit output.
Note that the depth of the connected video display device cannot be detected.
Often, LCD panels will do dithering on their own, which conflicts with this option
and leads to ugly output.
--dither-size-fruit=<2-8>
Set the size of the dither matrix (default: 6). The actual size of the matrix is
(2^N) x (2^N) for an option value of N, so a value of 6 gives a size of 64x64. The
matrix is generated at startup time, and a large matrix can take rather long to
compute (seconds).
Used in --dither=fruit mode only.
--dither=<fruit|ordered|error-diffusion|no>
Select dithering algorithm (default: fruit). (Normally, the --dither-depth option
controls whether dithering is enabled.)
The error-diffusion option requires compute shader support. It also requires large
amount of shared memory to run, the size of which depends on both the kernel (see
--error-diffusion option below) and the height of video window. It will fallback to
fruit dithering if there is no enough shared memory to run the shader.
--temporal-dither
Enable temporal dithering. (Only active if dithering is enabled in general.) This
changes between 8 different dithering patterns on each frame by changing the
orientation of the tiled dithering matrix. Unfortunately, this can lead to flicker
on LCD displays, since these have a high reaction time.
--temporal-dither-period=<1-128>
Determines how often the dithering pattern is updated when --temporal-dither is in
use. 1 (the default) will update on every video frame, 2 on every other frame, etc.
--error-diffusion=<kernel>
The error diffusion kernel to use when --dither=error-diffusion is set.
simple Propagate error to only two adjacent pixels. Fastest but low quality.
sierra-lite
Fast with reasonable quality. This is the default.
floyd-steinberg
Most notable error diffusion kernel.
atkinson
Looks different from other kernels because only fraction of errors will be
propagated during dithering. A typical use case of this kernel is saving
dithered screenshot (in window mode). This kernel produces slightly smaller
file, with still reasonable dithering quality.
There are other kernels (use --error-diffusion=help to list) but most of them are
much slower and demanding even larger amount of shared memory. Among these
kernels, burkes achieves a good balance between performance and quality, and
probably is the one you want to try first.
--gpu-debug
Enables GPU debugging. What this means depends on the API type. For OpenGL, it
calls glGetError(), and requests a debug context. For Vulkan, it enables validation
layers.
--opengl-swapinterval=<n>
Interval in displayed frames between two buffer swaps. 1 is equivalent to enable
VSYNC, 0 to disable VSYNC. Defaults to 1 if not specified.
Note that this depends on proper OpenGL vsync support. On some platforms and
drivers, this only works reliably when in fullscreen mode. It may also require
driver-specific hacks if using multiple monitors, to ensure mpv syncs to the right
one. Compositing window managers can also lead to bad results, as can missing or
incorrect display FPS information (see --display-fps-override).
--vulkan-device=<device name|UUID>
The name or UUID of the Vulkan device to use for rendering and presentation. Use
--vulkan-device=help to see the list of available devices and their names and
UUIDs. If left unspecified, the first enumerated hardware Vulkan device will be
used.
--vulkan-swap-mode=<mode>
Controls the presentation mode of the vulkan swapchain. This is similar to the
--opengl-swapinterval option.
auto Use the preferred swapchain mode for the vulkan context. (Default)
fifo Non-tearing, vsync blocked. Similar to "VSync on".
fifo-relaxed
Tearing, vsync blocked. Late frames will tear instead of stuttering.
mailbox
Non-tearing, not vsync blocked. Similar to "triple buffering".
immediate
Tearing, not vsync blocked. Similar to "VSync off".
--vulkan-queue-count=<1..8>
Controls the number of VkQueues used for rendering (limited by how many your device
supports). In theory, using more queues could enable some parallelism between
frames (when using a --swapchain-depth higher than 1), but it can also slow things
down on hardware where there's no true parallelism between queues. (Default: 1)
--vulkan-async-transfer
Enables the use of async transfer queues on supported vulkan devices. Using them
allows transfer operations like texture uploads and blits to happen concurrently
with the actual rendering, thus improving overall throughput and power consumption.
Enabled by default, and should be relatively safe.
--vulkan-async-compute
Enables the use of async compute queues on supported vulkan devices. Using this, in
theory, allows out-of-order scheduling of compute shaders with graphics shaders,
thus enabling the hardware to do more effective work while waiting for pipeline
bubbles and memory operations. Not beneficial on all GPUs. It's worth noting that
if async compute is enabled, and the device supports more compute queues than
graphics queues (bound by the restrictions set by --vulkan-queue-count), mpv will
internally try and prefer the use of compute shaders over fragment shaders wherever
possible. Enabled by default, although Nvidia users may want to disable it.
--vulkan-display-display=<n>
The index of the display, on the selected Vulkan device, to present on when using
the displayvk GPU context. Use --vulkan-display-display=help to see the list of
available displays. If left unspecified, the first enumerated display will be used.
--vulkan-display-mode=<n>
The index of the display mode, of the selected Vulkan display, to use when using
the displayvk GPU context. Use --vulkan-display-mode=help to see the list of
available modes. If left unspecified, the first enumerated mode will be used.
--vulkan-display-plane=<n>
The index of the plane, on the selected Vulkan device, to present on when using the
displayvk GPU context. Use --vulkan-display-plane=help to see the list of available
planes. If left unspecified, the first enumerated plane will be used.
--d3d11-exclusive-fs=<yes|no>
Switches the D3D11 swap chain fullscreen state to 'fullscreen' when fullscreen
video is requested. Also known as "exclusive fullscreen" or "D3D fullscreen" in
other applications. Gives mpv full control of rendering on the swap chain's screen.
Off by default.
--d3d11-warp=<yes|no|auto>
Use WARP (Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform) with the D3D11 GPU backend
(default: auto). This is a high performance software renderer. By default, it is
only used when the system has no hardware adapters that support D3D11. While the
extended GPU features will work with WARP, they can be very slow.
--d3d11-feature-level=<12_1|12_0|11_1|11_0|10_1|10_0|9_3|9_2|9_1>
Select a specific feature level when using the D3D11 GPU backend. By default, the
highest available feature level is used. This option can be used to select a lower
feature level, which is mainly useful for debugging. Most extended GPU features
will not work at 9_x feature levels.
--d3d11-flip=<yes|no>
Enable flip-model presentation, which avoids unnecessarily copying the backbuffer
by sharing surfaces with the DWM (default: yes). This may cause performance issues
with older drivers. If flip-model presentation is not supported (for example, on
Windows 7 without the platform update), mpv will automatically fall back to the
older bitblt presentation model.
--d3d11-sync-interval=<0..4>
Schedule each frame to be presented for this number of VBlank intervals. (default:
1) Setting to 1 will enable VSync, setting to 0 will disable it.
--d3d11-adapter=<adapter name|help>
Select a specific D3D11 adapter to utilize for D3D11 rendering. Will pick the
default adapter if unset. Alternatives are listed when the name "help" is given.
Checks for matches based on the start of the string, case insensitive. Thus, if the
description of the adapter starts with the vendor name, that can be utilized as the
selection parameter.
Hardware decoders utilizing the D3D11 rendering abstraction's helper functionality
to receive a device, such as D3D11VA or DXVA2's DXGI mode, will be affected by this
choice.
--d3d11-output-format=<auto|rgba8|bgra8|rgb10_a2|rgba16f>
Select a specific D3D11 output format to utilize for D3D11 rendering. "auto" is
the default, which will pick either rgba8 or rgb10_a2 depending on the configured
desktop bit depth. rgba16f and bgra8 are left out of the autodetection logic, and
are available for manual testing.
NOTE:
Desktop bit depth querying is only available from an API available from Windows
10. Thus on older systems it will only automatically utilize the rgba8 output
format.
--d3d11-output-csp=<auto|srgb|linear|pq|bt.2020>
Select a specific D3D11 output color space to utilize for D3D11 rendering. "auto"
is the default, which will select the color space of the desktop on which the swap
chain is located.
Values other than "srgb" and "pq" have had issues in testing, so they are mostly
available for manual testing.
NOTE:
Swap chain color space configuration is only available from an API available
from Windows 10. Thus on older systems it will not work.
--d3d11va-zero-copy=<yes|no>
By default, when using hardware decoding with --gpu-api=d3d11, the video image will
be copied (GPU-to-GPU) from the decoder surface to a shader resource. Set this
option to avoid that copy by sampling directly from the decoder image. This may
increase performance and reduce power usage, but can cause the image to be sampled
incorrectly on the bottom and right edges due to padding, and may invoke driver
bugs, since Direct3D 11 technically does not allow sampling from a decoder surface
(though most drivers support it.)
Currently only relevant for --gpu-api=d3d11.
--wayland-app-id=<string>
Set the client app id for Wayland-based video output methods (default: mpv).
--wayland-configure-bounds=<auto|yes|no>
Controls whether or not mpv opts into the configure bounds event if sent by the
compositor (default: auto). This restricts the initial size of the mpv window to a
certain maximum size intended by the compositor. In most cases, this simply just
prevents the mpv window from being larger than the size of the monitor when it
first renders. With the default value of auto, configure-bounds will silently be
ignored if any autofit or geometry type option is also set.
--wayland-content-type=<auto|none|photo|video|game>
If supported by the compositor, mpv will send a hint using the content-type
protocol telling the compositor what type of content is being displayed. auto
(default) will automatically switch between telling the compositor the content is a
photo, video or possibly none depending on internal heuristics.
--wayland-disable-vsync=<yes|no>
Disable mpv's internal vsync for Wayland-based video output (default: no). This is
mainly useful for benchmarking wayland VOs when combined with
video-sync=display-desync, --no-audio, and --untimed=yes.
--wayland-edge-pixels-pointer=<value>
Defines the size of an edge border (default: 16) to initiate client side resize
events in the wayland contexts with the mouse. This is only active if there are no
server side decorations from the compositor.
--wayland-edge-pixels-touch=<value>
Defines the size of an edge border (default: 32) to initiate client side resizes
events in the wayland contexts with touch events.
--spirv-compiler=<compiler>
Controls which compiler is used to translate GLSL to SPIR-V. This is (currently)
only relevant for --gpu-api=vulkan and --gpu-api=d3d11. The possible choices are
currently only:
auto Use the first available compiler. (Default)
shaderc
Use libshaderc, which is an API wrapper around glslang. This is generally
the most preferred, if available.
NOTE:
This option is deprecated, since there is only one reasonable value. It may be
removed in the future.
--glsl-shader=<file>, --glsl-shaders=<file-list>
Custom GLSL hooks. These are a flexible way to add custom fragment shaders, which
can be injected at almost arbitrary points in the rendering pipeline, and access
all previous intermediate textures.
Each use of the --glsl-shader option will add another file to the internal list of
shaders, while --glsl-shaders takes a list of files, and overwrites the internal
list with it. The latter is a path list option (see List Options for details).
Warning
The syntax is not stable yet and may change any time.
The general syntax of a user shader looks like this:
//!METADATA ARGS...
//!METADATA ARGS...
vec4 hook() {
...
return something;
}
//!METADATA ARGS...
//!METADATA ARGS...
...
Each section of metadata, along with the non-metadata lines after it, defines a
single block. There are currently two types of blocks, HOOKs and TEXTUREs.
A TEXTURE block can set the following options:
TEXTURE <name> (required)
The name of this texture. Hooks can then bind the texture under this name
using BIND. This must be the first option of the texture block.
SIZE <width> [<height>] [<depth>] (required)
The dimensions of the texture. The height and depth are optional. The type
of texture (1D, 2D or 3D) depends on the number of components specified.
FORMAT <name> (required)
The texture format for the samples. Supported texture formats are listed in
debug logging when the gpu VO is initialized (look for Texture formats:).
Usually, this follows OpenGL naming conventions. For example, rgb16
provides 3 channels with normalized 16 bit components. One oddity are float
formats: for example, rgba16f has 16 bit internal precision, but the texture
data is provided as 32 bit floats, and the driver converts the data on
texture upload.
Although format names follow a common naming convention, not all of them are
available on all hardware, drivers, GL versions, and so on.
FILTER <LINEAR|NEAREST>
The min/magnification filter used when sampling from this texture.
BORDER <CLAMP|REPEAT|MIRROR>
The border wrapping mode used when sampling from this texture.
Following the metadata is a string of bytes in hexadecimal notation that define the
raw texture data, corresponding to the format specified by FORMAT, on a single line
with no extra whitespace.
A HOOK block can set the following options:
HOOK <name> (required)
The texture which to hook into. May occur multiple times within a metadata
block, up to a predetermined limit. See below for a list of hookable
textures.
DESC <title>
User-friendly description of the pass. This is the name used when
representing this shader in the list of passes for property vo-passes.
BIND <name>
Loads a texture (either coming from mpv or from a TEXTURE block) and makes
it available to the pass. When binding textures from mpv, this will also set
up macros to facilitate accessing it properly. See below for a list. By
default, no textures are bound. The special name HOOKED can be used to refer
to the texture that triggered this pass.
SAVE <name>
Gives the name of the texture to save the result of this pass into. By
default, this is set to the special name HOOKED which has the effect of
overwriting the hooked texture.
WIDTH <szexpr>, HEIGHT <szexpr>
Specifies the size of the resulting texture for this pass. szexpr refers to
an expression in RPN (reverse polish notation), using the operators + - * /
> < !, floating point literals, and references to sizes of existing texture
(such as MAIN.width or CHROMA.height), OUTPUT, or NATIVE_CROPPED (size of an
input texture cropped after pan-and-scan, video-align-x/y, video-pan-x/y,
etc. and possibly prescaled). By default, these are set to HOOKED.w and
HOOKED.h, espectively.
WHEN <szexpr>
Specifies a condition that needs to be true (non-zero) for the shader stage
to be evaluated. If it fails, it will silently be omitted. (Note that a
shader stage like this which has a dependency on an optional hook point can
still cause that hook point to be saved, which has some minor overhead)
OFFSET <ox oy | ALIGN>
Indicates a pixel shift (offset) introduced by this pass. These pixel
offsets will be accumulated and corrected during the next scaling pass
(cscale or scale). The default values are 0 0 which correspond to no shift.
Note that offsets are ignored when not overwriting the hooked texture.
A special value of ALIGN will attempt to fix existing offset of HOOKED by
align it with reference. It requires HOOKED to be resizable (see below). It
works transparently with fragment shader. For compute shader, the predefined
texmap macro is required to handle coordinate mapping.
COMPONENTS <n>
Specifies how many components of this pass's output are relevant and should
be stored in the texture, up to 4 (rgba). By default, this value is equal to
the number of components in HOOKED.
COMPUTE <bw> <bh> [<tw> <th>]
Specifies that this shader should be treated as a compute shader, with the
block size bw and bh. The compute shader will be dispatched with however
many blocks are necessary to completely tile over the output. Within each
block, there will be tw*th threads, forming a single work group. In other
words: tw and th specify the work group size, which can be different from
the block size. So for example, a compute shader with bw, bh = 32 and tw, th
= 8 running on a 500x500 texture would dispatch 16x16 blocks (rounded up),
each with 8x8 threads.
Compute shaders in mpv are treated a bit different from fragment shaders.
Instead of defining a vec4 hook that produces an output sample, you directly
define void hook which writes to a fixed writeonly image unit named
out_image (this is bound by mpv) using imageStore. To help translate texture
coordinates in the absence of vertices, mpv provides a special function
NAME_map(id) to map from the texel space of the output image to the texture
coordinates for all bound textures. In particular, NAME_pos is equivalent to
NAME_map(gl_GlobalInvocationID), although using this only really makes sense
if (tw,th) == (bw,bh).
Each bound mpv texture (via BIND) will make available the following definitions to
that shader pass, where NAME is the name of the bound texture:
vec4 NAME_tex(vec2 pos)
The sampling function to use to access the texture at a certain spot (in
texture coordinate space, range [0,1]). This takes care of any necessary
normalization conversions.
vec4 NAME_texOff(vec2 offset)
Sample the texture at a certain offset in pixels. This works like NAME_tex
but additionally takes care of necessary rotations, so that sampling at e.g.
vec2(-1,0) is always one pixel to the left.
vec2 NAME_pos
The local texture coordinate of that texture, range [0,1].
vec2 NAME_size
The (rotated) size in pixels of the texture.
mat2 NAME_rot
The rotation matrix associated with this texture. (Rotates pixel space to
texture coordinates)
vec2 NAME_pt
The (unrotated) size of a single pixel, range [0,1].
float NAME_mul
The coefficient that needs to be multiplied into the texture contents in
order to normalize it to the range [0,1].
sampler NAME_raw
The raw bound texture itself. The use of this should be avoided unless
absolutely necessary.
Normally, users should use either NAME_tex or NAME_texOff to read from the texture.
For some shaders however , it can be better for performance to do custom sampling
from NAME_raw, in which case care needs to be taken to respect NAME_mul and
NAME_rot.
In addition to these parameters, the following uniforms are also globally
available:
float random
A random number in the range [0-1], different per frame.
int frame
A simple count of frames rendered, increases by one per frame and never
resets (regardless of seeks).
vec2 input_size
The size in pixels of the input image (possibly cropped and prescaled).
vec2 target_size
The size in pixels of the visible part of the scaled (and possibly cropped)
image.
vec2 tex_offset
Texture offset introduced by user shaders or options like panscan,
video-align-x/y, video-pan-x/y.
Internally, vo_gpu may generate any number of the following textures. Whenever a
texture is rendered and saved by vo_gpu, all of the passes that have hooked into it
will run, in the order they were added by the user. This is a list of the legal
hook points:
RGB, LUMA, CHROMA, ALPHA, XYZ (resizable)
Source planes (raw). Which of these fire depends on the image format of the
source.
CHROMA_SCALED, ALPHA_SCALED (fixed)
Source planes (upscaled). These only fire on subsampled content.
NATIVE (resizable)
The combined image, in the source colorspace, before conversion to RGB.
MAINPRESUB (resizable)
The image, after conversion to RGB, but before --blend-subtitles=video is
applied.
MAIN (resizable)
The main image, after conversion to RGB but before upscaling.
LINEAR (fixed)
Linear light image, before scaling. This only fires when --linear-upscaling,
--linear-downscaling or --sigmoid-upscaling is in effect.
SIGMOID (fixed)
Sigmoidized light, before scaling. This only fires when --sigmoid-upscaling
is in effect.
PREKERNEL (fixed)
The image immediately before the scaler kernel runs.
POSTKERNEL (fixed)
The image immediately after the scaler kernel runs.
SCALED (fixed)
The final upscaled image, before color management.
OUTPUT (fixed)
The final output image, after color management but before dithering and
drawing to screen.
Only the textures labelled with resizable may be transformed by the pass. When
overwriting a texture marked fixed, the WIDTH, HEIGHT and OFFSET must be left at
their default values.
--glsl-shader=<file>
CLI/config file only alias for --glsl-shaders-append.
--glsl-shader-opts=param1=value1,param2=value2,...
Specifies the options to use for tunable shader parameters. You can target specific
named shaders by prefixing the shader name with a /, e.g. shader/param=value.
Without a prefix, parameters affect all shaders. The shader name is the base part
of the shader filename, without the extension. (--vo=gpu-next only)
--deband
Enable the debanding algorithm. This greatly reduces the amount of visible banding,
blocking and other quantization artifacts, at the expense of very slightly blurring
some of the finest details. In practice, it's virtually always an improvement - the
only reason to disable it would be for performance.
--deband-iterations=<0..16>
The number of debanding steps to perform per sample. Each step reduces a bit more
banding, but takes time to compute. Note that the strength of each step falls off
very quickly, so high numbers (>4) are practically useless. (Default 1)
--deband-threshold=<0..4096>
The debanding filter's cut-off threshold. Higher numbers increase the debanding
strength dramatically but progressively diminish image details. (Default 48)
--deband-range=<1..64>
The debanding filter's initial radius. The radius increases linearly for each
iteration. A higher radius will find more gradients, but a lower radius will smooth
more aggressively. (Default 16)
If you increase the --deband-iterations, you should probably decrease this to
compensate.
--deband-grain=<0..4096>
Add some extra noise to the image. This significantly helps cover up remaining
quantization artifacts. Higher numbers add more noise. (Default 32)
--corner-rounding=<0..1>
If set to a value above 0.0, the output will be rendered with rounded corners, as
if an alpha transparency mask had been applied. The value indicates the relative
fraction of the side length to round - a value of 1.0 rounds the corners as much as
possible. (--vo=gpu-next only)
--sharpen=<value>
If set to a value other than 0, enable an unsharp masking filter. Positive values
will sharpen the image (but add more ringing and aliasing). Negative values will
blur the image. If your GPU is powerful enough, consider alternatives like the
ewa_lanczossharp scale filter, or the --scale-blur option. (Only for --vo=gpu)
--opengl-glfinish
Call glFinish() before swapping buffers (default: disabled). Slower, but might
improve results when doing framedropping. Can completely ruin performance. The
details depend entirely on the OpenGL driver.
--opengl-waitvsync
Call glXWaitVideoSyncSGI after each buffer swap (default: disabled). This may or
may not help with video timing accuracy and frame drop. It's possible that this
makes video output slower, or has no effect at all.
X11/GLX only.
--opengl-dwmflush=<no|windowed|yes|auto>
(Windows only) Calls DwmFlush after swapping buffers on Windows (default: auto). It
also sets SwapInterval(0) to ignore the OpenGL timing. Values are: no (disabled),
windowed (only in windowed mode), yes (also in full screen).
The value auto will try to determine whether the compositor is active, and calls
DwmFlush only if it seems to be.
This may help to get more consistent frame intervals, especially with high-fps
clips - which might also reduce dropped frames. Typically, a value of windowed
should be enough, since full screen may bypass the DWM.
--angle-d3d11-feature-level=<11_0|10_1|10_0|9_3>
Selects a specific feature level when using the ANGLE backend with D3D11. By
default, the highest available feature level is used. This option can be used to
select a lower feature level, which is mainly useful for debugging. Note that
OpenGL ES 3.0 is only supported at feature level 10_1 or higher. Most extended
OpenGL features will not work at lower feature levels (similar to --gpu-dumb-mode).
Windows with ANGLE only.
--angle-d3d11-warp=<yes|no|auto>
Use WARP (Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform) when using the ANGLE backend
with D3D11 (default: auto). This is a high performance software renderer. By
default, it is used when the Direct3D hardware does not support Direct3D 11 feature
level 9_3. While the extended OpenGL features will work with WARP, they can be very
slow.
Windows with ANGLE only.
--angle-egl-windowing=<yes|no|auto>
Use ANGLE's built in EGL windowing functions to create a swap chain (default:
auto). If this is set to no and the D3D11 renderer is in use, ANGLE's built in swap
chain will not be used and a custom swap chain that is optimized for video
rendering will be created instead. If set to auto, a custom swap chain will be used
for D3D11 and the built in swap chain will be used for D3D9. This option is mainly
for debugging purposes, in case the custom swap chain has poor performance or does
not work.
If set to yes, the --angle-flip option will have no effect.
Windows with ANGLE only.
--angle-flip=<yes|no>
Enable flip-model presentation, which avoids unnecessarily copying the backbuffer
by sharing surfaces with the DWM (default: yes). This may cause performance issues
with older drivers. If flip-model presentation is not supported (for example, on
Windows 7 without the platform update), mpv will automatically fall back to the
older bitblt presentation model.
If set to no, the --angle-swapchain-length option will have no effect.
Windows with ANGLE only.
--angle-renderer=<d3d9|d3d11|auto>
Forces a specific renderer when using the ANGLE backend (default: auto). In auto
mode this will pick D3D11 for systems that support Direct3D 11 feature level 9_3 or
higher, and D3D9 otherwise. This option is mainly for debugging purposes. Normally
there is no reason to force a specific renderer, though --angle-renderer=d3d9 may
give slightly better performance on old hardware. Note that the D3D9 renderer only
supports OpenGL ES 2.0, so most extended OpenGL features will not work if this
renderer is selected (similar to --gpu-dumb-mode).
Windows with ANGLE only.
--macos-force-dedicated-gpu=<yes|no>
Deactivates the automatic graphics switching and forces the dedicated GPU.
(default: no)
macOS only.
--cocoa-cb-sw-renderer=<yes|no|auto>
Use the Apple Software Renderer when using cocoa-cb (default: auto). If set to no
the software renderer is never used and instead fails when a the usual pixel format
could not be created, yes will always only use the software renderer, and auto only
falls back to the software renderer when the usual pixel format couldn't be
created.
macOS only.
--cocoa-cb-10bit-context=<yes|no>
Creates a 10bit capable pixel format for the context creation (default: yes).
Instead of 8bit integer framebuffer a 16bit half-float framebuffer is requested.
macOS only.
--macos-title-bar-appearance=<appearance>
Sets the appearance of the title bar (default: auto). Not all combinations of
appearances and --macos-title-bar-material materials make sense or are unique.
Appearances that are not supported by you current macOS version fall back to the
default value. macOS and cocoa-cb only
<appearance> can be one of the following:
auto Detects the system settings and sets the title bar appearance appropriately.
On macOS 10.14 it also detects run time changes.
aqua The standard macOS Light appearance.
darkAqua
The standard macOS Dark appearance. (macOS 10.14+)
vibrantLight
Light vibrancy appearance with.
vibrantDark
Dark vibrancy appearance with.
aquaHighContrast
Light Accessibility appearance. (macOS 10.14+)
darkAquaHighContrast
Dark Accessibility appearance. (macOS 10.14+)
vibrantLightHighContrast
Light vibrancy Accessibility appearance. (macOS 10.14+)
vibrantDarkHighContrast
Dark vibrancy Accessibility appearance. (macOS 10.14+)
--macos-title-bar-material=<material>
Sets the material of the title bar (default: titlebar). All deprecated materials
should not be used on macOS 10.14+ because their functionality is not guaranteed.
Not all combinations of materials and --macos-title-bar-appearance appearances make
sense or are unique. Materials that are not supported by you current macOS version
fall back to the default value. macOS and cocoa-cb only
<material> can be one of the following:
titlebar
The standard macOS title bar material.
selection
The standard macOS selection material.
menu The standard macOS menu material. (macOS 10.11+)
popover
The standard macOS popover material. (macOS 10.11+)
sidebar
The standard macOS sidebar material. (macOS 10.11+)
headerView
The standard macOS header view material. (macOS 10.14+)
sheet The standard macOS sheet material. (macOS 10.14+)
windowBackground
The standard macOS window background material. (macOS 10.14+)
hudWindow
The standard macOS hudWindow material. (macOS 10.14+)
fullScreen
The standard macOS full screen material. (macOS 10.14+)
toolTip
The standard macOS tool tip material. (macOS 10.14+)
contentBackground
The standard macOS content background material. (macOS 10.14+)
underWindowBackground
The standard macOS under window background material. (macOS 10.14+)
underPageBackground
The standard macOS under page background material. (deprecated in macOS
10.14+)
dark The standard macOS dark material. (deprecated in macOS 10.14+)
light The standard macOS light material. (macOS 10.14+)
mediumLight
The standard macOS mediumLight material. (macOS 10.11+, deprecated in macOS
10.14+)
ultraDark
The standard macOS ultraDark material. (macOS 10.11+ deprecated in macOS
10.14+)
--macos-title-bar-color=<color>
Sets the color of the title bar (default: completely transparent). Is influenced by
--macos-title-bar-appearance and --macos-title-bar-material. See --sub-color for
color syntax.
--macos-fs-animation-duration=<default|0-1000>
Sets the fullscreen resize animation duration in ms (default: default). The
default value is slightly less than the system's animation duration (500ms) to
prevent some problems when the end of an async animation happens at the same time
as the end of the system wide fullscreen animation. Setting anything higher than
500ms will only prematurely cancel the resize animation after the system wide
animation ended. The upper limit is still set at 1000ms since it's possible that
Apple or the user changes the system defaults. Anything higher than 1000ms though
seems too long and shouldn't be set anyway. (macOS and cocoa-cb only)
--macos-app-activation-policy=<regular|accessory|prohibited>
Changes the App activation policy. With accessory the mpv icon in the Dock can be
hidden. (default: regular)
macOS only.
--macos-geometry-calculation=<visible|whole>
This changes the rectangle which is used to calculate the screen position and size
of the window (default: visible). visible takes the the menu bar and Dock into
account and the window is only positioned/sized within the visible screen frame
rectangle, whole takes the whole screen frame rectangle and ignores the menu bar
and Dock. Other previous restrictions still apply, like the window can't be placed
on top of the menu bar etc.
macOS only.
--macos-render-timer=<timer>
Sets the mode (default: callback) for syncing the rendering of frames to the
display's vertical refresh rate. macOS and Vulkan (macvk) only.
<timer> can be one of the following:
callback
Syncs to the CVDisplayLink callback
precise
Syncs to the time of the next vertical display refresh reported by the
CVDisplayLink callback provided information
system No manual syncing, depend on the layer mechanic and the next drawable
--android-surface-size=<WxH>
Set dimensions of the rendering surface used by the Android gpu context. Needs to
be set by the embedding application if the dimensions change during runtime (i.e.
if the device is rotated), via the surfaceChanged callback.
Android with --gpu-context=android only.
--gpu-sw
Continue even if a software renderer is detected.
--gpu-context=<sys>
The value auto (the default) selects the GPU context. You can also pass help to get
a complete list of compiled in backends (sorted by autoprobe order).
auto auto-select (default)
cocoa Cocoa/macOS (deprecated, use --vo=libmpv instead)
win Win32/WGL
winvk VK_KHR_win32_surface
angle Direct3D11 through the OpenGL ES translation layer ANGLE. This supports
almost everything the win backend does (if the ANGLE build is new enough).
dxinterop (experimental)
Win32, using WGL for rendering and Direct3D 9Ex for presentation. Works on
Nvidia and AMD. Newer Intel chips with the latest drivers may also work.
d3d11 Win32, with native Direct3D 11 rendering.
x11 X11/GLX (deprecated/legacy, EGL is preferred these days)
x11vk VK_KHR_xlib_surface
wayland
Wayland/EGL
waylandvk
VK_KHR_wayland_surface
drm DRM/EGL
displayvk
VK_KHR_display. This backend is roughly the Vukan equivalent of DRM/EGL,
allowing for direct rendering via Vulkan without a display manager.
x11egl X11/EGL
android
Android/EGL. Requires --wid be set to an android.view.Surface.
macvk Vulkan on macOS with a metal surface through a translation layer
(experimental)
--gpu-api=<type>
Controls which type of graphics APIs will be accepted:
auto Use any available API (default)
opengl Allow only OpenGL (requires OpenGL 2.1+ or GLES 2.0+)
vulkan Allow only Vulkan (requires a valid/working --spirv-compiler)
d3d11 Allow only --gpu-context=d3d11
--opengl-es=<mode>
Controls which type of OpenGL context will be accepted:
auto Allow all types of OpenGL (default)
yes Only allow GLES
no Only allow desktop/core GL
--fbo-format=<fmt>
Selects the internal format of textures used for FBOs. The format can influence
performance and quality of the video output. fmt can be one of: rgb8, rgb10,
rgb10_a2, rgb16, rgb16f, rgb32f, rgba12, rgba16, rgba16f, rgba16hf, rgba32f.
Default: auto, which first attempts to utilize 16bit float (rgba16f, rgba16hf), and
falls back to rgba16 if those are not available. Finally, attempts to utilize
rgb10_a2 or rgba8 if all of the previous formats are not available.
--gamma-factor=<0.1..2.0>
Set an additional raw gamma factor (default: 1.0). If gamma is adjusted in other
ways (like with the --gamma option or key bindings and the gamma property), the
value is multiplied with the other gamma value.
This option is deprecated and may be removed in the future.
--gamma-auto
Automatically corrects the gamma value depending on ambient lighting conditions
(adding a gamma boost for bright rooms).
This option is deprecated and may be removed in the future.
NOTE: Only implemented on macOS.
--image-lut=<file>
Specifies a custom LUT file (in Adobe .cube format) to apply to the colors during
image decoding. The exact interpretation of the LUT depends on the value of
--image-lut-type. (Only for --vo=gpu-next)
--image-lut-type=<value>
Controls the interpretation of color values fed to and from the LUT specified as
--image-lut. Valid values are:
auto Chooses the interpretation of the LUT automatically from tagged metadata,
and otherwise falls back to native. (Default)
native Applied to the raw image contents in its native colorspace, before decoding
to RGB. For example, for a HDR10 image, this would be fed PQ-encoded YCbCr
values in the range 0.0 - 1.0.
normalized
Applied to the normalized RGB image contents, after decoding from its native
color encoding, but before linearization.
conversion
Fully replaces the color decoding. A LUT of this type should ingest the
image's native colorspace and output normalized non-linear RGB.
--target-colorspace-hint
Automatically configure the output colorspace of the display to pass through the
input values of the stream (e.g. for HDR passthrough), if possible. Requires a
supporting driver and --vo=gpu-next.
--target-prim=<value>
Specifies the primaries of the display. Video colors will be adapted to this
colorspace when ICC color management is not being used. Valid values are:
auto Disable any adaptation, except for atypical color spaces. Specifically,
wide/unusual gamuts get automatically adapted to BT.709, while standard
gamut (i.e. BT.601 and BT.709) content is not touched. (default)
bt.470m
ITU-R BT.470 M
bt.601-525
ITU-R BT.601 (525-line SD systems, eg. NTSC), SMPTE 170M/240M
bt.601-625
ITU-R BT.601 (625-line SD systems, eg. PAL/SECAM), ITU-R BT.470 B/G
bt.709 ITU-R BT.709 (HD), IEC 61966-2-4 (sRGB), SMPTE RP177 Annex B
bt.2020
ITU-R BT.2020 (UHD)
apple Apple RGB
adobe Adobe RGB (1998)
prophoto
ProPhoto RGB (ROMM)
cie1931
CIE 1931 RGB (not to be confused with CIE XYZ)
dci-p3 DCI-P3 (Digital Cinema Colorspace), SMPTE RP431-2
v-gamut
Panasonic V-Gamut (VARICAM) primaries
s-gamut
Sony S-Gamut (S-Log) primaries
--target-trc=<value>
Specifies the transfer characteristics (gamma) of the display. Video colors will be
adjusted to this curve when ICC color management is not being used. Valid values
are:
auto Disable any adaptation, except for atypical transfers. Specifically, HDR or
linear light source material gets automatically converted to gamma 2.2,
while SDR content is not touched. (default)
bt.1886
ITU-R BT.1886 curve (assuming infinite contrast)
srgb IEC 61966-2-4 (sRGB)
linear Linear light output
gamma1.8
Pure power curve (gamma 1.8), also used for Apple RGB
gamma2.0
Pure power curve (gamma 2.0)
gamma2.2
Pure power curve (gamma 2.2)
gamma2.4
Pure power curve (gamma 2.4)
gamma2.6
Pure power curve (gamma 2.6)
gamma2.8
Pure power curve (gamma 2.8), also used for BT.470-BG
prophoto
ProPhoto RGB (ROMM)
pq ITU-R BT.2100 PQ (Perceptual quantizer) curve, aka SMPTE ST2084
hlg ITU-R BT.2100 HLG (Hybrid Log-gamma) curve, aka ARIB STD-B67
v-log Panasonic V-Log (VARICAM) curve
s-log1 Sony S-Log1 curve
s-log2 Sony S-Log2 curve
NOTE:
When using HDR output formats, mpv will encode to the specified curve but it
will not set any HDMI flags or other signalling that might be required for the
target device to correctly display the HDR signal. The user should
independently guarantee this before using these signal formats for display.
--target-peak=<auto|nits>
Specifies the measured peak brightness of the output display, in cd/m^2 (AKA nits).
The interpretation of this brightness depends on the configured --target-trc. In
all cases, it imposes a limit on the signal values that will be sent to the
display. If the source exceeds this brightness level, a tone mapping filter will be
inserted. For HLG, it has the additional effect of parametrizing the inverse OOTF,
in order to get colorimetrically consistent results with the mastering display. For
SDR, or when using an ICC (profile (--icc-profile), setting this to a value above
203 essentially causes the display to be treated as if it were an HDR display in
disguise. (See the note below)
In auto mode (the default), the chosen peak is an appropriate value based on the
TRC in use. For SDR curves, it uses 203. For HDR curves, it uses 203 * the transfer
function's nominal peak.
NOTE:
When using an SDR transfer function, this is normally not needed, and setting it
may lead to very unexpected results. The one time it is useful is if you want to
calibrate a HDR display using traditional transfer functions and calibration
equipment. In such cases, you can set your HDR display to a high brightness such
as 800 cd/m^2, and then calibrate it to a standard curve like gamma2.8. Setting
this value to 800 would then instruct mpv to essentially treat it as an HDR
display with the given peak. This may be a good alternative in environments
where PQ or HLG input to the display is not possible, and makes it possible to
use HDR displays with mpv regardless of operating system support for HDMI HDR
metadata.
In such a configuration, we highly recommend setting --tone-mapping to mobius or
even clip.
--target-contrast=<auto|10-1000000|inf>
Specifies the measured contrast of the output display. --target-contrast in
conjunction with --target-peak value is used to calculate display black point. Used
in black point compensation during HDR tone-mapping. auto is the default and
assumes 1000:1 contrast as a typical SDR display would have or an infinite contrast
when HDR --target-trc is used. inf contrast specifies display with perfect black
level, in practice OLED. (Only for --vo=gpu-next)
--target-gamut=<value>
Constrains the gamut of the display. You can use this option to output e.g.
DCIP3-in-BT.2020. Set --target-prim to the primaries of the containing colorspace
(into which values will be encoded), and --target-gamut to the gamut you want to
limit colors to. Takes the same values as --target-prim. (Only for --vo=gpu-next)
--target-lut=<file>
Specifies a custom LUT file (in Adobe .cube format) to apply to the colors before
display on-screen. This LUT is fed values in normalized RGB, after encoding into
the target colorspace, so after the application of --target-trc. (Only for
--vo=gpu-next)
--tone-mapping=<value>
Specifies the algorithm used for tone-mapping images onto the target display. This
is relevant for both HDR->SDR conversion as well as gamut reduction (e.g. playing
back BT.2020 content on a standard gamut display). Valid values are:
auto Choose the best curve according to internal heuristics. (Default)
clip Hard-clip any out-of-range values. Use this when you care about perfect
color accuracy for in-range values at the cost of completely distorting
out-of-range values. Not generally recommended.
mobius Generalization of Reinhard to a Möbius transform with linear section.
Smoothly maps out-of-range values while retaining contrast and colors for
in-range material as much as possible. Use this when you care about color
accuracy more than detail preservation. This is somewhere in between clip
and reinhard, depending on the value of --tone-mapping-param.
reinhard
Reinhard tone mapping algorithm. Very simple continuous curve. Preserves
overall image brightness but uses nonlinear contrast, which results in
flattening of details and degradation in color accuracy.
hable Similar to reinhard but preserves both dark and bright details better
(slightly sigmoidal), at the cost of slightly darkening / desaturating
everything. Developed by John Hable for use in video games. Use this when
you care about detail preservation more than color/brightness accuracy. This
is roughly equivalent to --tone-mapping=reinhard --tone-mapping-param=0.24.
If possible, you should also enable --hdr-compute-peak for the best results.
bt.2390
Perceptual tone mapping curve (EETF) specified in ITU-R Report BT.2390.
gamma Fits a logarithmic transfer between the tone curves.
linear Linearly stretches the entire reference gamut to (a linear multiple of) the
display.
spline Perceptually linear single-pivot polynomial. (--vo=gpu-next only)
bt.2446a
HDR<->SDR mapping specified in ITU-R Report BT.2446, method A. This is the
recommended curve for well-mastered content. (--vo=gpu-next only)
st2094-40
Dynamic HDR10+ tone-mapping method specified in SMPTE ST2094-40 Annex B. In
the absence of metadata, falls back to a fixed spline matched to the
input/output average brightness characteristics. (--vo=gpu-next only)
st2094-10
Dynamic tone-mapping method specified in SMPTE ST2094-10 Annex B.2.
Conceptually simpler than ST2094-40, and generally produces worse results.
--tone-mapping-param=<value>
Set tone mapping parameters. By default, this is set to the special string default,
which maps to an algorithm-specific default value. Ignored if the tone mapping
algorithm is not tunable. This affects the following tone mapping algorithms:
clip Specifies an extra linear coefficient to multiply into the signal before
clipping. Defaults to 1.0.
mobius Specifies the transition point from linear to mobius transform. Every value
below this point is guaranteed to be mapped 1:1. The higher the value, the
more accurate the result will be, at the cost of losing bright details.
Defaults to 0.3, which due to the steep initial slope still preserves
in-range colors fairly accurately.
reinhard
Specifies the local contrast coefficient at the display peak. Defaults to
0.5, which means that in-gamut values will be about half as bright as when
clipping.
bt.2390
Specifies the offset for the knee point. Defaults to 1.0, which is higher
than the value from the original ITU-R specification (0.5). (--vo=gpu-next
only)
gamma Specifies the exponent of the function. Defaults to 1.8.
linear Specifies the scale factor to use while stretching. Defaults to 1.0.
spline Specifies the knee point (in PQ space). Defaults to 0.30.
st2094-10
Specifies the contrast (slope) at the knee point. Defaults to 1.0.
--inverse-tone-mapping
If set, allows inverse tone mapping (expanding SDR to HDR). Not supported by all
tone mapping curves. Use with caution. (--vo=gpu-next only)
--tone-mapping-max-boost=<1.0..10.0>
Upper limit for how much the tone mapping algorithm is allowed to boost the average
brightness by over-exposing the image. The default value of 1.0 allows no
additional brightness boost. A value of 2.0 would allow over-exposing by a factor
of 2, and so on. Raising this setting can help reveal details that would otherwise
be hidden in dark scenes, but raising it too high will make dark scenes appear
unnaturally bright. (--vo=gpu only)
--tone-mapping-visualize
Display a (PQ-PQ) graph of the active tone-mapping LUT. Intended only for debugging
purposes. The X axis shows PQ input values, the Y axis shows PQ output values. The
tone-mapping curve is shown in green/yellow. Yellow means the brightness has been
boosted from the source, dark blue regions show where the brightness has been
reduced. The extra colored regions and lines indicate various monitor limits, as
well a reference diagonal (neutral tone-mapping) and source scene average
brightness information (if available). (--vo=gpu-next only)
--gamut-mapping-mode
Specifies the algorithm used for reducing the gamut of images for the target
display, after any tone mapping is done.
auto Choose the best mode automatically. (Default)
clip Hard-clip to the gamut (per-channel). Very low quality, but free.
perceptual
Performs a perceptually balanced gamut mapping using a soft knee function to
roll-off clipped regions, and a hue shifting function to preserve
saturation. (--vo=gpu-next only)
relative
Performs relative colorimetric clipping, while maintaining an exponential
relationship between brightness and chromaticity. (--vo=gpu-next only)
saturation
Performs simple RGB->RGB saturation mapping. The input R/G/B channels are
mapped directly onto the output R/G/B channels. Will never clip, but will
distort all hues and/or result in a faded look. (--vo=gpu-next only)
absolute
Performs absolute colorimetric clipping. Like relative, but does not adapt
the white point. (--vo=gpu-next only)
desaturate
Performs constant-luminance colorimetric clipping, desaturing colors towards
white until they're in-range.
darken Uniformly darkens the input slightly to prevent clipping on blown-out
highlights, then clamps colorimetrically to the input gamut boundary, biased
slightly to preserve chromaticity over luminance. (--vo=gpu-next only)
warn Performs no gamut mapping, but simply highlights out-of-gamut pixels.
linear Linearly/uniformly desaturates the image in order to bring the entire image
into the target gamut. (--vo=gpu-next only)
--hdr-compute-peak=<auto|yes|no>
Compute the HDR peak and frame average brightness per-frame instead of relying on
tagged metadata. These values are averaged over local regions as well as over
several frames to prevent the value from jittering around too much. This option
basically gives you dynamic, per-scene tone mapping. Requires compute shaders,
which is a fairly recent OpenGL feature, and will probably also perform horribly on
some drivers, so enable at your own risk. The special value auto (default) will
enable HDR peak computation automatically if compute shaders and SSBOs are
supported.
--allow-delayed-peak-detect
When using --hdr-compute-peak, allow delaying the detected peak by a frame when
beneficial for performance. In particular, this is required to avoid an unnecessary
FBO indirection when no advanced rendering is required otherwise. Has no effect if
there already is an indirect pass, such as when advanced scaling is enabled.
Defaults to no. (Only affects --vo=gpu-next, note that --vo=gpu always delays the
peak.)
--hdr-peak-percentile=<0.0..100.0>
Which percentile of the input image brightness histogram to consider as the true
peak of the scene. If this is set to 100 (default), the brightest pixel is
measured. Otherwise, the top of the frequency distribution is progressively cut
off. Setting this too low will cause clipping of very bright details, but can
improve the dynamic brightness range of scenes with very bright isolated
highlights. Values other than 100 come with a small performance penalty. (Only for
--vo=gpu-next)
--hdr-peak-decay-rate=<0.0..1000.0>
The decay rate used for the HDR peak detection algorithm (default: 20.0). This is
only relevant when --hdr-compute-peak is enabled. Higher values make the peak decay
more slowly, leading to more stable values at the cost of more "eye
adaptation"-like effects (although this is mitigated somewhat by
--hdr-scene-threshold). A value of 0.0 (the lowest possible) disables all
averaging, meaning each frame's value is used directly as measured, but doing this
is not recommended for "noisy" sources since it may lead to excessive flicker. (In
signal theory terms, this controls the time constant "tau" of an IIR low pass
filter)
--hdr-scene-threshold-low=<0.0..100.0>, --hdr-scene-threshold-high=<0.0..100.0>
The lower and upper thresholds (in dB) for a brightness difference to be considered
a scene change (default: 1.0 low, 3.0 high). This is only relevant when
--hdr-compute-peak is enabled. Normally, small fluctuations in the frame brightness
are compensated for by the peak averaging mechanism, but for large jumps in the
brightness this can result in the frame remaining too bright or too dark for up to
several seconds, depending on the value of --hdr-peak-decay-rate. To counteract
this, when the brightness between the running average and the current frame exceeds
the low threshold, mpv will make the averaging filter more aggressive, up to the
limit of the high threshold (at which point the filter becomes instant).
--hdr-contrast-recovery=<0.0..2.0>, --hdr-contrast-smoothness=<1.0..100.0>
Enables the HDR contrast recovery algorithm, which is to designed to enhance
contrast of HDR video after tone mapping. The strength (default: 0.0) indicates the
degree of contrast recovery, with 0.0 being completely disabled and 1.0 being 100%
strength. Values higher than 1.0 are allowed, but may result in excessive
sharpening. The smoothness (default: 3.5) indicates the degree to which the HDR
source is low-passed in order to obtain contrast information - a value of 2.0
corresponds to 2x downscaling. Users on low DPI displays (<= 100) may want to
lower this value, while users on very high DPI displays ("retina") may want to
increase it. (Only for vo=gpu-next)
--use-embedded-icc-profile
Load the embedded ICC profile contained in media files such as PNG images.
(Default: yes). Note that this option only works when also using a display ICC
profile (--icc-profile or --icc-profile-auto), and also requires LittleCMS 2
support.
--icc-profile=<file>
Load an ICC profile and use it to transform video RGB to screen output. Needs
LittleCMS 2 support compiled in. This option overrides the --target-prim,
--target-trc and --icc-profile-auto options.
--icc-profile-auto
Automatically select the ICC display profile currently specified by the display
settings of the operating system.
NOTE: On Windows, the default profile must be an ICC profile. WCS profiles are not
supported.
Applications using libmpv with the render API need to provide the ICC profile via
MPV_RENDER_PARAM_ICC_PROFILE.
--icc-cache
Store and load 3DLUTs created from the ICC profile on disk in the cache directory
(Default: yes). This can be used to speed up loading, since LittleCMS 2 can take a
while to create a 3D LUT. Note that these files contain uncompressed LUTs. Their
size depends on the --icc-3dlut-size, and can be very big.
NOTE: On --vo=gpu, this is not cleaned automatically, so old, unused cache files
may stick around indefinitely.
--icc-cache-dir
The directory where icc cache is stored. Cache is stored in the system's cache
directory (usually ~/.cache/mpv) if this is unset.
--icc-intent=<value>
Specifies the ICC intent used for the color transformation (when using
--icc-profile).
0 perceptual
1 relative colorimetric (default)
2 saturation
3 absolute colorimetric
--icc-3dlut-size=<auto|RxGxB>
Size of the 3D LUT generated from the ICC profile in each dimension. The default of
auto means to pick the size automatically based on the profile characteristics.
Sizes may range from 2 to 512.
NOTE: Setting this option to anything other than auto is strongly discouraged,
except for testing.
--icc-force-contrast=<no|0-1000000|inf>
Override the target device's detected contrast ratio by a specific value. This is
detected automatically from the profile if possible, but for some profiles it might
be missing, causing the contrast to be assumed as infinite. As a result, video may
appear darker than intended. If this is the case, setting this option might help.
This only affects BT.1886 content. The default of no means to use the profile
values. The special value inf causes the BT.1886 curve to be treated as a pure
power gamma 2.4 function.
--icc-use-luma
Use ICC profile luminance value. (Only for --vo=gpu-next)
--lut=<file>
Specifies a custom LUT (in Adobe .cube format) to apply to the colors as part of
color conversion. The exact interpretation depends on the value of --lut-type.
(Only for --vo=gpu-next)
--lut-type=<value>
Controls the interpretation of color values fed to and from the LUT specified as
--lut. Valid values are:
auto Chooses the interpretation of the LUT automatically from tagged metadata,
and otherwise falls back to native. (Default)
native Applied to raw image contents in its native RGB colorspace (non-linear
light), before conversion to the output color space.
normalized
Applied to the normalized RGB image contents, in linear light, before
conversion to the output color space.
conversion
Fully replaces the conversion from the image color space to the output color
space. If such a LUT is present, it has the highest priority, and overrides
any ICC profiles, as well as options related to tone mapping and output
colorimetry (--target-prim, --target-trc etc.).
--blend-subtitles=<yes|video|no>
Blend subtitles directly onto upscaled video frames, before interpolation and/or
color management (default: no). Enabling this causes subtitles to be affected by
--icc-profile, --target-prim, --target-trc, --interpolation, --gamma-factor and
--glsl-shaders. It also increases subtitle performance when using --interpolation.
The downside of enabling this is that it restricts subtitles to the visible portion
of the video, so you can't have subtitles exist in the black margins below a video
(for example).
If video is selected, the behavior is similar to yes, but subs are drawn at the
video's native resolution, and scaled along with the video.
WARNING:
This changes the way subtitle colors are handled. Normally, subtitle colors are
assumed to be in sRGB and color managed as such. Enabling this makes them
treated as being in the video's color space instead. This is good if you want
things like softsubbed ASS signs to match the video colors, but may cause SRT
subtitles or similar to look slightly off.
--alpha=<blend-tiles|blend|yes|no>
Decides what to do if the input has an alpha component.
blend-tiles
Blend the frame against a 16x16 gray/white tiles background (default).
blend Blend the frame against the background color (--background, normally black).
yes Try to create a framebuffer with alpha component. This only makes sense if
the video contains alpha information (which is extremely rare) or if you
make the background color transparent. May not be supported on all
platforms. If alpha framebuffers are unavailable, it silently falls back on
a normal framebuffer. Note that if you set the --fbo-format option to a
non-default value, a format with alpha must be specified, or this won't
work. Whether this really works depends on the windowing system and desktop
environment.
no Ignore alpha component.
--opengl-rectangle-textures
Force use of rectangle textures (default: no). Normally this shouldn't have any
advantages over normal textures. Note that hardware decoding overrides this flag.
Could be removed any time.
--background=<color>
Color used to draw parts of the mpv window not covered by video. See the
--sub-color option for how colors are defined.
--gpu-tex-pad-x, --gpu-tex-pad-y
Enlarge the video source textures by this many pixels. For debugging only (normally
textures are sized exactly, but due to hardware decoding interop we may have to
deal with additional padding, which can be tested with these options). Could be
removed any time.
--opengl-early-flush=<yes|no|auto>
Call glFlush() after rendering a frame and before attempting to display it
(default: auto). Can fix stuttering in some cases, in other cases probably causes
it. The auto mode will call glFlush() only if the renderer is going to wait for a
while after rendering, instead of flipping GL front and backbuffers immediately
(i.e. it doesn't call it in display-sync mode).
On macOS this is always deactivated because it only causes performance problems and
other regressions.
--gpu-dumb-mode=<yes|no|auto>
This mode is extremely restricted, and will disable most extended features. That
includes high quality scalers and custom shaders!
It is intended for hardware that does not support FBOs (including GLES, which
supports it insufficiently), or to get some more performance out of bad or old
hardware.
This mode is forced automatically if needed, and this option is mostly useful for
debugging. The default of auto will enable it automatically if nothing uses
features which require FBOs.
This option might be silently removed in the future.
--gpu-shader-cache
Store and load compiled GLSL shaders in the cache directory (Default: yes).
Normally, shader compilation is very fast, so this is not usually needed. It mostly
matters for anything based on D3D11 (including ANGLE), as well as on some other
proprietary drivers. Enabling this can improve startup performance on these
platforms.
NOTE: On --vo=gpu, is not cleaned automatically, so old, unused cache files may
stick around indefinitely.
--gpu-shader-cache-dir
The directory where gpu shader cache is stored. Cache is stored in the system's
cache directory (usually ~/.cache/mpv) if this is unset.
--libplacebo-opts=<key>=<value>[,<key>=<value>[,...]]
Passes extra raw option to the libplacebo rendering backend (used by
--vo=gpu-next). May override the effects of any other options set using the normal
options system. Requires libplacebo v6.309 or higher. Included for debugging
purposes only. For more information, see:
https://libplacebo.org/options/
Miscellaneous
--display-tags=tag1,tags2,...
Set the list of tags that should be displayed on the terminal. Tags that are in the
list, but are not present in the played file, will not be shown. If a value ends
with *, all tags are matched by prefix (though there is no general globbing). Just
passing * essentially filtering.
The default includes a common list of tags, call mpv with --list-options to see it.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
--mc=<seconds/frame>
Maximum A-V sync correction per frame (in seconds)
--autosync=<factor>
Gradually adjusts the A/V sync based on audio delay measurements. Specifying
--autosync=0, the default, will cause frame timing to be based entirely on audio
delay measurements. Specifying --autosync=1 will do the same, but will subtly
change the A/V correction algorithm. An uneven video framerate in a video which
plays fine with --no-audio can often be helped by setting this to an integer value
greater than 1. The higher the value, the closer the timing will be to --no-audio.
Try --autosync=30 to smooth out problems with sound drivers which do not implement
a perfect audio delay measurement. With this value, if large A/V sync offsets
occur, they will only take about 1 or 2 seconds to settle out. This delay in
reaction time to sudden A/V offsets should be the only side effect of turning this
option on, for all sound drivers.
--video-timing-offset=<seconds>
Control how long before video display target time the frame should be rendered
(default: 0.050). If a video frame should be displayed at a certain time, the VO
will start rendering the frame earlier, and then will perform a blocking wait until
the display time, and only then "swap" the frame to display. The rendering cannot
start before the previous frame is displayed, so this value is implicitly limited
by the video framerate. With normal video frame rates, the default value will
ensure that rendering is always immediately started after the previous frame was
displayed. On the other hand, setting a too high value can reduce responsiveness
with low FPS value.
This option is interesting for client API users using the render API because you
can stop it from limiting your FPS (see mpv_render_context_render() documentation).
This applies only to audio timing modes (e.g. --video-sync=audio). In other modes
(--video-sync=display-...), video timing relies on vsync blocking, and this option
is not used.
--video-sync=<audio|...>
How the player synchronizes audio and video.
If you use this option, you usually want to set it to display-resample to enable a
timing mode that tries to not skip or repeat frames when for example playing 24fps
video on a 24Hz screen.
The modes starting with display- try to output video frames completely
synchronously to the display, using the detected display vertical refresh rate as a
hint how fast frames will be displayed on average. These modes change video speed
slightly to match the display. See --video-sync-... options for fine tuning. The
robustness of this mode is further reduced by making a some idealized assumptions,
which may not always apply in reality. Behavior can depend on the VO and the
system's video and audio drivers. Media files must use constant framerate.
Section-wise VFR might work as well with some container formats (but not e.g. mkv).
Under some circumstances, the player automatically reverts to audio mode for some
time or permanently. This can happen on very low framerate video, or if the
framerate cannot be detected.
Also in display-sync modes it can happen that interruptions to video playback (such
as toggling fullscreen mode, or simply resizing the window) will skip the video
frames that should have been displayed, while audio mode will display them after
the renderer has resumed (typically resulting in a short A/V desync and the video
"catching up").
Before mpv 0.30.0, there was a fallback to audio mode on severe A/V desync. This
was changed for the sake of not sporadically stopping. Now, display-desync does
what it promises and may desync with audio by an arbitrary amount, until it is
manually fixed with a seek.
These modes also require a vsync blocked presentation mode. For OpenGL, this
translates to --opengl-swapinterval=1. For Vulkan, it translates to
--vulkan-swap-mode=fifo (or fifo-relaxed).
The modes with desync in their names do not attempt to keep audio/video in sync.
They will slowly (or quickly) desync, until e.g. the next seek happens. These modes
are meant for testing, not serious use.
audio Time video frames to audio. This is the most robust mode, because the player
doesn't have to assume anything about how the display behaves. The
disadvantage is that it can lead to occasional frame drops or repeats. If
audio is disabled, this uses the system clock. This is the default mode.
display-resample
Resample audio to match the video. This mode will also try to adjust audio
speed to compensate for other drift. (This means it will play the audio at
a different speed every once in a while to reduce the A/V difference.)
display-resample-vdrop
Resample audio to match the video. Drop video frames to compensate for
drift.
display-resample-desync
Like the previous mode, but no A/V compensation.
display-tempo
Same as display-resample, but apply audio speed changes to audio filters
instead of resampling to avoid the change in pitch. Beware that some audio
filters don't do well with a speed close to 1. It is recommend to use a
conditional profile to automatically switch to display-resample when speed
gets too close to 1 for your filter setup. Use (speed *
video_speed_correction) to get the actual playback speed in the condition.
See Conditional auto profiles for details.
display-vdrop
Drop or repeat video frames to compensate desyncing video. (Although it
should have the same effects as audio, the implementation is very
different.)
display-adrop
Drop or repeat audio data to compensate desyncing video. This mode will
cause severe audio artifacts if the real monitor refresh rate is too
different from the reported or forced rate. Since mpv 0.33.0, this acts on
entire audio frames, instead of single samples.
display-desync
Sync video to display, and let audio play on its own.
desync Sync video according to system clock, and let audio play on its own.
--video-sync-max-factor=<value>
Maximum multiple for which to try to fit the video's FPS to the display's FPS
(default: 5).
For example, if this is set to 1, the video FPS is forced to an integer multiple of
the display FPS, as long as the speed change does not exceed the value set by
--video-sync-max-video-change.
See --interpolation-threshold for how this option affects interpolation.
--video-sync-max-video-change=<value>
Maximum speed difference in percent that is applied to video with
--video-sync=display-... (default: 1). Display sync mode will be disabled if the
monitor and video refresh way do not match within the given range. It tries
multiples as well: playing 30 fps video on a 60 Hz screen will duplicate every
second frame. Playing 24 fps video on a 60 Hz screen will play video in a
2-3-2-3-... pattern.
The default settings are not loose enough to speed up 23.976 fps video to 25 fps.
We consider the pitch change too extreme to allow this behavior by default. Set
this option to a value of 5 to enable it.
Note that --video-sync=display-tempo avoids this pitch change.
Also note that in the --video-sync=display-resample or --video-sync=display-tempo
mode, audio speed will additionally be changed by a small amount if necessary for
A/V sync. See --video-sync-max-audio-change.
--video-sync-max-audio-change=<value>
Maximum additional speed difference in percent that is applied to audio with
--video-sync=display-... (default: 0.125). Normally, the player plays the audio at
the speed of the video. But if the difference between audio and video position is
too high, e.g. due to drift or other timing errors, it will attempt to speed up or
slow down audio by this additional factor. Too low values could lead to video frame
dropping or repeating if the A/V desync cannot be compensated, too high values
could lead to chaotic frame dropping due to the audio "overshooting" and skipping
multiple video frames before the sync logic can react.
--mf-fps=<value>
Framerate used when decoding from multiple PNG or JPEG files with mf:// (default:
1).
--mf-type=<value>
Input file type for mf:// (available: jpeg, png, tga, sgi). By default, this is
guessed from the file extension.
--stream-dump=<destination-filename>
Instead of playing a file, read its byte stream and write it to the given
destination file. The destination is overwritten. Can be useful to test
network-related behavior.
--stream-lavf-o=opt1=value1,opt2=value2,...
Set AVOptions on streams opened with libavformat. Unknown or misspelled options are
silently ignored. (They are mentioned in the terminal output in verbose mode, i.e.
--v. In general we can't print errors, because other options such as e.g. user
agent are not available with all protocols, and printing errors for unknown options
would end up being too noisy.)
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--backdrop-type=<auto|none|mica|acrylic|mica-alt>
(Windows only) Controls the backdrop/border style.
auto Default Windows behavior
none The backdrop will be black or white depending on the system's theme
settings.
mica Enables the Mica style, which is the default on Windows 11.
acrylic
Enables the Acrylic style (frosted glass look).
mica-alt
Same as Mica, except reversed.
--window-affinity=<default|excludefromcmcapture|monitor>
(Windows only) Controls the window affinity behavior of mpv.
default
Default Windows behavior
excludefromcapture
mpv's window will be completely excluded from capture by external
applications or screen recording software.
monitor
Blacks out the mpv window
--vo-mmcss-profile=<name>
(Windows only) Set the MMCSS profile for the video renderer thread (default:
Playback).
--priority=<prio>
(Windows only) Set process priority for mpv according to the predefined priorities
available under Windows.
Possible values of <prio>: idle|belownormal|normal|abovenormal|high|realtime
WARNING:
Using realtime priority can cause system lockup.
--force-media-title=<string>
Force the contents of the media-title property to this value. Useful for scripts
which want to set a title, without overriding the user's setting in --title.
--external-files=<file-list>
Load a file and add all of its tracks. This is useful to play different files
together (for example audio from one file, video from another), or for advanced
--lavfi-complex used (like playing two video files at the same time).
Unlike --sub-files and --audio-files, this includes all tracks, and does not cause
default stream selection over the "proper" file. This makes it slightly less
intrusive. (In mpv 0.28.0 and before, this was not quite strictly enforced.)
This is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--external-file=<file>
CLI/config file only alias for --external-files-append. Each use of this option
will add a new external file.
--cover-art-files=<file-list>
Use an external file as cover art while playing audio. This makes it appear on the
track list and subject to automatic track selection. Options like --audio-display
control whether such tracks are supposed to be selected.
(The difference to loading a file with --external-files is that video tracks will
be marked as being pictures, which affects the auto-selection method. If the passed
file is a video, only the first frame will be decoded and displayed. Enabling the
cover art track during playback may show a random frame if the source file is a
video. Normally you're not supposed to pass videos to this option, so this
paragraph describes the behavior coincidentally resulting from implementation
details.)
This is a path list option. See List Options for details.
--cover-art-file=<file>
CLI/config file only alias for --cover-art-files-append. Each use of this option
will add a new external file.
--cover-art-auto=<no|exact|fuzzy|all>
Whether to load _external_ cover art automatically. Similar to --sub-auto and
--audio-file-auto. If a video already has tracks (which are not marked as cover
art), external cover art will not be loaded.
no Don't automatically load cover art.
exact Load the media filename with an image file extension (default).
fuzzy Load all cover art containing the media filename.
all Load all images in the current directory.
See --cover-art-files for details about what constitutes cover art.
See --audio-display how to control display of cover art (this can be used to
disable cover art that is part of the file).
--cover-art-auto-exts=ext1,ext2,...
Cover art extentions to try and match when using cover-art-auto.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
--cover-art-whitelist=<no|yes>
Whether to load files with a filename among "AlbumArt", "Album", "cover", "front",
"AlbumArtSmall", "Folder", ".folder", "thumb", and an extension in
--cover-art-auto-exts, as cover art. This has no effect if cover-art-auto is no.
Default: yes.
--autoload-files=<yes|no>
Automatically load/select external files (default: yes).
If set to no, then do not automatically load external files as specified by
--sub-auto, --audio-file-auto and --cover-art-auto. If external files are forcibly
added (like with --sub-files), they will not be auto-selected.
This does not affect playlist expansion, redirection, or other loading of
referenced files like with ordered chapters.
--stream-record=<file>
Write received/read data from the demuxer to the given output file. The output file
will always be overwritten without asking. The output format is determined by the
extension of the output file.
Switching streams or seeking during recording might result in recording being
stopped and/or broken files. Use with care.
Seeking outside of the demuxer cache will result in "skips" in the output file, but
seeking within the demuxer cache should not affect recording. One exception is
when you seek back far enough to exceed the forward buffering size, in which case
the cache stops actively reading. This will return in dropped data if it's a live
stream.
If this is set at runtime, the old file is closed, and the new file is opened. Note
that this will write only data that is appended at the end of the cache, and the
already cached data cannot be written. You can try the dump-cache command as an
alternative.
External files (--audio-file etc.) are ignored by this, it works on the "main" file
only. Using this with files using ordered chapters or EDL files will also not work
correctly in general.
There are some glitches with this because it uses FFmpeg's libavformat for writing
the output file. For example, it's typical that it will only work if the output
format is the same as the input format. This is the case even if it works with the
ffmpeg tool. One reason for this is that ffmpeg and its libraries contain certain
hacks and workarounds for these issues, that are unavailable to outside users.
--lavfi-complex=<string>
Set a "complex" libavfilter filter, which means a single filter graph can take
input from multiple source audio and video tracks. The graph can result in a single
audio or video output (or both).
Currently, the filter graph labels are used to select the participating input
tracks and audio/video output. The following rules apply:
• A label of the form aidN selects audio track N as input (e.g. aid1).
• A label of the form vidN selects video track N as input.
• A label named ao will be connected to the audio output.
• A label named vo will be connected to the video output.
Each label can be used only once. If you want to use e.g. an audio stream for
multiple filters, you need to use the asplit filter. Multiple video or audio
outputs are not possible, but you can use filters to merge them into one.
It's not possible to change the tracks connected to the filter at runtime, unless
you explicitly change the lavfi-complex property and set new track assignments.
When the graph is changed, the track selection is changed according to the used
labels as well.
Other tracks, as long as they're not connected to the filter, and the corresponding
output is not connected to the filter, can still be freely changed with the normal
methods.
Note that the normal filter chains (--af, --vf) are applied between the complex
graphs (e.g. ao label) and the actual output.
Examples
• --lavfi-complex='[aid1] [aid2] amix [ao]' Play audio track 1 and 2 at the same
time.
• --lavfi-complex='[vid1] [vid2] vstack [vo]' Stack video track 1 and 2 and play
them at the same time. Note that both tracks need to have the same width, or
filter initialization will fail (you can add scale filters before the vstack
filter to fix the size). To load a video track from another file, you can use
--external-file=other.mkv.
• --lavfi-complex='[vid1] [vid2] [vid3] hstack=inputs=3 [vo]' Use the inputs
option to stack more than 2 tracks.
• --lavfi-complex='[aid1] asplit [t1] [ao] ; [t1] showvolume [t2] ; [vid1] [t2]
overlay [vo]' Play audio track 1, and overlay the measured volume for each
speaker over video track 1.
See the FFmpeg libavfilter documentation for details on the available filters.
--metadata-codepage=<codepage>
Codepage for various input metadata (default: auto). This affects how file tags,
chapter titles, etc. are interpreted. In most cases, this merely evaluates to UTF-8
as non-UTF-8 codepages are obscure.
See --sub-codepage option on how codepages are specified and further details
regarding autodetection and codepage conversion. (The underlying code is the same.)
Conversion is not applied to metadata that is updated at runtime.
AUDIO OUTPUT DRIVERS
Audio output drivers are interfaces to different audio output facilities. The syntax is:
--ao=<driver1,driver2,...[,]>
Specify a priority list of audio output drivers to be used.
If the list has a trailing ',', mpv will fall back on drivers not contained in the list.
NOTE:
See --ao=help for a list of compiled-in audio output drivers. The driver --ao=alsa is
preferred. --ao=pulse is preferred on systems where PulseAudio is used. On BSD systems,
--ao=oss is preferred.
Available audio output drivers are:
alsa (Linux only)
ALSA audio output driver
See ALSA audio output options for options specific to this AO.
WARNING:
To get multichannel/surround audio, use --audio-channels=auto. The default for
this option is auto-safe, which makes this audio output explicitly reject
multichannel output, as there is no way to detect whether a certain channel
layout is actually supported.
You can also try using the upmix plugin. This setup enables multichannel audio
on the default device with automatic upmixing with shared access, so playing
stereo and multichannel audio at the same time will work as expected.
oss OSS audio output driver
jack JACK (Jack Audio Connection Kit) audio output driver.
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--jack-port=<name>
Connects to the ports with the given name (default: physical ports).
--jack-name=<client>
Client name that is passed to JACK (default: mpv). Useful if you want to
have certain connections established automatically.
--jack-autostart=<yes|no>
Automatically start jackd if necessary (default: disabled). Note that this
tends to be unreliable and will flood stdout with server messages.
--jack-connect=<yes|no>
Automatically create connections to output ports (default: enabled). When
enabled, the maximum number of output channels will be limited to the number
of available output ports.
--jack-std-channel-layout=<waveext|any>
Select the standard channel layout (default: waveext). JACK itself has no
notion of channel layouts (i.e. assigning which speaker a given channel is
supposed to map to) - it just takes whatever the application outputs, and
reroutes it to whatever the user defines. This means the user and the
application are in charge of dealing with the channel layout. waveext uses
WAVE_FORMAT_EXTENSIBLE order, which, even though it was defined by
Microsoft, is the standard on many systems. The value any makes JACK accept
whatever comes from the audio filter chain, regardless of channel layout and
without reordering. This mode is probably not very useful, other than for
debugging or when used with fixed setups.
coreaudio (macOS only)
Native macOS audio output driver using AudioUnits and the CoreAudio sound server.
Automatically redirects to coreaudio_exclusive when playing compressed formats.
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--coreaudio-change-physical-format=<yes|no>
Change the physical format to one similar to the requested audio format
(default: no). This has the advantage that multichannel audio output will
actually work. The disadvantage is that it will change the system-wide audio
settings. This is equivalent to changing the Format setting in the Audio
Devices dialog in the Audio MIDI Setup utility. Note that this does not
affect the selected speaker setup.
--coreaudio-spdif-hack=<yes|no>
Try to pass through AC3/DTS data as PCM. This is useful for drivers which do
not report AC3 support. It converts the AC3 data to float, and assumes the
driver will do the inverse conversion, which means a typical A/V receiver
will pick it up as compressed IEC framed AC3 stream, ignoring that it's
marked as PCM. This disables normal AC3 passthrough (even if the device
reports it as supported). Use with extreme care.
coreaudio_exclusive (macOS only)
Native macOS audio output driver using direct device access and exclusive mode
(bypasses the sound server).
openal OpenAL audio output driver.
--openal-num-buffers=<2-128>
Specify the number of audio buffers to use. Lower values are better for
lower CPU usage. Default: 4.
--openal-num-samples=<256-32768>
Specify the number of complete samples to use for each buffer. Higher values
are better for lower CPU usage. Default: 8192.
--openal-direct-channels=<yes|no>
Enable OpenAL Soft's direct channel extension when available to avoid
tinting the sound with ambisonics or HRTF. Default: yes.
pulse PulseAudio audio output driver
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--pulse-host=<host>
Specify the host to use. An empty <host> string uses a local connection,
"localhost" uses network transfer (most likely not what you want).
--pulse-buffer=<1-2000|native>
Set the audio buffer size in milliseconds. A higher value buffers more data,
and has a lower probability of buffer underruns. A smaller value makes the
audio stream react faster, e.g. to playback speed changes. "native" lets the
sound server determine buffers.
--pulse-latency-hacks=<yes|no>
Enable hacks to workaround PulseAudio timing bugs (default: no). If enabled,
mpv will do elaborate latency calculations on its own. If disabled, it will
use PulseAudio automatically updated timing information. Disabling this
might help with e.g. networked audio or some plugins, while enabling it
might help in some unknown situations (it used to be required to get good
behavior on old PulseAudio versions).
If you have stuttering video when using pulse, try to enable this option.
(Or try to update PulseAudio.)
--pulse-allow-suspended=<yes|no>
Allow mpv to use PulseAudio even if the sink is suspended (default: no).
Can be useful if PulseAudio is running as a bridge to jack and mpv has its
sink-input set to the one jack is using.
pipewire
PipeWire audio output driver
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--pipewire-buffer=<1-2000|native>
Set the audio buffer size in milliseconds. A higher value buffers more data,
and has a lower probability of buffer underruns. A smaller value makes the
audio stream react faster, e.g. to playback speed changes. "native" lets the
sound server determine buffers.
--pipewire-remote=<remote>
Specify the PipeWire remote daemon name to connect to via local UNIX
sockets. An empty <remote> string uses the default remote named pipewire-0.
--pipewire-volume-mode=<channel|global>
Specify if the ao-volume property should apply to the channel volumes or the
global volume. By default the channel volumes are used.
sdl SDL 1.2+ audio output driver. Should work on any platform supported by SDL 1.2, but
may require the SDL_AUDIODRIVER environment variable to be set appropriately for
your system.
NOTE:
This driver is for compatibility with extremely foreign environments, such as
systems where none of the other drivers are available.
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--sdl-buflen=<length>
Sets the audio buffer length in seconds. Is used only as a hint by the sound
system. Playing a file with -v will show the requested and obtained exact
buffer size. A value of 0 selects the sound system default.
null Produces no audio output but maintains video playback speed. You can use --ao=null
--ao-null-untimed for benchmarking.
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--ao-null-untimed
Do not simulate timing of a perfect audio device. This means audio decoding
will go as fast as possible, instead of timing it to the system clock.
--ao-null-buffer
Simulated buffer length in seconds.
--ao-null-outburst
Simulated chunk size in samples.
--ao-null-speed
Simulated audio playback speed as a multiplier. Usually, a real audio device
will not go exactly as fast as the system clock. It will deviate just a
little, and this option helps to simulate this.
--ao-null-latency
Simulated device latency. This is additional to EOF.
--ao-null-broken-eof
Simulate broken audio drivers, which always add the fixed device latency to
the reported audio playback position.
--ao-null-broken-delay
Simulate broken audio drivers, which don't report latency correctly.
--ao-null-channel-layouts
If not empty, this is a , separated list of channel layouts the AO allows.
This can be used to test channel layout selection.
--ao-null-format
Force the audio output format the AO will accept. If unset accepts any.
pcm Raw PCM/WAVE file writer audio output
The following global options are supported by this audio output:
--ao-pcm-waveheader=<yes|no>
Include or do not include the WAVE header (default: included). When not
included, raw PCM will be generated.
--ao-pcm-file=<filename>
Write the sound to <filename> instead of the default audiodump.wav. If
no-waveheader is specified, the default is audiodump.pcm.
--ao-pcm-append=<yes|no>
Append to the file, instead of overwriting it. Always use this with the
no-waveheader option - with waveheader it's broken, because it will write a
WAVE header every time the file is opened.
sndio Audio output to the OpenBSD sndio sound system
(Note: only supports mono, stereo, 4.0, 5.1 and 7.1 channel layouts.)
wasapi Audio output to the Windows Audio Session API.
VIDEO OUTPUT DRIVERS
Video output drivers are interfaces to different video output facilities. The syntax is:
--vo=<driver1,driver2,...[,]>
Specify a priority list of video output drivers to be used.
If the list has a trailing ,, mpv will fall back on drivers not contained in the list.
NOTE:
See --vo=help for a list of compiled-in video output drivers.
The recommended output driver is --vo=gpu, which is the default. All other drivers are
for compatibility or special purposes. If the default does not work, it will fallback
to other drivers (in the same order as listed by --vo=help).
Available video output drivers are:
gpu General purpose, customizable, GPU-accelerated video output driver. It supports
extended scaling methods, dithering, color management, custom shaders, HDR, and
more.
See GPU renderer options for options specific to this VO.
By default, mpv utilizes settings that balance quality and performance.
Additionally, two predefined profiles are available: fast for maximum performance
and high-quality for superior rendering quality. You can apply a specific profile
using the --profile=<name> option and inspect its contents using
--show-profile=<name>.
This VO abstracts over several possible graphics APIs and windowing contexts, which
can be influenced using the --gpu-api and --gpu-context options.
Hardware decoding over OpenGL-interop is supported to some degree. Note that in
this mode, some corner case might not be gracefully handled, and color space
conversion and chroma upsampling is generally in the hand of the hardware decoder
APIs.
gpu makes use of FBOs by default. Sometimes you can achieve better quality or
performance by changing the --fbo-format option to rgb16f, rgb32f or rgb. Known
problems include Mesa/Intel not accepting rgb16, Mesa sometimes not being compiled
with float texture support, and some macOS setups being very slow with rgb16 but
fast with rgb32f. If you have problems, you can also try enabling the
--gpu-dumb-mode=yes option.
gpu-next
Experimental video renderer based on libplacebo. This supports almost the same set
of features as --vo=gpu. See GPU renderer options for a list.
Should generally be faster and higher quality, but some features may still be
missing or misbehave. Expect (and report!) bugs. See here for a list of known
differences and bugs:
https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/wiki/GPU-Next-vs-GPU
xv (X11 only)
Uses the XVideo extension to enable hardware-accelerated display. This is the most
compatible VO on X, but may be low-quality, and has issues with OSD and subtitle
display.
NOTE:
This driver is for compatibility with old systems.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--xv-adaptor=<number>
Select a specific XVideo adapter (check xvinfo results).
--xv-port=<number>
Select a specific XVideo port.
--xv-ck=<cur|use|set>
Select the source from which the color key is taken (default: cur).
cur The default takes the color key currently set in Xv.
use Use but do not set the color key from mpv (use the --colorkey option
to change it).
set Same as use but also sets the supplied color key.
--xv-ck-method=<none|man|bg|auto>
Sets the color key drawing method (default: man).
none Disables color-keying.
man Draw the color key manually (reduces flicker in some cases).
bg Set the color key as window background.
auto Let Xv draw the color key.
--xv-colorkey=<number>
Changes the color key to an RGB value of your choice. 0x000000 is black and
0xffffff is white.
--xv-buffers=<number>
Number of image buffers to use for the internal ringbuffer (default: 2).
Increasing this will use more memory, but might help with the X server not
responding quickly enough if video FPS is close to or higher than the
display refresh rate.
x11 (X11 only)
Shared memory video output driver without hardware acceleration that works whenever
X11 is present.
Since mpv 0.30.0, you may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
NOTE:
This is a fallback only, and should not be normally used.
vdpau (X11 only)
Uses the VDPAU interface to display and optionally also decode video. Hardware
decoding is used with --hwdec=vdpau. Note that there is absolutely no reason to use
this, other than compatibility. We strongly recommend that you use --vo=gpu with
--hwdec=nvdec instead.
NOTE:
Earlier versions of mpv (and MPlayer, mplayer2) provided sub-options to tune
vdpau post-processing, like deint, sharpen, denoise, chroma-deint, pullup,
hqscaling. These sub-options are deprecated, and you should use the vdpaupp
video filter instead.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--vo-vdpau-sharpen=<-1-1>
(Deprecated. See note about vdpaupp.)
For positive values, apply a sharpening algorithm to the video, for negative
values a blurring algorithm (default: 0).
--vo-vdpau-denoise=<0-1>
(Deprecated. See note about vdpaupp.)
Apply a noise reduction algorithm to the video (default: 0; no noise
reduction).
--vo-vdpau-chroma-deint
(Deprecated. See note about vdpaupp.)
Makes temporal deinterlacers operate both on luma and chroma (default). Use
no-chroma-deint to solely use luma and speed up advanced deinterlacing.
Useful with slow video memory.
--vo-vdpau-pullup
(Deprecated. See note about vdpaupp.)
Try to apply inverse telecine, needs motion adaptive temporal deinterlacing.
--vo-vdpau-hqscaling=<0-9>
(Deprecated. See note about vdpaupp.)
0 Use default VDPAU scaling (default).
1-9 Apply high quality VDPAU scaling (needs capable hardware).
--vo-vdpau-fps=<number>
Override autodetected display refresh rate value (the value is needed for
framedrop to allow video playback rates higher than display refresh rate,
and for vsync-aware frame timing adjustments). Default 0 means use
autodetected value. A positive value is interpreted as a refresh rate in Hz
and overrides the autodetected value. A negative value disables all timing
adjustment and framedrop logic.
--vo-vdpau-composite-detect
NVIDIA's current VDPAU implementation behaves somewhat differently under a
compositing window manager and does not give accurate frame timing
information. With this option enabled, the player tries to detect whether a
compositing window manager is active. If one is detected, the player
disables timing adjustments as if the user had specified fps=-1 (as they
would be based on incorrect input). This means timing is somewhat less
accurate than without compositing, but with the composited mode behavior of
the NVIDIA driver, there is no hard playback speed limit even without the
disabled logic. Enabled by default, use --vo-vdpau-composite-detect=no to
disable.
--vo-vdpau-queuetime-windowed=<number> and queuetime-fs=<number>
Use VDPAU's presentation queue functionality to queue future video frame
changes at most this many milliseconds in advance (default: 50). See below
for additional information.
--vo-vdpau-output-surfaces=<2-15>
Allocate this many output surfaces to display video frames (default: 3). See
below for additional information.
--vo-vdpau-colorkey=<#RRGGBB|#AARRGGBB>
Set the VDPAU presentation queue background color, which in practice is the
colorkey used if VDPAU operates in overlay mode (default: #020507, some
shade of black). If the alpha component of this value is 0, the default
VDPAU colorkey will be used instead (which is usually green).
--vo-vdpau-force-yuv
Never accept RGBA input. This means mpv will insert a filter to convert to a
YUV format before the VO. Sometimes useful to force availability of certain
YUV-only features, like video equalizer or deinterlacing.
Using the VDPAU frame queuing functionality controlled by the queuetime options
makes mpv's frame flip timing less sensitive to system CPU load and allows mpv to
start decoding the next frame(s) slightly earlier, which can reduce jitter caused
by individual slow-to-decode frames. However, the NVIDIA graphics drivers can make
other window behavior such as window moves choppy if VDPAU is using the blit queue
(mainly happens if you have the composite extension enabled) and this feature is
active. If this happens on your system and it bothers you then you can set the
queuetime value to 0 to disable this feature. The settings to use in windowed and
fullscreen mode are separate because there should be no reason to disable this for
fullscreen mode (as the driver issue should not affect the video itself).
You can queue more frames ahead by increasing the queuetime values and the
output_surfaces count (to ensure enough surfaces to buffer video for a certain time
ahead you need at least as many surfaces as the video has frames during that time,
plus two). This could help make video smoother in some cases. The main downsides
are increased video RAM requirements for the surfaces and laggier display response
to user commands (display changes only become visible some time after they're
queued). The graphics driver implementation may also have limits on the length of
maximum queuing time or number of queued surfaces that work well or at all.
direct3d (Windows only)
Video output driver that uses the Direct3D interface.
NOTE:
This driver is for compatibility with systems that don't provide proper OpenGL
drivers, and where ANGLE does not perform well.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--vo-direct3d-disable-texture-align
Normally texture sizes are always aligned to 16. With this option enabled,
the video texture will always have exactly the same size as the video
itself.
Debug options. These might be incorrect, might be removed in the future, might
crash, might cause slow downs, etc. Contact the developers if you actually need any
of these for performance or proper operation.
--vo-direct3d-force-power-of-2
Always force textures to power of 2, even if the device reports
non-power-of-2 texture sizes as supported.
--vo-direct3d-texture-memory=<mode>
Only affects operation with shaders/texturing enabled, and (E)OSD. Possible
values:
default (default)
Use D3DPOOL_DEFAULT, with a D3DPOOL_SYSTEMMEM texture for locking. If
the driver supports D3DDEVCAPS_TEXTURESYSTEMMEMORY, D3DPOOL_SYSTEMMEM
is used directly.
default-pool
Use D3DPOOL_DEFAULT. (Like default, but never use a shadow-texture.)
default-pool-shadow
Use D3DPOOL_DEFAULT, with a D3DPOOL_SYSTEMMEM texture for locking.
(Like default, but always force the shadow-texture.)
managed
Use D3DPOOL_MANAGED.
scratch
Use D3DPOOL_SCRATCH, with a D3DPOOL_SYSTEMMEM texture for locking.
--vo-direct3d-swap-discard
Use D3DSWAPEFFECT_DISCARD, which might be faster. Might be slower too, as
it must(?) clear every frame.
--vo-direct3d-exact-backbuffer
Always resize the backbuffer to window size.
sdl SDL 2.0+ Render video output driver, depending on system with or without hardware
acceleration. Should work on all platforms supported by SDL 2.0. For tuning, refer
to your copy of the file SDL_hints.h.
NOTE:
This driver is for compatibility with systems that don't provide proper graphics
drivers.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--sdl-sw
Continue even if a software renderer is detected.
--sdl-switch-mode
Instruct SDL to switch the monitor video mode when going fullscreen.
dmabuf-wayland
Experimental Wayland output driver designed for use with either drm stateless or VA
API hardware decoding. The driver is designed to avoid any GPU to CPU copies, and
to perform scaling and color space conversion using fixed-function hardware, if
available, rather than GPU shaders. This frees up GPU resources for other tasks.
It is highly recommended to use this VO with the appropriate --hwdec option such as
auto-safe. It can still work in some circumstances without --hwdec due to mpv's
internal conversion filters, but this is not recommended as it's a needless extra
step. Correct output depends on support from your GPU, drivers, and compositor.
Weston and wlroots-based compositors like Sway and Intel GPUs are known to
generally work.
vaapi Intel VA API video output driver with support for hardware decoding. Note that
there is absolutely no reason to use this, other than compatibility. This is low
quality, and has issues with OSD. We strongly recommend that you use --vo=gpu with
--hwdec=vaapi instead.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--vo-vaapi-scaling=<algorithm>
default
Driver default (mpv default as well).
fast Fast, but low quality.
hq Unspecified driver dependent high-quality scaling, slow.
nla non-linear anamorphic scaling
--vo-vaapi-scaled-osd=<yes|no>
If enabled, then the OSD is rendered at video resolution and scaled to
display resolution. By default, this is disabled, and the OSD is rendered at
display resolution if the driver supports it.
null Produces no video output. Useful for benchmarking.
Usually, it's better to disable video with --no-video instead.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--vo-null-fps=<value>
Simulate display FPS. This artificially limits how many frames the VO
accepts per second.
caca Color ASCII art video output driver that works on a text console.
NOTE:
This driver is a joke.
tct Color Unicode art video output driver that works on a text console. By default
depends on support of true color by modern terminals to display the images at full
color range, but 256-colors output is also supported (see below). On Windows it
requires an ansi terminal such as mintty.
Since mpv 0.30.0, you may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
Note: the TCT image output is not synchronized with other terminal output from mpv,
which can lead to broken images. The options --no-terminal or --really-quiet can
help with that.
--vo-tct-algo=<algo>
Select how to write the pixels to the terminal.
half-blocks
Uses unicode LOWER HALF BLOCK character to achieve higher vertical
resolution. (Default.)
plain Uses spaces. Causes vertical resolution to drop twofolds, but in
theory works in more places.
--vo-tct-width=<width> --vo-tct-height=<height>
Assume the terminal has the specified character width and/or height. These
default to 80x25 if the terminal size cannot be determined.
--vo-tct-256=<yes|no> (default: no)
Use 256 colors - for terminals which don't support true color.
kitty Graphical output for the terminal, using the kitty graphics protocol. Tested with
kitty and Konsole.
You may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
Kitty size and alignment options:
--vo-kitty-cols=<columns>, --vo-kitty-rows=<rows> (default: 0)
Specify the terminal size in character cells, otherwise (0) read it from the
terminal, or fall back to 80x25.
--vo-kitty-width=<width>, --vo-kitty-height=<height> (default: 0)
Specify the available size in pixels, otherwise (0) read it from the
terminal, or fall back to 320x240.
--vo-kitty-left=<col>, --vo-kitty-top=<row> (default: 0)
Specify the position in character cells where the image starts (1 is the
first column or row). If 0 (default) then try to automatically determine it
according to the other values and the image aspect ratio and zoom.
--vo-kitty-config-clear=<yes|no> (default: yes)
Whether or not to clear the terminal whenever the output is reconfigured
(e.g. when video size changes).
--vo-kitty-alt-screen=<yes|no> (default: yes)
Whether or not to use the alternate screen buffer and return the terminal to
its previous state on exit. When set to no, the last kitty image stays on
screen after quit, with the cursor following it.
--vo-kitty-use-shm=<yes|no> (default: no)
Use shared memory objects to transfer image data to the terminal. This is
much faster than sending the data as escape codes, but is not supported by
as many terminals. It also only works on the local machine and not via e.g.
SSH connections.
This option is not implemented on Windows.
sixel Graphical output for the terminal, using sixels. Tested with mlterm and xterm.
Note: the Sixel image output is not synchronized with other terminal output from
mpv, which can lead to broken images. The option --really-quiet can help with
that, and is recommended. On some platforms, using the --vo-sixel-buffered option
may work as well.
You may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
Note: at the time of writing, xterm does not enable sixel by default - launching it
as xterm -ti 340 is one way to enable it. Also, xterm does not display images
bigger than 1000x1000 pixels by default.
To render and align sixel images correctly, mpv needs to know the terminal size
both in cells and in pixels. By default it tries to use values which the terminal
reports, however, due to differences between terminals this is an error-prone
process which cannot be automated with certainty - some terminals report the size
in pixels including the padding - e.g. xterm, while others report the actual usable
number of pixels - like mlterm. Additionally, they may behave differently when
maximized or in fullscreen, and mpv cannot detect this state using standard
methods.
Sixel size and alignment options:
--vo-sixel-cols=<columns>, --vo-sixel-rows=<rows> (default: 0)
Specify the terminal size in character cells, otherwise (0) read it from the
terminal, or fall back to 80x25. Note that mpv doesn't use the the last row
with sixel because this seems to result in scrolling.
--vo-sixel-width=<width>, --vo-sixel-height=<height> (default: 0)
Specify the available size in pixels, otherwise (0) read it from the
terminal, or fall back to 320x240. Other than excluding the last line, the
height is also further rounded down to a multiple of 6 (sixel unit height)
to avoid overflowing below the designated size.
--vo-sixel-left=<col>, --vo-sixel-top=<row> (default: 0)
Specify the position in character cells where the image starts (1 is the
first column or row). If 0 (default) then try to automatically determine it
according to the other values and the image aspect ratio and zoom.
--vo-sixel-pad-x=<pad_x>, --vo-sixel-pad-y=<pad_y> (default: -1)
Used only when mpv reads the size in pixels from the terminal. Specify the
number of padding pixels (on one side) which are included at the size which
the terminal reports. If -1 (default) then the number of pixels is rounded
down to a multiple of number of cells (per axis), to take into account
padding at the report - this only works correctly when the overall padding
per axis is smaller than the number of cells.
--vo-sixel-config-clear=<yes|no> (default: yes)
Whether or not to clear the terminal whenever the output is reconfigured
(e.g. when video size changes).
--vo-sixel-alt-screen=<yes|no> (default: yes)
Whether or not to use the alternate screen buffer and return the terminal to
its previous state on exit. When set to no, the last sixel image stays on
screen after quit, with the cursor following it.
--vo-sixel-exit-clear is a deprecated alias for this option and may be
removed in the future.
--vo-sixel-buffered=<yes|no> (default: no)
Buffers the full output sequence before writing it to the terminal. On
POSIX platforms, this can help prevent interruption (including from other
applications) and thus broken images, but may come at a performance cost
with some terminals and is subject to implementation details.
Sixel image quality options:
--vo-sixel-dither=<algo>
Selects the dither algorithm which libsixel should apply. Can be one of the
below list as per libsixel's documentation.
auto (Default)
Let libsixel choose the dithering method.
none Don't diffuse
atkinson
Diffuse with Bill Atkinson's method.
fs Diffuse with Floyd-Steinberg method
jajuni Diffuse with Jarvis, Judice & Ninke method
stucki Diffuse with Stucki's method
burkes Diffuse with Burkes' method
arithmetic
Positionally stable arithmetic dither
xor Positionally stable arithmetic xor based dither
--vo-sixel-fixedpalette=<yes|no> (default: yes)
Use libsixel's built-in static palette using the XTERM256 profile for
dither. Fixed palette uses 256 colors for dithering. Note that using no (at
the time of writing) will slow down xterm.
--vo-sixel-reqcolors=<colors> (default: 256)
Has no effect with fixed palette. Set up libsixel to use required number of
colors for dynamic palette. This value depends on the terminal emulator as
well. Xterm supports 256 colors. Can set this to a lower value for faster
performance.
--vo-sixel-threshold=<threshold> (default: -1)
Has no effect with fixed palette. Defines the threshold to change the
palette - as percentage of the number of colors, e.g. 20 will change the
palette when the number of colors changed by 20%. It's a simple measure to
reduce the number of palette changes, because it can be slow in some
terminals (xterm). The default (-1) will choose a palette on every frame and
will have better quality.
image Output each frame into an image file in the current directory. Each file takes the
frame number padded with leading zeros as name.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--vo-image-format=<format>
Select the image file format.
jpg JPEG files, extension .jpg. (Default.)
jpeg JPEG files, extension .jpeg.
png PNG files.
webp WebP files.
--vo-image-png-compression=<0-9>
PNG compression factor (speed vs. file size tradeoff) (default: 7)
--vo-image-png-filter=<0-5>
Filter applied prior to PNG compression (0 = none; 1 = sub; 2 = up; 3 =
average; 4 = Paeth; 5 = mixed) (default: 5)
--vo-image-jpeg-quality=<0-100>
JPEG quality factor (default: 90)
--vo-image-jpeg-optimize=<0-100>
JPEG optimization factor (default: 100)
--vo-image-webp-lossless=<yes|no>
Enable writing lossless WebP files (default: no)
--vo-image-webp-quality=<0-100>
WebP quality (default: 75)
--vo-image-webp-compression=<0-6>
WebP compression factor (default: 4)
--vo-image-outdir=<dirname>
Specify the directory to save the image files to (default: ./).
libmpv For use with libmpv direct embedding. As a special case, on macOS it is used like a
normal VO within mpv (cocoa-cb). Otherwise useless in any other contexts. (See
<mpv/render.h>.)
This also supports many of the options the gpu VO has, depending on the backend.
rpi (Raspberry Pi)
Native video output on the Raspberry Pi using the MMAL API.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--rpi-display=<number>
Select the display number on which the video overlay should be shown
(default: 0).
--rpi-layer=<number>
Select the dispmanx layer on which the video overlay should be shown
(default: -10). Note that mpv will also use the 2 layers above the selected
layer, to handle the window background and OSD. Actual video rendering will
happen on the layer above the selected layer.
--rpi-background=<yes|no>
Whether to render a black background behind the video (default: no).
Normally it's better to kill the console framebuffer instead, which gives
better performance.
--rpi-osd=<yes|no>
Enabled by default. If disabled with no, no OSD layer is created. This also
means there will be no subtitles rendered.
drm (Direct Rendering Manager)
Video output driver using Kernel Mode Setting / Direct Rendering Manager. Should
be used when one doesn't want to install full-blown graphical environment (e.g. no
X). Does not support hardware acceleration (if you need this, check the drm backend
for gpu VO).
Since mpv 0.30.0, you may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
The following global options are supported by this video output:
--drm-connector=<name>
Select the connector to use (usually this is a monitor.) If <name> is empty
or auto, mpv renders the output on the first available connector. Use
--drm-connector=help to get a list of available connectors. (default: empty)
--drm-device=<path>
Select the DRM device file to use. If specified this overrides automatic
card selection. (default: empty)
--drm-mode=<preferred|highest|N|WxH[@R]>
Mode to use (resolution and frame rate). Possible values:
preferred
Use the preferred mode for the screen on the selected connector.
(default)
highest
Use the mode with the highest resolution available on the selected
connector.
N Select mode by index.
WxH[@R]
Specify mode by width, height, and optionally refresh rate. In case
several modes match, selects the mode that comes first in the EDID
list of modes.
Use --drm-mode=help to get a list of available modes for all active
connectors.
--drm-draw-plane=<primary|overlay|N>
Select the DRM plane to which video and OSD is drawn to, under normal
circumstances. The plane can be specified as primary, which will pick the
first applicable primary plane; overlay, which will pick the first
applicable overlay plane; or by index. The index is zero based, and related
to the CRTC. (default: primary)
When using this option with the drmprime-overlay hwdec interop, only the OSD
is rendered to this plane.
--drm-drmprime-video-plane=<primary|overlay|N>
Select the DRM plane to use for video with the drmprime-overlay hwdec
interop (used by e.g. the rkmpp hwdec on RockChip SoCs, and v4l2 hwdec:s on
various other SoC:s). The plane is unused otherwise. This option accepts the
same values as --drm-draw-plane. (default: overlay)
To be able to successfully play 4K video on various SoCs you might need to
set --drm-draw-plane=overlay --drm-drmprime-video-plane=primary and setting
--drm-draw-surface-size=1920x1080, to render the OSD at a lower resolution
(the video when handled by the hwdec will be on the drmprime-video plane and
at full 4K resolution)
--drm-format=<xrgb8888|xrgb2101010>
Select the DRM format to use (default: xrgb8888). This allows you to choose
the bit depth of the DRM mode. xrgb8888 is your usual 24 bit per pixel/8
bits per channel packed RGB format with 8 bits of padding. xrgb2101010 is a
packed 30 bits per pixel/10 bits per channel packed RGB format with 2 bits
of padding.
There are cases when xrgb2101010 will work with the drm VO, but not with the
drm backend for the gpu VO. This is because with the gpu VO, in addition to
requiring support in your DRM driver, requires support for xrgb2101010 in
your EGL driver
--drm-draw-surface-size=<[WxH]>
Sets the size of the surface used on the draw plane. The surface will then
be upscaled to the current screen resolution. This option can be useful when
used together with the drmprime-overlay hwdec interop at high resolutions,
as it allows scaling the draw plane (which in this case only handles the
OSD) down to a size the GPU can handle.
When used without the drmprime-overlay hwdec interop this option will just
cause the video to get rendered at a different resolution and then scaled to
screen size.
(default: display resolution)
--drm-vrr-enabled=<no|yes|auto>
Toggle use of Variable Refresh Rate (VRR), aka Freesync or Adaptive Sync on
compatible systems. VRR allows for the display to be refreshed at any rate
within a range (usually ~40Hz-60Hz for 60Hz displays). This can help with
playback of 24/25/50fps content. Support depends on the use of a compatible
monitor, GPU, and a sufficiently new kernel with drivers that support the
feature.
no Do not attempt to enable VRR. (default)
yes Attempt to enable VRR, whether the capability is reported or not.
auto Attempt to enable VRR if support is reported.
mediacodec_embed (Android)
Renders IMGFMT_MEDIACODEC frames directly to an android.view.Surface. Requires
--hwdec=mediacodec for hardware decoding, along with --vo=mediacodec_embed and
--wid=(intptr_t)(*android.view.Surface).
Since this video output driver uses native decoding and rendering routines, many of
mpv's features (subtitle rendering, OSD/OSC, video filters, etc) are not available
with this driver.
To use hardware decoding with --vo=gpu instead, use --hwdec=mediacodec or
mediacodec-copy along with --gpu-context=android.
wlshm (Wayland only)
Shared memory video output driver without hardware acceleration that works whenever
Wayland is present.
Since mpv 0.30.0, you may need to use --profile=sw-fast to get decent performance.
NOTE:
This is a fallback only, and should not be normally used.
AUDIO FILTERS
Audio filters allow you to modify the audio stream and its properties. The syntax is:
--af=...
Setup a chain of audio filters. See --vf (VIDEO FILTERS) for the full syntax.
NOTE:
To get a full list of available audio filters, see --af=help.
Also, keep in mind that most actual filters are available via the lavfi wrapper, which
gives you access to most of libavfilter's filters. This includes all filters that have
been ported from MPlayer to libavfilter.
The --vf description describes how libavfilter can be used and how to workaround
deprecated mpv filters.
See --vf group of options for info on how --af-add, --af-pre, --af-clr, and possibly
others work.
Available filters are:
lavcac3enc[=options]
Encode multi-channel audio to AC-3 at runtime using libavcodec. Supports 16-bit
native-endian input format, maximum 6 channels. The output is big-endian when
outputting a raw AC-3 stream, native-endian when outputting to S/PDIF. If the input
sample rate is not 48 kHz, 44.1 kHz or 32 kHz, it will be resampled to 48 kHz.
tospdif=<yes|no>
Output raw AC-3 stream if no, output to S/PDIF for pass-through if yes
(default).
bitrate=<rate>
The bitrate use for the AC-3 stream. Set it to 384 to get 384 kbps.
The default is 640. Some receivers might not be able to handle this.
Valid values: 32, 40, 48, 56, 64, 80, 96, 112, 128, 160, 192, 224, 256, 320,
384, 448, 512, 576, 640.
The special value auto selects a default bitrate based on the input channel
number:
1ch 96
2ch 192
3ch 224
4ch 384
5ch 448
6ch 448
minch=<n>
If the input channel number is less than <minch>, the filter will detach
itself (default: 3).
encoder=<name>
Select the libavcodec encoder used. Currently, this should be an AC-3
encoder, and using another codec will fail horribly.
format=format:srate:channels:out-srate:out-channels
Does not do any format conversion itself. Rather, it may cause the filter system to
insert necessary conversion filters before or after this filter if needed. It is
primarily useful for controlling the audio format going into other filters. To
specify the format for audio output, see --audio-format, --audio-samplerate, and
--audio-channels. This filter is able to force a particular format, whereas
--audio-* may be overridden by the ao based on output compatibility.
All parameters are optional. The first 3 parameters restrict what the filter
accepts as input. They will therefore cause conversion filters to be inserted
before this one. The out- parameters tell the filters or audio outputs following
this filter how to interpret the data without actually doing a conversion. Setting
these will probably just break things unless you really know you want this for some
reason, such as testing or dealing with broken media.
<format>
Force conversion to this format. Use --af=format=format=help to get a list
of valid formats.
<srate>
Force conversion to a specific sample rate. The rate is an integer, 48000
for example.
<channels>
Force mixing to a specific channel layout. See --audio-channels option for
possible values.
<out-srate>
<out-channels>
NOTE: this filter used to be named force. The old format filter used to do
conversion itself, unlike this one which lets the filter system handle the
conversion.
scaletempo[=option1:option2:...]
Scales audio tempo without altering pitch, optionally synced to playback speed.
This works by playing 'stride' ms of audio at normal speed then consuming
'stride*scale' ms of input audio. It pieces the strides together by blending
'overlap'% of stride with audio following the previous stride. It optionally
performs a short statistical analysis on the next 'search' ms of audio to determine
the best overlap position.
scale=<amount>
Nominal amount to scale tempo. Scales this amount in addition to speed.
(default: 1.0)
stride=<amount>
Length in milliseconds to output each stride. Too high of a value will cause
noticeable skips at high scale amounts and an echo at low scale amounts.
Very low values will alter pitch. Increasing improves performance. (default:
60)
overlap=<factor>
Factor of stride to overlap. Decreasing improves performance. (default:
.20)
search=<amount>
Length in milliseconds to search for best overlap position. Decreasing
improves performance greatly. On slow systems, you will probably want to set
this very low. (default: 14)
speed=<tempo|pitch|both|none>
Set response to speed change.
tempo Scale tempo in sync with speed (default).
pitch Reverses effect of filter. Scales pitch without altering tempo. Add
this to your input.conf to step by musical semi-tones:
[ multiply speed 0.9438743126816935
] multiply speed 1.059463094352953
WARNING:
Loses sync with video.
both Scale both tempo and pitch.
none Ignore speed changes.
Examples
mpv --af=scaletempo --speed=1.2 media.ogg
Would play media at 1.2x normal speed, with audio at normal pitch.
Changing playback speed would change audio tempo to match.
mpv --af=scaletempo=scale=1.2:speed=none --speed=1.2 media.ogg
Would play media at 1.2x normal speed, with audio at normal pitch, but
changing playback speed would have no effect on audio tempo.
mpv --af=scaletempo=stride=30:overlap=.50:search=10 media.ogg
Would tweak the quality and performance parameters.
mpv --af=scaletempo=scale=1.2:speed=pitch audio.ogg
Would play media at 1.2x normal speed, with audio at normal pitch.
Changing playback speed would change pitch, leaving audio tempo at 1.2x.
scaletempo2[=option1:option2:...]
Scales audio tempo without altering pitch. The algorithm is ported from chromium
and uses the Waveform Similarity Overlap-and-add (WSOLA) method. It seems to
achieves higher audio quality than scaletempo, and rubberband R2 engine, or
engine=faster. This filter is inserted automatically if audio-pitch-correction
option is used (on by default) when the playback speed is changed.
By default, the search-interval and window-size parameters have the same values as
in chromium.
min-speed=<speed>
Mute audio if the playback speed is below <speed>. (default: 0.25)
max-speed=<speed>
Mute audio if the playback speed is above <speed> and <speed> != 0.
(default: 8.0)
search-interval=<amount>
Length in milliseconds to search for best overlap position. (default: 40)
window-size=<amount>
Length in milliseconds of the overlap-and-add window. (default: 12)
rubberband
High quality pitch correction with librubberband. This can be used in place of
scaletempo and scaletempo2, and will be used to adjust audio pitch when playing at
speed different from normal. It can also be used to adjust audio pitch without
changing playback speed.
pitch-scale=<amount>
Sets the pitch scaling factor. Frequencies are multiplied by this value.
(default: 1.0)
engine=<faster|finer>
Select the core Rubberband engine to be used. There are two available:
Faster This is the Rubberband R2 engine. It uses significantly less CPU than
the Finer (R3) engine.
Finer This is the Rubberband R3 engine. This engine is only available with
librubberband version 3 or newer. This produces significantly higher
quality output, at the cost of higher CPU usage. (Default if
available)
This filter has a number of additional sub-options. You can list them with mpv
--af=rubberband=help. This will also show the default values for each option. The
options are not documented here, because they are merely passed to librubberband.
Look at the librubberband documentation to learn what each option does:
https://breakfastquay.com/rubberband/code-doc/classRubberBand_1_1RubberBandStretcher.html
Do note that certain options are only applicable to one of R2 (faster) and R3
(finer) engines. (The mapping of the mpv rubberband filter sub-option names and
values to those of librubberband follows a simple pattern: "Option" + Name +
Value.)
This filter supports the following af-command commands:
set-pitch
Set the <pitch-scale> argument dynamically. This can be used to change the
playback pitch at runtime. Note that speed is controlled using the standard
speed property, not af-command.
multiply-pitch <factor>
Multiply the current value of <pitch-scale> dynamically. For example: 0.5
to go down by an octave, 1.5 to go up by a perfect fifth. If you want to go
up or down by semi-tones, use 1.059463094352953 and 0.9438743126816935
lavfi=graph
Filter audio using FFmpeg's libavfilter.
<graph>
Libavfilter graph. See lavfi video filter for details - the graph syntax is
the same.
WARNING:
Don't forget to quote libavfilter graphs as described in the lavfi video
filter section.
o=<string>
AVOptions.
fix-pts=<yes|no>
Determine PTS based on sample count (default: no). If this is enabled, the
player won't rely on libavfilter passing through PTS accurately. Instead,
it pass a sample count as PTS to libavfilter, and compute the PTS used by
mpv based on that and the input PTS. This helps with filters which output a
recomputed PTS instead of the original PTS (including filters which require
the PTS to start at 0). mpv normally expects filters to not touch the PTS
(or only to the extent of changing frame boundaries), so this is not the
default, but it will be needed to use broken filters. In practice, these
broken filters will either cause slow A/V desync over time (with some
files), or break playback completely if you seek or start playback from the
middle of a file.
drop This filter drops or repeats audio frames to adapt to playback speed. It always
operates on full audio frames, because it was made to handle SPDIF (compressed
audio passthrough). This is used automatically if the --video-sync=display-adrop
option is used. Do not use this filter (or the given option); they are extremely
low quality.
VIDEO FILTERS
Video filters allow you to modify the video stream and its properties. All of the
information described in this section applies to audio filters as well (generally using
the prefix --af instead of --vf).
The exact syntax is:
--vf=<filter1[=parameter1:parameter2:...],filter2,...>
Setup a chain of video filters. This consists on the filter name, and an option
list of parameters after =. The parameters are separated by : (not ,, as that
starts a new filter entry).
Before the filter name, a label can be specified with @name:, where name is an
arbitrary user-given name, which identifies the filter. This is only needed if you
want to toggle the filter at runtime.
A ! before the filter name means the filter is disabled by default. It will be
skipped on filter creation. This is also useful for runtime filter toggling.
See the vf command (and toggle sub-command) for further explanations and examples.
The general filter entry syntax is:
["@"<label-name>":"] ["!"] <filter-name> [ "=" <filter-parameter-list> ]
or for the special "toggle" syntax (see vf command):
"@"<label-name>
and the filter-parameter-list:
<filter-parameter> | <filter-parameter> "," <filter-parameter-list>
and filter-parameter:
( <param-name> "=" <param-value> ) | <param-value>
param-value can further be quoted in [ / ] in case the value contains characters
like , or =. This is used in particular with the lavfi filter, which uses a very
similar syntax as mpv (MPlayer historically) to specify filters and their
parameters.
NOTE:
--vf can only take a single track as input, even if the filter supports dynamic input.
Filters that require multiple inputs can't be used. Use --lavfi-complex for such a use
case. This also applies for --af.
Filters can be manipulated at run time. You can use @ labels as described above in
combination with the vf command (see COMMAND INTERFACE) to get more control over this.
Initially disabled filters with ! are useful for this as well.
NOTE:
To get a full list of available video filters, see --vf=help and
https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-filters.html .
Also, keep in mind that most actual filters are available via the lavfi wrapper, which
gives you access to most of libavfilter's filters. This includes all filters that have
been ported from MPlayer to libavfilter.
Most builtin filters are deprecated in some ways, unless they're only available in mpv
(such as filters which deal with mpv specifics, or which are implemented in mpv only).
If a filter is not builtin, the lavfi-bridge will be automatically tried. This bridge
does not support help output, and does not verify parameters before the filter is
actually used. Although the mpv syntax is rather similar to libavfilter's, it's not the
same. (Which means not everything accepted by vf_lavfi's graph option will be accepted
by --vf.)
You can also prefix the filter name with lavfi- to force the wrapper. This is helpful
if the filter name collides with a deprecated mpv builtin filter. For example
--vf=lavfi-scale=args would use libavfilter's scale filter over mpv's deprecated
builtin one.
Video filters are managed in lists. There are a few commands to manage the filter list.
--vf-append=filter
Appends the filter given as arguments to the filter list.
--vf-add=filter
Appends the filter given as arguments to the filter list. (Passing multiple filters
is currently still possible, but deprecated.)
--vf-pre=filter
Prepends the filters given as arguments to the filter list. (Passing multiple
filters is currently still possible, but deprecated.)
--vf-remove=filter
Deletes the filter from the list. The filter can be either given the way it was
added (filter name and its full argument list), or by label (prefixed with @).
Matching of filters works as follows: if either of the compared filters has a label
set, only the labels are compared. If none of the filters have a label, the filter
name, arguments, and argument order are compared. (Passing multiple filters is
currently still possible, but deprecated.)
-vf-toggle=filter
Add the given filter to the list if it was not present yet, or remove it from the
list if it was present. Matching of filters works as described in --vf-remove.
--vf-clr
Completely empties the filter list.
With filters that support it, you can access parameters by their name.
--vf=<filter>=help
Prints the parameter names and parameter value ranges for a particular filter.
Available mpv-only filters are:
format=fmt=<value>:colormatrix=<value>:...
Applies video parameter overrides, with optional conversion. By default, this
overrides the video's parameters without conversion (except for the fmt parameter),
but can be made to perform an appropriate conversion with convert=yes for
parameters for which conversion is supported.
<fmt> Image format name, e.g. rgb15, bgr24, 420p, etc. (default: don't change).
This filter always performs conversion to the given format.
NOTE:
For a list of available formats, use --vf=format=fmt=help.
NOTE:
Conversion between hardware formats is supported in some cases. eg: cuda
to vulkan, or vaapi to vulkan.
<convert=yes|no>
Force conversion of color parameters (default: no).
If this is disabled (the default), the only conversion that is possibly
performed is format conversion if <fmt> is set. All other parameters (like
<colormatrix>) are forced without conversion. This mode is typically useful
when files have been incorrectly tagged.
If this is enabled, libswscale or zimg is used if any of the parameters
mismatch. zimg is used of the input/output image formats are supported by
mpv's zimg wrapper, and if --sws-allow-zimg=yes is used. Both libraries may
not support all kinds of conversions. This typically results in silent
incorrect conversion. zimg has in many cases a better chance of performing
the conversion correctly.
In both cases, the color parameters are set on the output stage of the image
format conversion (if fmt was set). The difference is that with convert=no,
the color parameters are not passed on to the converter.
If input and output video parameters are the same, conversion is always
skipped.
When converting between hardware formats, this parameter has no effect, and
the only conversion that is done is the format conversion.
Examples
mpv test.mkv --vf=format:colormatrix=ycgco
Results in incorrect colors (if test.mkv was tagged correctly).
mpv test.mkv --vf=format:colormatrix=ycgco:convert=yes --sws-allow-zimg
Results in true conversion to ycgco, assuming the renderer
supports it (--vo=gpu normally does). You can add --vo=xv to force
a VO which definitely does not support it, which should show
incorrect colors as confirmation.
Using --sws-allow-zimg=no (or disabling zimg at build time) will
use libswscale, which cannot perform this conversion as of this
writing.
<colormatrix>
Controls the YUV to RGB color space conversion when playing video. There are
various standards. Normally, BT.601 should be used for SD video, and BT.709
for HD video. (This is done by default.) Using incorrect color space results
in slightly under or over saturated and shifted colors.
These options are not always supported. Different video outputs provide
varying degrees of support. The gpu and vdpau video output drivers usually
offer full support. The xv output can set the color space if the system
video driver supports it, but not input and output levels. The scale video
filter can configure color space and input levels, but only if the output
format is RGB (if the video output driver supports RGB output, you can force
this with -vf scale,format=rgba).
If this option is set to auto (which is the default), the video's color
space flag will be used. If that flag is unset, the color space will be
selected automatically. This is done using a simple heuristic that attempts
to distinguish SD and HD video. If the video is larger than 1279x576 pixels,
BT.709 (HD) will be used; otherwise BT.601 (SD) is selected.
Available color spaces are:
auto automatic selection (default)
bt.601 ITU-R BT.601 (SD)
bt.709 ITU-R BT.709 (HD)
bt.2020-ncl
ITU-R BT.2020 non-constant luminance system
bt.2020-cl
ITU-R BT.2020 constant luminance system
smpte-240m
SMPTE-240M
<colorlevels>
YUV color levels used with YUV to RGB conversion. This option is only
necessary when playing broken files which do not follow standard color
levels or which are flagged wrong. If the video does not specify its color
range, it is assumed to be limited range.
The same limitations as with <colormatrix> apply.
Available color ranges are:
auto automatic selection (normally limited range) (default)
limited
limited range (16-235 for luma, 16-240 for chroma)
full full range (0-255 for both luma and chroma)
<primaries>
RGB primaries the source file was encoded with. Normally this should be set
in the file header, but when playing broken or mistagged files this can be
used to override the setting.
This option only affects video output drivers that perform color management,
for example gpu with the target-prim or icc-profile suboptions set.
If this option is set to auto (which is the default), the video's primaries
flag will be used. If that flag is unset, the color space will be selected
automatically, using the following heuristics: If the <colormatrix> is set
or determined as BT.2020 or BT.709, the corresponding primaries are used.
Otherwise, if the video height is exactly 576 (PAL), BT.601-625 is used. If
it's exactly 480 or 486 (NTSC), BT.601-525 is used. If the video resolution
is anything else, BT.709 is used.
Available primaries are:
auto automatic selection (default)
bt.601-525
ITU-R BT.601 (SD) 525-line systems (NTSC, SMPTE-C)
bt.601-625
ITU-R BT.601 (SD) 625-line systems (PAL, SECAM)
bt.709 ITU-R BT.709 (HD) (same primaries as sRGB)
bt.2020
ITU-R BT.2020 (UHD)
apple Apple RGB
adobe Adobe RGB (1998)
prophoto
ProPhoto RGB (ROMM)
cie1931
CIE 1931 RGB
dci-p3 DCI-P3 (Digital Cinema)
v-gamut
Panasonic V-Gamut primaries
<gamma>
Gamma function the source file was encoded with. Normally this should be set
in the file header, but when playing broken or mistagged files this can be
used to override the setting.
This option only affects video output drivers that perform color management.
If this option is set to auto (which is the default), the gamma will be set
to BT.1886 for YCbCr content, sRGB for RGB content and Linear for XYZ
content.
Available gamma functions are:
auto automatic selection (default)
bt.1886
ITU-R BT.1886 (EOTF corresponding to BT.601/BT.709/BT.2020)
srgb IEC 61966-2-4 (sRGB)
linear Linear light
gamma1.8
Pure power curve (gamma 1.8)
gamma2.0
Pure power curve (gamma 2.0)
gamma2.2
Pure power curve (gamma 2.2)
gamma2.4
Pure power curve (gamma 2.4)
gamma2.6
Pure power curve (gamma 2.6)
gamma2.8
Pure power curve (gamma 2.8)
prophoto
ProPhoto RGB (ROMM) curve
pq ITU-R BT.2100 PQ (Perceptual quantizer) curve
hlg ITU-R BT.2100 HLG (Hybrid Log-gamma) curve
v-log Panasonic V-Log transfer curve
s-log1 Sony S-Log1 transfer curve
s-log2 Sony S-Log2 transfer curve
<sig-peak>
Reference peak illumination for the video file, relative to the signal's
reference white level. This is mostly interesting for HDR, but it can also
be used tone map SDR content to simulate a different exposure. Normally
inferred from tags such as MaxCLL or mastering metadata.
The default of 0.0 will default to the source's nominal peak luminance.
<light>
Light type of the scene. This is mostly correctly inferred based on the
gamma function, but it can be useful to override this when viewing raw
camera footage (e.g. V-Log), which is normally scene-referred instead of
display-referred.
Available light types are:
auto Automatic selection (default)
display
Display-referred light (most content)
hlg Scene-referred using the HLG OOTF (e.g. HLG content)
709-1886
Scene-referred using the BT709+BT1886 interaction
gamma1.2
Scene-referred using a pure power OOTF (gamma=1.2)
<dolbyvision=yes|no>
Whether or not to include Dolby Vision metadata (default: yes). If disabled,
any Dolby Vision metadata will be stripped from frames.
<film-grain=yes|no>
Whether or not to include film grain metadata (default: yes). If disabled,
any film grain metadata will be stripped from frames.
<stereo-in>
Set the stereo mode the video is assumed to be encoded in. Use
--vf=format:stereo-in=help to list all available modes. Check with the
stereo3d filter documentation to see what the names mean.
<stereo-out>
Set the stereo mode the video should be displayed as. Takes the same values
as the stereo-in option.
<rotate>
Set the rotation the video is assumed to be encoded with in degrees. The
special value -1 uses the input format.
<w>, <h>
If not 0, perform conversion to the given size. Ignored if convert=yes is
not set.
<dw>, <dh>
Set the display size. Note that setting the display size such that the video
is scaled in both directions instead of just changing the aspect ratio is an
implementation detail, and might change later.
<dar> Set the display aspect ratio of the video frame. This is a float, but values
such as [16:9] can be passed too ([...] for quoting to prevent the option
parser from interpreting the : character).
<force-scaler=auto|zimg|sws>
Force a specific scaler backend, if applicable. This is a debug option and
could go away any time.
<alpha=auto|straight|premul>
Set the kind of alpha the video uses. Undefined effect if the image format
has no alpha channel (could be ignored or cause an error, depending on how
mpv internals evolve). Setting this may or may not cause downstream image
processing to treat alpha differently, depending on support. With convert
and zimg used, this will convert the alpha. libswscale and other FFmpeg
components completely ignore this.
lavfi=graph[:sws-flags[:o=opts]]
Filter video using FFmpeg's libavfilter.
<graph>
The libavfilter graph string. The filter must have a single video input pad
and a single video output pad.
See https://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg-filters.html for syntax and available filters.
WARNING:
If you want to use the full filter syntax with this option, you have to
quote the filter graph in order to prevent mpv's syntax and the filter
graph syntax from clashing. To prevent a quoting and escaping mess,
consider using --lavfi-complex if you know which video track you want to
use from the input file. (There is only one video track for nearly all
video files anyway.)
Examples
--vf=lavfi=[gradfun=20:30,vflip]
gradfun filter with nonsense parameters, followed by a vflip
filter. (This demonstrates how libavfilter takes a graph and not
just a single filter.) The filter graph string is quoted with [
and ]. This requires no additional quoting or escaping with some
shells (like bash), while others (like zsh) require additional "
quotes around the option string.
'--vf=lavfi="gradfun=20:30,vflip"'
Same as before, but uses quoting that should be safe with all
shells. The outer ' quotes make sure that the shell does not
remove the " quotes needed by mpv.
'--vf=lavfi=graph="gradfun=radius=30:strength=20,vflip"'
Same as before, but uses named parameters for everything.
<sws-flags>
If libavfilter inserts filters for pixel format conversion, this option
gives the flags which should be passed to libswscale. This option is numeric
and takes a bit-wise combination of SWS_ flags.
See https://git.videolan.org/?p=ffmpeg.git;a=blob;f=libswscale/swscale.h.
<o> Set AVFilterGraph options. These should be documented by FFmpeg.
Example
'--vf=lavfi=yadif:o="threads=2,thread_type=slice"'
forces a specific threading configuration.
sub=[=bottom-margin:top-margin]
Moves subtitle rendering to an arbitrary point in the filter chain, or force
subtitle rendering in the video filter as opposed to using video output OSD
support.
<bottom-margin>
Adds a black band at the bottom of the frame. The SSA/ASS renderer can place
subtitles there (with --sub-use-margins).
<top-margin>
Black band on the top for toptitles (with --sub-use-margins).
Examples
--vf=sub,eq
Moves sub rendering before the eq filter. This will put both subtitle
colors and video under the influence of the video equalizer settings.
vapoursynth=file:buffered-frames:concurrent-frames
Loads a VapourSynth filter script. This is intended for streamed processing: mpv
actually provides a source filter, instead of using a native VapourSynth video
source. The mpv source will answer frame requests only within a small window of
frames (the size of this window is controlled with the buffered-frames parameter),
and requests outside of that will return errors. As such, you can't use the full
power of VapourSynth, but you can use certain filters.
WARNING:
Do not use this filter, unless you have expert knowledge in VapourSynth, and
know how to fix bugs in the mpv VapourSynth wrapper code.
If you just want to play video generated by VapourSynth (i.e. using a native
VapourSynth video source), it's better to use vspipe and a pipe or FIFO to feed the
video to mpv. The same applies if the filter script requires random frame access
(see buffered-frames parameter).
file Filename of the script source. Currently, this is always a python script
(.vpy in VapourSynth convention).
The variable video_in is set to the mpv video source, and it is expected
that the script reads video from it. (Otherwise, mpv will decode no video,
and the video packet queue will overflow, eventually leading to only audio
playing, or worse.)
The filter graph created by the script is also expected to pass through
timestamps using the _DurationNum and _DurationDen frame properties.
See the end of the option list for a full list of script variables defined
by mpv.
Example:
import vapoursynth as vs
from vapoursynth import core
core.std.AddBorders(video_in, 10, 10, 20, 20).set_output()
WARNING:
The script will be reloaded on every seek. This is done to reset the
filter properly on discontinuities.
buffered-frames
Maximum number of decoded video frames that should be buffered before the
filter (default: 4). This specifies the maximum number of frames the script
can request in backward direction.
E.g. if buffered-frames=5, and the script just requested frame 15, it can
still request frame 10, but frame 9 is not available anymore. If it
requests frame 30, mpv will decode 15 more frames, and keep only frames
25-30.
The only reason why this buffer exists is to serve the random access
requests the VapourSynth filter can make.
The VapourSynth API has a getFrameAsync function, which takes an absolute
frame number. Source filters must respond to all requests. For example, a
source filter can request frame 2432, and then frame 3. Source filters
typically implement this by pre-indexing the entire file.
mpv on the other hand is stream oriented, and does not allow filters to
seek. (And it would not make sense to allow it, because it would ruin
performance.) Filters get frames sequentially in playback direction, and
cannot request them out of order.
To compensate for this mismatch, mpv allows the filter to access frames
within a certain window. buffered-frames controls the size of this window.
Most VapourSynth filters happen to work with this, because mpv requests
frames sequentially increasing from it, and most filters only require frames
"close" to the requested frame.
If the filter requests a frame that has a higher frame number than the
highest buffered frame, new frames will be decoded until the requested frame
number is reached. Excessive frames will be flushed out in a FIFO manner
(there are only at most buffered-frames in this buffer).
If the filter requests a frame that has a lower frame number than the lowest
buffered frame, the request cannot be satisfied, and an error is returned to
the filter. This kind of error is not supposed to happen in a "proper"
VapourSynth environment. What exactly happens depends on the filters
involved.
Increasing this buffer will not improve performance. Rather, it will waste
memory, and slow down seeks (when enough frames to fill the buffer need to
be decoded at once). It is only needed to prevent the error described in the
previous paragraph.
How many frames a filter requires depends on filter implementation details,
and mpv has no way of knowing. A scale filter might need only 1 frame, an
interpolation filter may require a small number of frames, and the Reverse
filter will require an infinite number of frames.
If you want reliable operation to the full extend VapourSynth is capable,
use vspipe.
The actual number of buffered frames also depends on the value of the
concurrent-frames option. Currently, both option values are multiplied to
get the final buffer size.
concurrent-frames
Number of frames that should be requested in parallel. The level of
concurrency depends on the filter and how quickly mpv can decode video to
feed the filter. This value should probably be proportional to the number of
cores on your machine. Most time, making it higher than the number of cores
can actually make it slower.
Technically, mpv will call the VapourSynth getFrameAsync function in a loop,
until there are concurrent-frames frames that have not been returned by the
filter yet. This also assumes that the rest of the mpv filter chain reads
the output of the vapoursynth filter quickly enough. (For example, if you
pause the player, filtering will stop very soon, because the filtered frames
are waiting in a queue.)
Actual concurrency depends on many other factors.
By default, this uses the special value auto, which sets the option to the
number of detected logical CPU cores.
The following .vpy script variables are defined by mpv:
video_in
The mpv video source as vapoursynth clip. Note that this has an incorrect
(very high) length set, which confuses many filters. This is necessary,
because the true number of frames is unknown. You can use the Trim filter on
the clip to reduce the length.
video_in_dw, video_in_dh
Display size of the video. Can be different from video size if the video
does not use square pixels (e.g. DVD).
container_fps
FPS value as reported by file headers. This value can be wrong or completely
broken (e.g. 0 or NaN). Even if the value is correct, if another filter
changes the real FPS (by dropping or inserting frames), the value of this
variable will not be useful. Note that the --container-fps-override command
line option overrides this value.
Useful for some filters which insist on having a FPS.
display_fps
Refresh rate of the current display. Note that this value can be 0.
display_res
Resolution of the current display. This is an integer array with the first
entry corresponding to the width and the second entry coresponding to the
height. These values can be 0. Note that this will not respond to monitor
changes and may not work on all platforms.
vavpp VA-API video post processing. Requires the system to support VA-API, i.e. Linux/BSD
only. Works with --vo=vaapi and --vo=gpu only. Currently deinterlaces. This filter
is automatically inserted if deinterlacing is requested (either using the d key, by
default mapped to the command cycle deinterlace, or the --deinterlace option).
deint=<method>
Select the deinterlacing algorithm.
no Don't perform deinterlacing.
auto Select the best quality deinterlacing algorithm (default). This goes
by the order of the options as documented, with motion-compensated
being considered best quality.
first-field
Show only first field.
bob bob deinterlacing.
weave, motion-adaptive, motion-compensated
Advanced deinterlacing algorithms. Whether these actually work
depends on the GPU hardware, the GPU drivers, driver bugs, and mpv
bugs.
<interlaced-only>
no Deinterlace all frames (default).
yes Only deinterlace frames marked as interlaced.
reversal-bug=<yes|no>
no Use the API as it was interpreted by older Mesa drivers. While this
interpretation was more obvious and intuitive, it was apparently
wrong, and not shared by Intel driver developers.
yes Use Intel interpretation of surface forward and backwards references
(default). This is what Intel drivers and newer Mesa drivers expect.
Matters only for the advanced deinterlacing algorithms.
vdpaupp
VDPAU video post processing. Works with --vo=vdpau and --vo=gpu only. This filter
is automatically inserted if deinterlacing is requested (either using the d key, by
default mapped to the command cycle deinterlace, or the --deinterlace option). When
enabling deinterlacing, it is always preferred over software deinterlacer filters
if the vdpau VO is used, and also if gpu is used and hardware decoding was
activated at least once (i.e. vdpau was loaded).
sharpen=<-1-1>
For positive values, apply a sharpening algorithm to the video, for negative
values a blurring algorithm (default: 0).
denoise=<0-1>
Apply a noise reduction algorithm to the video (default: 0; no noise
reduction).
deint=<yes|no>
Whether deinterlacing is enabled (default: no). If enabled, it will use the
mode selected with deint-mode.
deint-mode=<first-field|bob|temporal|temporal-spatial>
Select deinterlacing mode (default: temporal).
Note that there's currently a mechanism that allows the vdpau VO to change
the deint-mode of auto-inserted vdpaupp filters. To avoid confusion, it's
recommended not to use the --vo=vdpau suboptions related to filtering.
first-field
Show only first field.
bob Bob deinterlacing.
temporal
Motion-adaptive temporal deinterlacing. May lead to A/V desync with
slow video hardware and/or high resolution.
temporal-spatial
Motion-adaptive temporal deinterlacing with edge-guided spatial
interpolation. Needs fast video hardware.
chroma-deint
Makes temporal deinterlacers operate both on luma and chroma (default). Use
no-chroma-deint to solely use luma and speed up advanced deinterlacing.
Useful with slow video memory.
pullup Try to apply inverse telecine, needs motion adaptive temporal deinterlacing.
interlaced-only=<yes|no>
If yes, only deinterlace frames marked as interlaced (default: no).
hqscaling=<0-9>
0 Use default VDPAU scaling (default).
1-9 Apply high quality VDPAU scaling (needs capable hardware).
d3d11vpp
Direct3D 11 video post processing. Currently requires D3D11 hardware decoding for
use.
deint=<yes|no>
Whether deinterlacing is enabled (default: no).
interlaced-only=<yes|no>
If yes, only deinterlace frames marked as interlaced (default: no).
mode=<blend|bob|adaptive|mocomp|ivctc|none>
Tries to select a video processor with the given processing capability. If
a video processor supports multiple capabilities, it is not clear which
algorithm is actually selected. none always falls back. On most if not all
hardware, this option will probably do nothing, because a video processor
usually supports all modes or none.
fingerprint=...
Compute video frame fingerprints and provide them as metadata. Actually, it
currently barely deserved to be called fingerprint, because it does not compute
"proper" fingerprints, only tiny downscaled images (but which can be used to
compute image hashes or for similarity matching).
The main purpose of this filter is to support the skip-logo.lua script. If this
script is dropped, or mpv ever gains a way to load user-defined filters (other than
VapourSynth), this filter will be removed. Due to the "special" nature of this
filter, it will be removed without warning.
The intended way to read from the filter is using vf-metadata (also see
clear-on-query filter parameter). The property will return a list of key/value
pairs as follows:
fp0.pts = 1.2345
fp0.hex = 1234abcdef...bcde
fp1.pts = 1.4567
fp1.hex = abcdef1234...6789
...
fpN.pts = ...
fpN.hex = ...
type = gray-hex-16x16
Each fp<N> entry is for a frame. The pts entry specifies the timestamp of the frame
(within the filter chain; in simple cases this is the same as the display
timestamp). The hex field is the hex encoded fingerprint, whose size and meaning
depend on the type filter option. The type field has the same value as the option
the filter was created with.
This returns the frames that were filtered since the last query of the property. If
clear-on-query=no was set, a query doesn't reset the list of frames. In both cases,
a maximum of 10 frames is returned. If there are more frames, the oldest frames are
discarded. Frames are returned in filter order.
(This doesn't return a structured list for the per-frame details because the
internals of the vf-metadata mechanism suck. The returned format may change in the
future.)
This filter uses zimg for speed and profit. However, it will fallback to libswscale
in a number of situations: lesser pixel formats, unaligned data pointers or
strides, or if zimg fails to initialize for unknown reasons. In these cases, the
filter will use more CPU. Also, it will output different fingerprints, because
libswscale cannot perform the full range expansion we normally request from zimg.
As a consequence, the filter may be slower and not work correctly in random
situations.
type=...
What fingerprint to compute. Available types are:
gray-hex-8x8
grayscale, 8 bit, 8x8 size
gray-hex-16x16
grayscale, 8 bit, 16x16 size (default)
Both types simply remove all colors, downscale the image, concatenate all
pixel values to a byte array, and convert the array to a hex string.
clear-on-query=yes|no
Clear the list of frame fingerprints if the vf-metadata property for this
filter is queried (default: yes). This requires some care by the user. Some
types of accesses might query the filter multiple times, which leads to lost
frames.
print=yes|no
Print computed fingerprints to the terminal (default: no). This is mostly
for testing and such. Scripts should use vf-metadata to read information
from this filter instead.
gpu=...
Convert video to RGB using the OpenGL renderer normally used with --vo=gpu. This
requires that the EGL implementation supports off-screen rendering on the default
display. (This is the case with Mesa.)
Sub-options:
w=<pixels>, h=<pixels>
Size of the output in pixels (default: 0). If not positive, this will use
the size of the first filtered input frame.
WARNING:
This is highly experimental. Performance is bad, and it will not work everywhere
in the first place. Some features are not supported.
WARNING:
This does not do OSD rendering. If you see OSD, then it has been rendered by the
VO backend. (Subtitles are rendered by the gpu filter, if possible.)
WARNING:
If you use this with encoding mode, keep in mind that encoding mode will convert
the RGB filter's output back to yuv420p in software, using the configured
software scaler. Using zimg might improve this, but in any case it might go
against your goals when using this filter.
WARNING:
Do not use this with --vo=gpu. It will apply filtering twice, since most
--vo=gpu options are unconditionally applied to the gpu filter. There is no
mechanism in mpv to prevent this.
ENCODING
You can encode files from one format/codec to another using this facility.
--o=<filename>
Enables encoding mode and specifies the output file name.
--of=<format>
Specifies the output format (overrides autodetection by the file name extension of
the file specified by -o). See --of=help for a full list of supported formats.
--ofopts=<options>
Specifies the output format options for libavformat. See --ofopts=help for a full
list of supported options.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--ofopts-add=<option>
Appends the option given as an argument to the options list. (Passing
multiple options is currently still possible, but deprecated.)
--ofopts=""
Completely empties the options list.
--oac=<codec>
Specifies the output audio codec. See --oac=help for a full list of supported
codecs.
--oacopts=<options>
Specifies the output audio codec options for libavcodec. See --oacopts=help for a
full list of supported options.
Example
"--oac=libmp3lame --oacopts=b=128000"
selects 128 kbps MP3 encoding.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--oacopts-add=<option>
Appends the option given as an argument to the options list. (Passing
multiple options is currently still possible, but deprecated.)
--oacopts=""
Completely empties the options list.
--ovc=<codec>
Specifies the output video codec. See --ovc=help for a full list of supported
codecs.
--ovcopts=<options>
Specifies the output video codec options for libavcodec. See --ovcopts=help for a
full list of supported options.
Examples
"--ovc=mpeg4 --ovcopts=qscale=5"
selects constant quantizer scale 5 for MPEG-4 encoding.
"--ovc=libx264 --ovcopts=crf=23"
selects VBR quality factor 23 for H.264 encoding.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
--ovcopts-add=<option>
Appends the option given as an argument to the options list. (Passing
multiple options is currently still possible, but deprecated.)
--ovcopts=""
Completely empties the options list.
--orawts
Copies input pts to the output video (not supported by some output container
formats, e.g. AVI). In this mode, discontinuities are not fixed and all pts are
passed through as-is. Never seek backwards or use multiple input files in this
mode!
--no-ocopy-metadata
Turns off copying of metadata from input files to output files when encoding (which
is enabled by default).
--oset-metadata=<metadata-tag[,metadata-tag,...]>
Specifies metadata to include in the output file. Supported keys vary between
output formats. For example, Matroska (MKV) and FLAC allow almost arbitrary keys,
while support in MP4 and MP3 is more limited.
This is a key/value list option. See List Options for details.
Example
"--oset-metadata=title="Output title",comment="Another tag""
adds a title and a comment to the output file.
--oremove-metadata=<metadata-tag[,metadata-tag,...]>
Specifies metadata to exclude from the output file when copying from the input
file.
This is a string list option. See List Options for details.
Example
"--oremove-metadata=comment,genre"
excludes copying of the the comment and genre tags to the output file.
COMMAND INTERFACE
The mpv core can be controlled with commands and properties. A number of ways to interact
with the player use them: key bindings (input.conf), OSD (showing information with
properties), JSON IPC, the client API (libmpv), and the classic slave mode.
input.conf
The input.conf file consists of a list of key bindings, for example:
s screenshot # take a screenshot with the s key
LEFT seek 15 # map the left-arrow key to seeking forward by 15 seconds
Each line maps a key to an input command. Keys are specified with their literal value
(upper case if combined with Shift), or a name for special keys. For example, a maps to
the a key without shift, and A maps to a with shift.
The file is located in the mpv configuration directory (normally at
~/.config/mpv/input.conf depending on platform). The default bindings are defined here:
https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/blob/master/etc/input.conf
A list of special keys can be obtained with
mpv --input-keylist
In general, keys can be combined with Shift, Ctrl and Alt:
ctrl+q quit
mpv can be started in input test mode, which displays key bindings and the commands
they're bound to on the OSD, instead of executing the commands:
mpv --input-test --force-window --idle
(Only closing the window will make mpv exit, pressing normal keys will merely display the
binding, even if mapped to quit.)
Also see Key names.
input.conf syntax
[Shift+][Ctrl+][Alt+][Meta+]<key> [{<section>}] <command> ( ; <command> )*
Note that by default, the right Alt key can be used to create special characters, and thus
does not register as a modifier. The option --no-input-right-alt-gr changes this behavior.
Newlines always start a new binding. # starts a comment (outside of quoted string
arguments). To bind commands to the # key, SHARP can be used.
<key> is either the literal character the key produces (ASCII or Unicode character), or a
symbolic name (as printed by --input-keylist).
<section> (braced with { and }) is the input section for this command.
<command> is the command itself. It consists of the command name and multiple (or none)
arguments, all separated by whitespace. String arguments should be quoted, typically with
". See Flat command syntax.
You can bind multiple commands to one key. For example:
a show-text "command 1" ; show-text "command 2"
It's also possible to bind a command to a sequence of keys:
a-b-c show-text "command run after a, b, c have been pressed"
(This is not shown in the general command syntax.)
If a or a-b or b are already bound, this will run the first command that matches, and the
multi-key command will never be called. Intermediate keys can be remapped to ignore in
order to avoid this issue. The maximum number of (non-modifier) keys for combinations is
currently 4.
Key names
All mouse and keyboard input is to converted to mpv-specific key names. Key names are
either special symbolic identifiers representing a physical key, or a text key names,
which are unicode code points encoded as UTF-8. These are what keyboard input would
normally produce, for example a for the A key. As a consequence, mpv uses input translated
by the current OS keyboard layout, rather than physical scan codes.
Currently there is the hardcoded assumption that every text key can be represented as a
single unicode code point (in NFKC form).
All key names can be combined with the modifiers Shift, Ctrl, Alt, Meta. They must be
prefixed to the actual key name, where each modifier is followed by a + (for example
ctrl+q).
The Shift modifier requires some attention. For instance Shift+2 should usually be
specified as key-name @ at input.conf, and similarly the combination Alt+Shift+2 is
usually Alt+@, etc. Special key names like Shift+LEFT work as expected. If in doubt - use
--input-test to check how a key/combination is seen by mpv.
Symbolic key names and modifier names are case-insensitive. Unicode key names are
case-sensitive because input bindings typically respect the shift key.
Another type of key names are hexadecimal key names, that serve as fallback for special
keys that are neither unicode, nor have a special mpv defined name. They will break as
soon as mpv adds proper names for them, but can enable you to use a key at all if that
does not happen.
All symbolic names are listed by --input-keylist. --input-test is a special mode that
prints all input on the OSD.
Comments on some symbolic names:
KP* Keypad names. Behavior varies by backend (whether they implement this, and on how
they treat numlock), but typically, mpv tries to map keys on the keypad to separate
names, even if they produce the same text as normal keys.
MOUSE_BTN*, MBTN*
Various mouse buttons.
Depending on backend, the mouse wheel might also be represented as a button. In
addition, MOUSE_BTN3 to MOUSE_BTN6 are deprecated aliases for WHEEL_UP, WHEEL_DOWN,
WHEEL_LEFT, WHEEL_RIGHT.
MBTN* are aliases for MOUSE_BTN*.
WHEEL_*
Mouse wheels (typically).
AXIS_* Deprecated aliases for WHEEL_*.
*_DBL Mouse button double clicks.
MOUSE_MOVE, MOUSE_ENTER, MOUSE_LEAVE
Emitted by mouse move events. Enter/leave happens when the mouse enters or leave
the mpv window (or the current mouse region, using the deprecated mouse region
input section mechanism).
CLOSE_WIN
Pseudo key emitted when closing the mpv window using the OS window manager (for
example, by clicking the close button in the window title bar).
GAMEPAD_*
Keys emitted by the SDL gamepad backend.
UNMAPPED
Pseudo-key that matches any unmapped key. (You should probably avoid this if
possible, because it might change behavior or get removed in the future.)
ANY_UNICODE
Pseudo-key that matches any key that produces text. (You should probably avoid this
if possible, because it might change behavior or get removed in the future.)
Flat command syntax
This is the syntax used in input.conf, and referred to "input.conf syntax" in a number of
other places.
<command> ::= [<prefixes>] <command_name> (<argument>)*
<argument> ::= (<unquoted> | " <double_quoted> " | ' <single_quoted> ' | `X <custom_quoted> X`)
command_name is an unquoted string with the command name itself. See List of Input
Commands for a list.
Arguments are separated by whitespaces even if the command expects only one argument.
Arguments with whitespaces or other special characters must be quoted, or the command
cannot be parsed correctly.
Double quotes interpret JSON/C-style escaping, like \t or \" or \\. JSON escapes
according to RFC 8259, minus surrogate pair escapes. This is the only form which allows
newlines at the value - as \n.
Single quotes take the content literally, and cannot include the single-quote character at
the value.
Custom quotes also take the content literally, but are more flexible than single quotes.
They start with ` (back-quote) followed by any ASCII character, and end at the first
occurrence of the same pair in reverse order, e.g. `-foo-` or ``bar``. The final pair
sequence is not allowed at the value - in these examples -` and `` respectively. In the
second example the last character of the value also can't be a back-quote.
Mixed quoting at the same argument, like 'foo'"bar", is not supported.
Note that argument parsing and property expansion happen at different stages. First,
arguments are determined as described above, and then, where applicable, properties are
expanded - regardless of argument quoting. However, expansion can still be prevented with
the raw prefix or $>. See Input Command Prefixes and Property Expansion.
Commands specified as arrays
This applies to certain APIs, such as mp.commandv() or mp.command_native() (with array
parameters) in Lua scripting, or mpv_command() or mpv_command_node() (with
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY) in the C libmpv client API.
The command as well as all arguments are passed as a single array. Similar to the Flat
command syntax, you can first pass prefixes as strings (each as separate array item), then
the command name as string, and then each argument as string or a native value.
Since these APIs pass arguments as separate strings or native values, they do not expect
quotes, and do support escaping. Technically, there is the input.conf parser, which first
splits the command string into arguments, and then invokes argument parsers for each
argument. The input.conf parser normally handles quotes and escaping. The array command
APIs mentioned above pass strings directly to the argument parsers, or can sidestep them
by the ability to pass non-string values.
Property expansion is disabled by default for these APIs. This can be changed with the
expand-properties prefix. See Input Command Prefixes.
Sometimes commands have string arguments, that in turn are actually parsed by other
components (e.g. filter strings with vf add) - in these cases, you you would have to
double-escape in input.conf, but not with the array APIs.
For complex commands, consider using Named arguments instead, which should give slightly
more compatibility. Some commands do not support named arguments and inherently take an
array, though.
Named arguments
This applies to certain APIs, such as mp.command_native() (with tables that have string
keys) in Lua scripting, or mpv_command_node() (with MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP) in the C libmpv
client API.
The name of the command is provided with a name string field. The name of each command is
defined in each command description in the List of Input Commands. --input-cmdlist also
lists them. See the subprocess command for an example.
Some commands do not support named arguments (e.g. run command). You need to use APIs that
pass arguments as arrays.
Named arguments are not supported in the "flat" input.conf syntax, which means you cannot
use them for key bindings in input.conf at all.
Property expansion is disabled by default for these APIs. This can be changed with the
expand-properties prefix. See Input Command Prefixes.
List of Input Commands
Commands with parameters have the parameter name enclosed in < / >. Don't add those to
the actual command. Optional arguments are enclosed in [ / ]. If you don't pass them, they
will be set to a default value.
Remember to quote string arguments in input.conf (see Flat command syntax).
ignore Use this to "block" keys that should be unbound, and do nothing. Useful for
disabling default bindings, without disabling all bindings with
--no-input-default-bindings.
seek <target> [<flags>]
Change the playback position. By default, seeks by a relative amount of seconds.
The second argument consists of flags controlling the seek mode:
relative (default)
Seek relative to current position (a negative value seeks backwards).
absolute
Seek to a given time (a negative value starts from the end of the file).
absolute-percent
Seek to a given percent position.
relative-percent
Seek relative to current position in percent.
keyframes
Always restart playback at keyframe boundaries (fast).
exact Always do exact/hr/precise seeks (slow).
Multiple flags can be combined, e.g.: absolute+keyframes.
By default, keyframes is used for relative, relative-percent, and absolute-percent
seeks, while exact is used for absolute seeks.
Before mpv 0.9, the keyframes and exact flags had to be passed as 3rd parameter
(essentially using a space instead of +). The 3rd parameter is still parsed, but is
considered deprecated.
revert-seek [<flags>]
Undoes the seek command, and some other commands that seek (but not necessarily all
of them). Calling this command once will jump to the playback position before the
seek. Calling it a second time undoes the revert-seek command itself. This only
works within a single file.
The first argument is optional, and can change the behavior:
mark Mark the current time position. The next normal revert-seek command will
seek back to this point, no matter how many seeks happened since last time.
mark-permanent
If set, mark the current position, and do not change the mark position
before the next revert-seek command that has mark or mark-permanent set (or
playback of the current file ends). Until this happens, revert-seek will
always seek to the marked point. This flag cannot be combined with mark.
Using it without any arguments gives you the default behavior.
frame-step
Play one frame, then pause. Does nothing with audio-only playback.
frame-back-step
Go back by one frame, then pause. Note that this can be very slow (it tries to be
precise, not fast), and sometimes fails to behave as expected. How well this works
depends on whether precise seeking works correctly (e.g. see the
--hr-seek-demuxer-offset option). Video filters or other video post-processing that
modifies timing of frames (e.g. deinterlacing) should usually work, but might make
backstepping silently behave incorrectly in corner cases. Using
--hr-seek-framedrop=no should help, although it might make precise seeking slower.
This does not work with audio-only playback.
set <name> <value>
Set the given property or option to the given value.
del <name>
Delete the given property. Most properties cannot be deleted.
add <name> [<value>]
Add the given value to the property or option. On overflow or underflow, clamp the
property to the maximum. If <value> is omitted, assume 1.
cycle <name> [<value>]
Cycle the given property or option. The second argument can be up or down to set
the cycle direction. On overflow, set the property back to the minimum, on
underflow set it to the maximum. If up or down is omitted, assume up.
Whether or not key-repeat is enabled by default depends on the property. Currently
properties with continuous values are repeatable by default (like volume), while
discrete values are not (like osd-level).
multiply <name> <value>
Similar to add, but multiplies the property or option with the numeric value.
screenshot <flags>
Take a screenshot.
Multiple flags are available (some can be combined with +):
<subtitles> (default)
Save the video image, in its original resolution, and with subtitles. Some
video outputs may still include the OSD in the output under certain
circumstances.
<video>
Like subtitles, but typically without OSD or subtitles. The exact behavior
depends on the selected video output.
<window>
Save the contents of the mpv window. Typically scaled, with OSD and
subtitles. The exact behavior depends on the selected video output.
<each-frame>
Take a screenshot each frame. Issue this command again to stop taking
screenshots. Note that you should disable frame-dropping when using this
mode - or you might receive duplicate images in cases when a frame was
dropped. This flag can be combined with the other flags, e.g.
video+each-frame.
Older mpv versions required passing single and each-frame as second argument (and
did not have flags). This syntax is still understood, but deprecated and might be
removed in the future.
If you combine this command with another one using ;, you can use the async flag to
make encoding/writing the image file asynchronous. For normal standalone commands,
this is always asynchronous, and the flag has no effect. (This behavior changed
with mpv 0.29.0.)
On success, returns a mpv_node with a filename field set to the saved screenshot
location.
screenshot-to-file <filename> <flags>
Take a screenshot and save it to a given file. The format of the file will be
guessed by the extension (and --screenshot-format is ignored - the behavior when
the extension is missing or unknown is arbitrary).
The second argument is like the first argument to screenshot and supports
subtitles, video, window.
If the file already exists, it's overwritten.
Like all input command parameters, the filename is subject to property expansion as
described in Property Expansion.
playlist-next <flags>
Go to the next entry on the playlist.
First argument:
weak (default)
If the last file on the playlist is currently played, do nothing.
force Terminate playback if there are no more files on the playlist.
playlist-prev <flags>
Go to the previous entry on the playlist.
First argument:
weak (default)
If the first file on the playlist is currently played, do nothing.
force Terminate playback if the first file is being played.
playlist-next-playlist
Go to the next entry on the playlist with a different playlist-path.
playlist-prev-playlist
Go to the first of the previous entries on the playlist with a different
playlist-path.
playlist-play-index <integer|current|none>
Start (or restart) playback of the given playlist index. In addition to the 0-based
playlist entry index, it supports the following values:
<current>
The current playlist entry (as in playlist-current-pos) will be played again
(unload and reload). If none is set, playback is stopped. (In corner cases,
playlist-current-pos can point to a playlist entry even if playback is
currently inactive,
<none> Playback is stopped. If idle mode (--idle) is enabled, the player will enter
idle mode, otherwise it will exit.
This command is similar to loadfile in that it only manipulates the state of what
to play next, without waiting until the current file is unloaded, and the next one
is loaded.
Setting playlist-pos or similar properties can have a similar effect to this
command. However, it's more explicit, and guarantees that playback is restarted if
for example the new playlist entry is the same as the previous one.
loadfile <url> [<flags> [<options>]]
Load the given file or URL and play it. Technically, this is just a playlist
manipulation command (which either replaces the playlist or appends an entry to
it). Actual file loading happens independently. For example, a loadfile command
that replaces the current file with a new one returns before the current file is
stopped, and the new file even begins loading.
Second argument:
<replace> (default)
Stop playback of the current file, and play the new file immediately.
<append>
Append the file to the playlist.
<append-play>
Append the file, and if nothing is currently playing, start playback.
(Always starts with the added file, even if the playlist was not empty
before running this command.)
The third argument is a list of options and values which should be set while the
file is playing. It is of the form opt1=value1,opt2=value2,... When using the
client API, this can be a MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (or a Lua table), however the values
themselves must be strings currently. These options are set during playback, and
restored to the previous value at end of playback (see Per-File Options).
loadlist <url> [<flags>]
Load the given playlist file or URL (like --playlist).
Second argument:
<replace> (default)
Stop playback and replace the internal playlist with the new one.
<append>
Append the new playlist at the end of the current internal playlist.
<append-play>
Append the new playlist, and if nothing is currently playing, start
playback. (Always starts with the new playlist, even if the internal
playlist was not empty before running this command.)
playlist-clear
Clear the playlist, except the currently played file.
playlist-remove <index>
Remove the playlist entry at the given index. Index values start counting with 0.
The special value current removes the current entry. Note that removing the current
entry also stops playback and starts playing the next entry.
playlist-move <index1> <index2>
Move the playlist entry at index1, so that it takes the place of the entry index2.
(Paradoxically, the moved playlist entry will not have the index value index2 after
moving if index1 was lower than index2, because index2 refers to the target entry,
not the index the entry will have after moving.)
playlist-shuffle
Shuffle the playlist. This is similar to what is done on start if the --shuffle
option is used.
playlist-unshuffle
Attempt to revert the previous playlist-shuffle command. This works only once
(multiple successive playlist-unshuffle commands do nothing). May not work
correctly if new recursive playlists have been opened since a playlist-shuffle
command.
run <command> [<arg1> [<arg2> [...]]]
Run the given command. Unlike in MPlayer/mplayer2 and earlier versions of mpv
(0.2.x and older), this doesn't call the shell. Instead, the command is run
directly, with each argument passed separately. Each argument is expanded like in
Property Expansion.
This command has a variable number of arguments, and cannot be used with named
arguments.
The program is run in a detached way. mpv doesn't wait until the command is
completed, but continues playback right after spawning it.
To get the old behavior, use /bin/sh and -c as the first two arguments.
Example
run "/bin/sh" "-c" "echo ${title} > /tmp/playing"
This is not a particularly good example, because it doesn't handle
escaping, and a specially prepared file might allow an attacker to
execute arbitrary shell commands. It is recommended to write a small
shell script, and call that with run.
subprocess
Similar to run, but gives more control about process execution to the caller, and
does does not detach the process.
You can avoid blocking until the process terminates by running this command
asynchronously. (For example mp.command_native_async() in Lua scripting.)
This has the following named arguments. The order of them is not guaranteed, so you
should always call them with named arguments, see Named arguments.
args (MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY[MPV_FORMAT_STRING])
Array of strings with the command as first argument, and subsequent command
line arguments following. This is just like the run command argument list.
The first array entry is either an absolute path to the executable, or a
filename with no path components, in which case the executable is searched
in the directories in the PATH environment variable. On Unix, this is
equivalent to posix_spawnp and execvp behavior.
playback_only (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
Boolean indicating whether the process should be killed when playback of the
current playlist entry terminates (optional, default: true). If enabled,
stopping playback will automatically kill the process, and you can't start
it outside of playback.
capture_size (MPV_FORMAT_INT64)
Integer setting the maximum number of stdout plus stderr bytes that can be
captured (optional, default: 64MB). If the number of bytes exceeds this,
capturing is stopped. The limit is per captured stream.
capture_stdout (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
Capture all data the process outputs to stdout and return it once the
process ends (optional, default: no).
capture_stderr (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
Same as capture_stdout, but for stderr.
detach (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
Whether to run the process in detached mode (optional, default: no). In this
mode, the process is run in a new process session, and the command does not
wait for the process to terminate. If neither capture_stdout nor
capture_stderr have been set to true, the command returns immediately after
the new process has been started, otherwise the command will read as long as
the pipes are open.
env (MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY[MPV_FORMAT_STRING])
Set a list of environment variables for the new process (default: empty).
If an empty list is passed, the environment of the mpv process is used
instead. (Unlike the underlying OS mechanisms, the mpv command cannot start
a process with empty environment. Fortunately, that is completely useless.)
The format of the list is as in the execle() syscall. Each string item
defines an environment variable as in NAME=VALUE.
On Lua, you may use utils.get_env_list() to retrieve the current environment
if you e.g. simply want to add a new variable.
stdin_data (MPV_FORMAT_STRING)
Feed the given string to the new process' stdin. Since this is a string, you
cannot pass arbitrary binary data. If the process terminates or closes the
pipe before all data is written, the remaining data is silently discarded.
Probably does not work on win32.
passthrough_stdin (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
If enabled, wire the new process' stdin to mpv's stdin (default: no).
Before mpv 0.33.0, this argument did not exist, but the behavior was as if
this was set to true.
The command returns the following result (as MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP):
status (MPV_FORMAT_INT64)
Typically this is the process exit code (0 or positive) if the process
terminates normally, or negative for other errors (failed to start,
terminated by mpv, and others). The meaning of negative values is
undefined, other than meaning error (and does not correspond to OS low level
exit status values).
On Windows, it can happen that a negative return value is returned even if
the process terminates normally, because the win32 UINT exit code is
assigned to an int variable before being set as int64_t field in the result
map. This might be fixed later.
stdout (MPV_FORMAT_BYTE_ARRAY)
Captured stdout stream, limited to capture_size.
stderr (MPV_FORMAT_BYTE_ARRAY)
Same as stdout, but for stderr.
error_string (MPV_FORMAT_STRING)
Empty string if the process terminated normally. The string killed if the
process was terminated in an unusual way. The string init if the process
could not be started.
On Windows, killed is only returned when the process has been killed by mpv
as a result of playback_only being set to true.
killed_by_us (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
Whether the process has been killed by mpv, for example as a result of
playback_only being set to true, aborting the command (e.g. by
mp.abort_async_command()), or if the player is about to exit.
Note that the command itself will always return success as long as the parameters
are correct. Whether the process could be spawned or whether it was somehow killed
or returned an error status has to be queried from the result value.
This command can be asynchronously aborted via API. Also see Asynchronous command
details. Only the run command can start processes in a truly detached way.
NOTE:
The subprocess will always be terminated on player exit if it wasn't started in
detached mode, even if playback_only is false.
Warning
Don't forget to set the playback_only field to false if you want the
command to run while the player is in idle mode, or if you don't want the
end of playback to kill the command.
Example
local r = mp.command_native({
name = "subprocess",
playback_only = false,
capture_stdout = true,
args = {"cat", "/proc/cpuinfo"},
})
if r.status == 0 then
print("result: " .. r.stdout)
end
This is a fairly useless Lua example, which demonstrates how to run a process in
a blocking manner, and retrieving its stdout output.
quit [<code>]
Exit the player. If an argument is given, it's used as process exit code.
quit-watch-later [<code>]
Exit player, and store current playback position. Playing that file later will seek
to the previous position on start. The (optional) argument is exactly as in the
quit command. See RESUMING PLAYBACK.
sub-add <url> [<flags> [<title> [<lang>]]]
Load the given subtitle file or stream. By default, it is selected as current
subtitle after loading.
The flags argument is one of the following values:
<select>
Select the subtitle immediately (default).
<auto>
Don't select the subtitle. (Or in some special situations, let the default
stream selection mechanism decide.)
<cached>
Select the subtitle. If a subtitle with the same filename was already added,
that one is selected, instead of loading a duplicate entry. (In this case,
title/language are ignored, and if the was changed since it was loaded, these
changes won't be reflected.)
The title argument sets the track title in the UI.
The lang argument sets the track language, and can also influence stream selection
with flags set to auto.
sub-remove [<id>]
Remove the given subtitle track. If the id argument is missing, remove the current
track. (Works on external subtitle files only.)
sub-reload [<id>]
Reload the given subtitle tracks. If the id argument is missing, reload the current
track. (Works on external subtitle files only.)
This works by unloading and re-adding the subtitle track.
sub-step <skip> <flags>
Change subtitle timing such, that the subtitle event after the next <skip> subtitle
events is displayed. <skip> can be negative to step backwards.
Secondary argument:
primary (default)
Steps through the primary subtitles.
secondary
Steps through the secondary subtitles.
sub-seek <skip> <flags>
Seek to the next (skip set to 1) or the previous (skip set to -1) subtitle. This
is similar to sub-step, except that it seeks video and audio instead of adjusting
the subtitle delay.
Secondary argument:
primary (default)
Seeks through the primary subtitles.
secondary
Seeks through the secondary subtitles.
For embedded subtitles (like with Matroska), this works only with subtitle events
that have already been displayed, or are within a short prefetch range.
print-text <text>
Print text to stdout. The string can contain properties (see Property Expansion).
Take care to put the argument in quotes.
show-text <text> [<duration>|-1 [<level>]]
Show text on the OSD. The string can contain properties, which are expanded as
described in Property Expansion. This can be used to show playback time, filename,
and so on. no-osd has no effect on this command.
<duration>
The time in ms to show the message for. By default, it uses the same value
as --osd-duration.
<level>
The minimum OSD level to show the text at (see --osd-level).
expand-text <string>
Property-expand the argument and return the expanded string. This can be used only
through the client API or from a script using mp.command_native. (see Property
Expansion).
expand-path "<string>"
Expand a path's double-tilde placeholders into a platform-specific path. As
expand-text, this can only be used through the client API or from a script using
mp.command_native.
Example
mp.osd_message(mp.command_native({"expand-path", "~~home/"}))
This line of Lua would show the location of the user's mpv configuration
directory on the OSD.
show-progress
Show the progress bar, the elapsed time and the total duration of the file on the
OSD. no-osd has no effect on this command.
write-watch-later-config
Write the resume config file that the quit-watch-later command writes, but continue
playback normally.
delete-watch-later-config [<filename>]
Delete any existing resume config file that was written by quit-watch-later or
write-watch-later-config. If a filename is specified, then the deleted config is
for that file; otherwise, it is the same one as would be written by
quit-watch-later or write-watch-later-config in the current circumstance.
stop [<flags>]
Stop playback and clear playlist. With default settings, this is essentially like
quit. Useful for the client API: playback can be stopped without terminating the
player.
The first argument is optional, and supports the following flags:
keep-playlist
Do not clear the playlist.
mouse <x> <y> [<button> [<mode>]]
Send a mouse event with given coordinate (<x>, <y>).
Second argument:
<button>
The button number of clicked mouse button. This should be one of 0-19. If
<button> is omitted, only the position will be updated.
Third argument:
<single> (default)
The mouse event represents regular single click.
<double>
The mouse event represents double-click.
keypress <name>
Send a key event through mpv's input handler, triggering whatever behavior is
configured to that key. name uses the input.conf naming scheme for keys and
modifiers. Useful for the client API: key events can be sent to libmpv to handle
internally.
keydown <name>
Similar to keypress, but sets the KEYDOWN flag so that if the key is bound to a
repeatable command, it will be run repeatedly with mpv's key repeat timing until
the keyup command is called.
keyup [<name>]
Set the KEYUP flag, stopping any repeated behavior that had been triggered. name is
optional. If name is not given or is an empty string, KEYUP will be set on all
keys. Otherwise, KEYUP will only be set on the key specified by name.
keybind <name> <command>
Binds a key to an input command. command must be a complete command containing all
the desired arguments and flags. Both name and command use the input.conf naming
scheme. This is primarily useful for the client API.
audio-add <url> [<flags> [<title> [<lang>]]]
Load the given audio file. See sub-add command.
audio-remove [<id>]
Remove the given audio track. See sub-remove command.
audio-reload [<id>]
Reload the given audio tracks. See sub-reload command.
video-add <url> [<flags> [<title> [<lang> [<albumart>]]]]
Load the given video file. See sub-add command for common options.
albumart (MPV_FORMAT_FLAG)
If enabled, mpv will load the given video as album art.
video-remove [<id>]
Remove the given video track. See sub-remove command.
video-reload [<id>]
Reload the given video tracks. See sub-reload command.
rescan-external-files [<mode>]
Rescan external files according to the current --sub-auto, --audio-file-auto and
--cover-art-auto settings. This can be used to auto-load external files after the
file was loaded.
The mode argument is one of the following:
<reselect> (default)
Select the default audio and subtitle streams, which typically selects
external files with the highest preference. (The implementation is not
perfect, and could be improved on request.)
<keep-selection>
Do not change current track selections.
Input Commands that are Possibly Subject to Change
af <operation> <value>
Change audio filter chain. See vf command.
vf <operation> <value>
Change video filter chain.
The semantics are exactly the same as with option parsing (see VIDEO FILTERS). As
such the text below is a redundant and incomplete summary.
The first argument decides what happens:
<set> Overwrite the previous filter chain with the new one.
<add> Append the new filter chain to the previous one.
<toggle>
Check if the given filter (with the exact parameters) is already in the
video chain. If it is, remove the filter. If it isn't, add the filter. (If
several filters are passed to the command, this is done for each filter.)
A special variant is combining this with labels, and using @name without
filter name and parameters as filter entry. This toggles the enable/disable
flag.
<remove>
Like toggle, but always remove the given filter from the chain.
<clr> Remove all filters. Note that like the other sub-commands, this does not
control automatically inserted filters.
The argument is always needed. E.g. in case of clr use vf clr "".
You can assign labels to filter by prefixing them with @name: (where name is a
user-chosen arbitrary identifier). Labels can be used to refer to filters by name
in all of the filter chain modification commands. For add, using an already used
label will replace the existing filter.
The vf command shows the list of requested filters on the OSD after changing the
filter chain. This is roughly equivalent to show-text ${vf}. Note that
auto-inserted filters for format conversion are not shown on the list, only what
was requested by the user.
Normally, the commands will check whether the video chain is recreated
successfully, and will undo the operation on failure. If the command is run before
video is configured (can happen if the command is run immediately after opening a
file and before a video frame is decoded), this check can't be run. Then it can
happen that creating the video chain fails.
Example for input.conf
• a vf set vflip turn the video upside-down on the a key
• b vf set "" remove all video filters on b
• c vf toggle gradfun toggle debanding on c
Example how to toggle disabled filters at runtime
• Add something like vf-add=@deband:!gradfun to mpv.conf. The @deband: is the
label, an arbitrary, user-given name for this filter entry. The ! before the
filter name disables the filter by default. Everything after this is the
normal filter name and possibly filter parameters, like in the normal --vf
syntax.
• Add a vf toggle @deband to input.conf. This toggles the "disabled" flag for
the filter with the label deband when the a key is hit.
cycle-values [<"!reverse">] <property> <value1> [<value2> [...]]
Cycle through a list of values. Each invocation of the command will set the given
property to the next value in the list. The command will use the current value of
the property/option, and use it to determine the current position in the list of
values. Once it has found it, it will set the next value in the list (wrapping
around to the first item if needed).
This command has a variable number of arguments, and cannot be used with named
arguments.
The special argument !reverse can be used to cycle the value list in reverse. The
only advantage is that you don't need to reverse the value list yourself when
adding a second key binding for cycling backwards.
enable-section <name> [<flags>]
This command is deprecated, except for mpv-internal uses.
Enable all key bindings in the named input section.
The enabled input sections form a stack. Bindings in sections on the top of the
stack are preferred to lower sections. This command puts the section on top of the
stack. If the section was already on the stack, it is implicitly removed
beforehand. (A section cannot be on the stack more than once.)
The flags parameter can be a combination (separated by +) of the following flags:
<exclusive>
All sections enabled before the newly enabled section are disabled. They
will be re-enabled as soon as all exclusive sections above them are removed.
In other words, the new section shadows all previous sections.
<allow-hide-cursor>
This feature can't be used through the public API.
<allow-vo-dragging>
Same.
disable-section <name>
This command is deprecated, except for mpv-internal uses.
Disable the named input section. Undoes enable-section.
define-section <name> <contents> [<flags>]
This command is deprecated, except for mpv-internal uses.
Create a named input section, or replace the contents of an already existing input
section. The contents parameter uses the same syntax as the input.conf file (except
that using the section syntax in it is not allowed), including the need to separate
bindings with a newline character.
If the contents parameter is an empty string, the section is removed.
The section with the name default is the normal input section.
In general, input sections have to be enabled with the enable-section command, or
they are ignored.
The last parameter has the following meaning:
<default> (also used if parameter omitted)
Use a key binding defined by this section only if the user hasn't already
bound this key to a command.
<force>
Always bind a key. (The input section that was made active most recently
wins if there are ambiguities.)
This command can be used to dispatch arbitrary keys to a script or a client API
user. If the input section defines script-binding commands, it is also possible to
get separate events on key up/down, and relatively detailed information about the
key state. The special key name unmapped can be used to match any unmapped key.
overlay-add <id> <x> <y> <file> <offset> <fmt> <w> <h> <stride>
Add an OSD overlay sourced from raw data. This might be useful for scripts and
applications controlling mpv, and which want to display things on top of the video
window.
Overlays are usually displayed in screen resolution, but with some VOs, the
resolution is reduced to that of the video's. You can read the osd-width and
osd-height properties. At least with --vo-xv and anamorphic video (such as DVD),
osd-par should be read as well, and the overlay should be aspect-compensated.
This has the following named arguments. The order of them is not guaranteed, so you
should always call them with named arguments, see Named arguments.
id is an integer between 0 and 63 identifying the overlay element. The ID can be
used to add multiple overlay parts, update a part by using this command with an
already existing ID, or to remove a part with overlay-remove. Using a previously
unused ID will add a new overlay, while reusing an ID will update it.
x and y specify the position where the OSD should be displayed.
file specifies the file the raw image data is read from. It can be either a numeric
UNIX file descriptor prefixed with @ (e.g. @4), or a filename. The file will be
mapped into memory with mmap(), copied, and unmapped before the command returns
(changed in mpv 0.18.1).
It is also possible to pass a raw memory address for use as bitmap memory by
passing a memory address as integer prefixed with an & character. Passing the
wrong thing here will crash the player. This mode might be useful for use with
libmpv. The offset parameter is simply added to the memory address (since mpv
0.8.0, ignored before).
offset is the byte offset of the first pixel in the source file. (The current
implementation always mmap's the whole file from position 0 to the end of the
image, so large offsets should be avoided. Before mpv 0.8.0, the offset was
actually passed directly to mmap, but it was changed to make using it easier.)
fmt is a string identifying the image format. Currently, only bgra is defined. This
format has 4 bytes per pixels, with 8 bits per component. The least significant 8
bits are blue, and the most significant 8 bits are alpha (in little endian, the
components are B-G-R-A, with B as first byte). This uses premultiplied alpha: every
color component is already multiplied with the alpha component. This means the
numeric value of each component is equal to or smaller than the alpha component.
(Violating this rule will lead to different results with different VOs: numeric
overflows resulting from blending broken alpha values is considered something that
shouldn't happen, and consequently implementations don't ensure that you get
predictable behavior in this case.)
w, h, and stride specify the size of the overlay. w is the visible width of the
overlay, while stride gives the width in bytes in memory. In the simple case, and
with the bgra format, stride==4*w. In general, the total amount of memory accessed
is stride * h. (Technically, the minimum size would be stride * (h - 1) + w * 4,
but for simplicity, the player will access all stride * h bytes.)
NOTE:
Before mpv 0.18.1, you had to do manual "double buffering" when updating an
overlay by replacing it with a different memory buffer. Since mpv 0.18.1, the
memory is simply copied and doesn't reference any of the memory indicated by the
command's arguments after the command returns. If you want to use this command
before mpv 0.18.1, reads the old docs to see how to handle this correctly.
overlay-remove <id>
Remove an overlay added with overlay-add and the same ID. Does nothing if no
overlay with this ID exists.
osd-overlay
Add/update/remove an OSD overlay.
(Although this sounds similar to overlay-add, osd-overlay is for text overlays,
while overlay-add is for bitmaps. Maybe overlay-add will be merged into osd-overlay
to remove this oddity.)
You can use this to add text overlays in ASS format. ASS has advanced positioning
and rendering tags, which can be used to render almost any kind of vector graphics.
This command accepts the following parameters:
id Arbitrary integer that identifies the overlay. Multiple overlays can be
added by calling this command with different id parameters. Calling this
command with the same id replaces the previously set overlay.
There is a separate namespace for each libmpv client (i.e. IPC connection,
script), so IDs can be made up and assigned by the API user without
conflicting with other API users.
If the libmpv client is destroyed, all overlays associated with it are also
deleted. In particular, connecting via --input-ipc-server, adding an
overlay, and disconnecting will remove the overlay immediately again.
format String that gives the type of the overlay. Accepts the following values
(HTML rendering of this is broken, view the generated manpage instead, or
the raw RST source):
ass-events
The data parameter is a string. The string is split on the newline
character. Every line is turned into the Text part of a Dialogue ASS
event. Timing is unused (but behavior of timing dependent ASS tags
may change in future mpv versions).
Note that it's better to put multiple lines into data, instead of
adding multiple OSD overlays.
This provides 2 ASS Styles. OSD contains the text style as defined by
the current --osd-... options. Default is similar, and contains style
that OSD would have if all options were set to the default.
In addition, the res_x and res_y options specify the value of the ASS
PlayResX and PlayResY header fields. If res_y is set to 0, PlayResY
is initialized to an arbitrary default value (but note that the
default for this command is 720, not 0). If res_x is set to 0,
PlayResX is set based on res_y such that a virtual ASS pixel has a
square pixel aspect ratio.
none Special value that causes the overlay to be removed. Most parameters
other than id and format are mostly ignored.
data String defining the overlay contents according to the format parameter.
res_x, res_y
Used if format is set to ass-events (see description there). Optional,
defaults to 0/720.
z The Z order of the overlay. Optional, defaults to 0.
Note that Z order between different overlays of different formats is static,
and cannot be changed (currently, this means that bitmap overlays added by
overlay-add are always on top of the ASS overlays added by osd-overlay). In
addition, the builtin OSD components are always below any of the custom OSD.
(This includes subtitles of any kind as well as text rendered by show-text.)
It's possible that future mpv versions will randomly change how Z order
between different OSD formats and builtin OSD is handled.
hidden If set to true, do not display this (default: false).
compute_bounds
If set to true, attempt to determine bounds and write them to the command's
result value as x0, x1, y0, y1 rectangle (default: false). If the rectangle
is empty, not known, or somehow degenerate, it is not set. x1/y1 is the
coordinate of the bottom exclusive corner of the rectangle.
The result value may depend on the VO window size, and is based on the last
known window size at the time of the call. This means the results may be
different from what is actually rendered.
For ass-events, the result rectangle is recomputed to PlayRes coordinates
(res_x/res_y). If window size is not known, a fallback is chosen.
You should be aware that this mechanism is very inefficient, as it renders
the full result, and then uses the bounding box of the rendered bitmap list
(even if hidden is set). It will flush various caches. Its results also
depend on the used libass version.
This feature is experimental, and may change in some way again.
NOTE:
Always use named arguments (mpv_command_node()). Lua scripts should use the
mp.create_osd_overlay() helper instead of invoking this command directly.
script-message [<arg1> [<arg2> [...]]]
Send a message to all clients, and pass it the following list of arguments. What
this message means, how many arguments it takes, and what the arguments mean is
fully up to the receiver and the sender. Every client receives the message, so be
careful about name clashes (or use script-message-to).
This command has a variable number of arguments, and cannot be used with named
arguments.
script-message-to <target> [<arg1> [<arg2> [...]]]
Same as script-message, but send it only to the client named <target>. Each client
(scripts etc.) has a unique name. For example, Lua scripts can get their name via
mp.get_script_name(). Note that client names only consist of alphanumeric
characters and _.
This command has a variable number of arguments, and cannot be used with named
arguments.
script-binding <name>
Invoke a script-provided key binding. This can be used to remap key bindings
provided by external Lua scripts.
The argument is the name of the binding.
It can optionally be prefixed with the name of the script, using / as separator,
e.g. script-binding scriptname/bindingname. Note that script names only consist of
alphanumeric characters and _.
For completeness, here is how this command works internally. The details could
change any time. On any matching key event, script-message-to or script-message is
called (depending on whether the script name is included), with the following
arguments:
1. The string key-binding.
2. The name of the binding (as established above).
3. The key state as string (see below).
4. The key name (since mpv 0.15.0).
5. The text the key would produce, or empty string if not applicable.
The 5th argument is only set if no modifiers are present (using the shift key with
a letter is normally not emitted as having a modifier, and results in upper case
text instead, but some backends may mess up).
The key state consists of 2 characters:
1. One of d (key was pressed down), u (was released), r (key is still down, and was
repeated; only if key repeat is enabled for this binding), p (key was pressed;
happens if up/down can't be tracked).
2. Whether the event originates from the mouse, either m (mouse button) or -
(something else).
Future versions can add more arguments and more key state characters to support
more input peculiarities.
ab-loop
Cycle through A-B loop states. The first command will set the A point (the
ab-loop-a property); the second the B point, and the third will clear both points.
drop-buffers
Drop audio/video/demuxer buffers, and restart from fresh. Might help with
unseekable streams that are going out of sync. This command might be changed or
removed in the future.
screenshot-raw [<flags>]
Return a screenshot in memory. This can be used only through the client API. The
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP returned by this command has the w, h, stride fields set to
obvious contents. The format field is set to bgr0 by default. This format is
organized as B8G8R8X8 (where B is the LSB). The contents of the padding X are
undefined. The data field is of type MPV_FORMAT_BYTE_ARRAY with the actual image
data. The image is freed as soon as the result mpv_node is freed. As usual with
client API semantics, you are not allowed to write to the image data.
The stride is the number of bytes from a pixel at (x0, y0) to the pixel at (x0, y0
+ 1). This can be larger than w * 4 if the image was cropped, or if there is
padding. This number can be negative as well. You access a pixel with byte_index =
y * stride + x * 4 (assuming the bgr0 format).
The flags argument is like the first argument to screenshot and supports subtitles,
video, window.
vf-command <label> <command> <argument> [<target>]
Send a command to the filter. Note that currently, this only works with the lavfi
filter. Refer to the libavfilter documentation for the list of supported commands
for each filter.
<label> is a mpv filter label, use all to send it to all filters at once.
<command> and <argument> are filter-specific strings.
<target> is a filter or filter instance name and defaults to all. Note that the
target is an additional specifier for filters that support them, such as complex
lavfi filter chains.
af-command <label> <command> <argument> [<target>]
Same as vf-command, but for audio filters.
apply-profile <name> [<mode>]
Apply the contents of a named profile. This is like using profile=name in a config
file, except you can map it to a key binding to change it at runtime.
The mode argument:
default
Apply the profile. Default if the argument is omitted.
restore
Restore options set by a previous apply-profile command for this profile.
Only works if the profile has profile-restore set to a relevant mode. Prints
a warning if nothing could be done. See Runtime profiles for details.
load-script <filename>
Load a script, similar to the --script option. Whether this waits for the script to
finish initialization or not changed multiple times, and the future behavior is
left undefined.
On success, returns a mpv_node with a client_id field set to the return value of
the mpv_client_id() API call of the newly created script handle.
change-list <name> <operation> <value>
This command changes list options as described in List Options. The <name>
parameter is the normal option name, while <operation> is the suffix or action used
on the option.
Some operations take no value, but the command still requires the value parameter.
In these cases, the value must be an empty string.
Example
change-list glsl-shaders append file.glsl
Add a filename to the glsl-shaders list. The command line equivalent is
--glsl-shaders-append=file.glsl or alternatively --glsl-shader=file.glsl.
dump-cache <start> <end> <filename>
Dump the current cache to the given filename. The <filename> file is overwritten if
it already exists. <start> and <end> give the time range of what to dump. If no
data is cached at the given time range, nothing may be dumped (creating a file with
no packets).
Dumping a larger part of the cache will freeze the player. No effort was made to
fix this, as this feature was meant mostly for creating small excerpts.
See --stream-record for various caveats that mostly apply to this command too, as
both use the same underlying code for writing the output file.
If <filename> is an empty string, an ongoing dump-cache is stopped.
If <end> is no, then continuous dumping is enabled. Then, after dumping the
existing parts of the cache, anything read from network is appended to the cache as
well. This behaves similar to --stream-record (although it does not conflict with
that option, and they can be both active at the same time).
If the <end> time is after the cache, the command will _not_ wait and write newly
received data to it.
The end of the resulting file may be slightly damaged or incomplete at the end.
(Not enough effort was made to ensure that the end lines up properly.)
Note that this command will finish only once dumping ends. That means it works
similar to the screenshot command, just that it can block much longer. If
continuous dumping is used, the command will not finish until playback is stopped,
an error happens, another dump-cache command is run, or an API like
mp.abort_async_command was called to explicitly stop the command. See Synchronous
vs. Asynchronous.
NOTE:
This was mostly created for network streams. For local files, there may be much
better methods to create excerpts and such. There are tons of much more
user-friendly Lua scripts, that will re-encode parts of a file by spawning a
separate instance of ffmpeg. With network streams, this is not that easily
possible, as the stream would have to be downloaded again. Even if
--stream-record is used to record the stream to the local filesystem, there may
be problems, because the recorded file is still written to.
This command is experimental, and all details about it may change in the future.
ab-loop-dump-cache <filename>
Essentially calls dump-cache with the current AB-loop points as arguments. Like
dump-cache, this will overwrite the file at <filename>. Likewise, if the B point is
set to no, it will enter continuous dumping after the existing cache was dumped.
The author reserves the right to remove this command if enough motivation is found
to move this functionality to a trivial Lua script.
ab-loop-align-cache
Re-adjust the A/B loop points to the start and end within the cache the
ab-loop-dump-cache command will (probably) dump. Basically, it aligns the times on
keyframes. The guess might be off especially at the end (due to granularity issues
due to remuxing). If the cache shrinks in the meantime, the points set by the
command will not be the effective parameters either.
This command has an even more uncertain future than ab-loop-dump-cache and might
disappear without replacement if the author decides it's useless.
Undocumented commands: ao-reload (experimental/internal).
List of events
This is a partial list of events. This section describes what mpv_event_to_node() returns,
and which is what scripting APIs and the JSON IPC sees. Note that the C API has separate
C-level declarations with mpv_event, which may be slightly different.
Note that events are asynchronous: the player core continues running while events are
delivered to scripts and other clients. In some cases, you can use hooks to enforce
synchronous execution.
All events can have the following fields:
event Name as the event (as returned by mpv_event_name()).
id The reply_userdata field (opaque user value). If reply_userdata is 0, the field is
not added.
error Set to an error string (as returned by mpv_error_string()). This field is missing
if no error happened, or the event type does not report error. Most events leave
this unset.
This list uses the event name field value, and the C API symbol in brackets:
start-file (MPV_EVENT_START_FILE)
Happens right before a new file is loaded. When you receive this, the player is
loading the file (or possibly already done with it).
This has the following fields:
playlist_entry_id
Playlist entry ID of the file being loaded now.
end-file (MPV_EVENT_END_FILE)
Happens after a file was unloaded. Typically, the player will load the next file
right away, or quit if this was the last file.
The event has the following fields:
reason Has one of these values:
eof The file has ended. This can (but doesn't have to) include incomplete
files or broken network connections under circumstances.
stop Playback was ended by a command.
quit Playback was ended by sending the quit command.
error An error happened. In this case, an error field is present with the
error string.
redirect
Happens with playlists and similar. Details see
MPV_END_FILE_REASON_REDIRECT in the C API.
unknown
Unknown. Normally doesn't happen, unless the Lua API is out of sync
with the C API. (Likewise, it could happen that your script gets
reason strings that did not exist yet at the time your script was
written.)
playlist_entry_id
Playlist entry ID of the file that was being played or attempted to be
played. This has the same value as the playlist_entry_id field in the
corresponding start-file event.
file_error
Set to mpv error string describing the approximate reason why playback
failed. Unset if no error known. (In Lua scripting, this value was set on
the error field directly. This is deprecated since mpv 0.33.0. In the
future, this error field will be unset for this specific event.)
playlist_insert_id
If loading ended, because the playlist entry to be played was for example a
playlist, and the current playlist entry is replaced with a number of other
entries. This may happen at least with MPV_END_FILE_REASON_REDIRECT (other
event types may use this for similar but different purposes in the future).
In this case, playlist_insert_id will be set to the playlist entry ID of the
first inserted entry, and playlist_insert_num_entries to the total number of
inserted playlist entries. Note this in this specific case, the ID of the
last inserted entry is playlist_insert_id+num-1. Beware that depending on
circumstances, you may observe the new playlist entries before seeing the
event (e.g. reading the "playlist" property or getting a property change
notification before receiving the event). If this is 0 in the C API, this
field isn't added.
playlist_insert_num_entries
See playlist_insert_id. Only present if playlist_insert_id is present.
file-loaded (MPV_EVENT_FILE_LOADED)
Happens after a file was loaded and begins playback.
seek (MPV_EVENT_SEEK)
Happens on seeking. (This might include cases when the player seeks internally,
even without user interaction. This includes e.g. segment changes when playing
ordered chapters Matroska files.)
playback-restart (MPV_EVENT_PLAYBACK_RESTART)
Start of playback after seek or after file was loaded.
shutdown (MPV_EVENT_SHUTDOWN)
Sent when the player quits, and the script should terminate. Normally handled
automatically. See Details on the script initialization and lifecycle.
log-message (MPV_EVENT_LOG_MESSAGE)
Receives messages enabled with mpv_request_log_messages() (Lua:
mp.enable_messages).
This contains, in addition to the default event fields, the following fields:
prefix The module prefix, identifies the sender of the message. This is what the
terminal player puts in front of the message text when using the --v option,
and is also what is used for --msg-level.
level The log level as string. See msg.log for possible log level names. Note
that later versions of mpv might add new levels or remove (undocumented)
existing ones.
text The log message. The text will end with a newline character. Sometimes it
can contain multiple lines.
Keep in mind that these messages are meant to be hints for humans. You should not
parse them, and prefix/level/text of messages might change any time.
hook The event has the following fields:
hook_id
ID to pass to mpv_hook_continue(). The Lua scripting wrapper provides a
better API around this with mp.add_hook().
get-property-reply (MPV_EVENT_GET_PROPERTY_REPLY)
See C API.
set-property-reply (MPV_EVENT_SET_PROPERTY_REPLY)
See C API.
command-reply (MPV_EVENT_COMMAND_REPLY)
This is one of the commands for which the `error field is meaningful.
JSON IPC and Lua and possibly other backends treat this specially and may not pass
the actual event to the user. See C API.
The event has the following fields:
result The result (on success) of any mpv_node type, if any.
client-message (MPV_EVENT_CLIENT_MESSAGE)
Lua and possibly other backends treat this specially and may not pass the actual
event to the user.
The event has the following fields:
args Array of strings with the message data.
video-reconfig (MPV_EVENT_VIDEO_RECONFIG)
Happens on video output or filter reconfig.
audio-reconfig (MPV_EVENT_AUDIO_RECONFIG)
Happens on audio output or filter reconfig.
property-change (MPV_EVENT_PROPERTY_CHANGE)
Happens when a property that is being observed changes value.
The event has the following fields:
name The name of the property.
data The new value of the property.
The following events also happen, but are deprecated: idle, tick Use
mpv_observe_property() (Lua: mp.observe_property()) instead.
Hooks
Hooks are synchronous events between player core and a script or similar. This applies to
client API (including the Lua scripting interface). Normally, events are supposed to be
asynchronous, and the hook API provides an awkward and obscure way to handle events that
require stricter coordination. There are no API stability guarantees made. Not following
the protocol exactly can make the player freeze randomly. Basically, nobody should use
this API.
The C API is described in the header files. The Lua API is described in the Lua section.
Before a hook is actually invoked on an API clients, it will attempt to return new values
for all observed properties that were changed before the hook. This may make it easier for
an application to set defined "barriers" between property change notifications by
registering hooks. (That means these hooks will have an effect, even if you do nothing and
make them continue immediately.)
The following hooks are currently defined:
on_load
Called when a file is to be opened, before anything is actually done. For example,
you could read and write the stream-open-filename property to redirect an URL to
something else (consider support for streaming sites which rarely give the user a
direct media URL), or you could set per-file options with by setting the property
file-local-options/<option name>. The player will wait until all hooks are run.
Ordered after start-file and before playback-restart.
on_load_fail
Called after after a file has been opened, but failed to. This can be used to
provide a fallback in case native demuxers failed to recognize the file, instead of
always running before the native demuxers like on_load. Demux will only be retried
if stream-open-filename was changed. If it fails again, this hook is _not_ called
again, and loading definitely fails.
Ordered after on_load, and before playback-restart and end-file.
on_preloaded
Called after a file has been opened, and before tracks are selected and decoders
are created. This has some usefulness if an API users wants to select tracks
manually, based on the set of available tracks. It's also useful to initialize
--lavfi-complex in a specific way by API, without having to "probe" the available
streams at first.
Note that this does not yet apply default track selection. Which operations exactly
can be done and not be done, and what information is available and what is not yet
available yet, is all subject to change.
Ordered after on_load_fail etc. and before playback-restart.
on_unload
Run before closing a file, and before actually uninitializing everything. It's not
possible to resume playback in this state.
Ordered before end-file. Will also happen in the error case (then after
on_load_fail).
on_before_start_file
Run before a start-file event is sent. (If any client changes the current playlist
entry, or sends a quit command to the player, the corresponding event will not
actually happen after the hook returns.) Useful to drain property changes before a
new file is loaded.
on_after_end_file
Run after an end-file event. Useful to drain property changes after a file has
finished.
Input Command Prefixes
These prefixes are placed between key name and the actual command. Multiple prefixes can
be specified. They are separated by whitespace.
osd-auto
Use the default behavior for this command. This is the default for input.conf
commands. Some libmpv/scripting/IPC APIs do not use this as default, but use no-osd
instead.
no-osd Do not use any OSD for this command.
osd-bar
If possible, show a bar with this command. Seek commands will show the progress
bar, property changing commands may show the newly set value.
osd-msg
If possible, show an OSD message with this command. Seek command show the current
playback time, property changing commands show the newly set value as text.
osd-msg-bar
Combine osd-bar and osd-msg.
raw Do not expand properties in string arguments. (Like "${property-name}".) This is
the default for some libmpv/scripting/IPC APIs.
expand-properties
All string arguments are expanded as described in Property Expansion. This is the
default for input.conf commands.
repeatable
For some commands, keeping a key pressed doesn't run the command repeatedly. This
prefix forces enabling key repeat in any case. For a list of commands: the first
command determines the repeatability of the whole list (up to and including version
0.33 - a list was always repeatable).
async Allow asynchronous execution (if possible). Note that only a few commands will
support this (usually this is explicitly documented). Some commands are
asynchronous by default (or rather, their effects might manifest after completion
of the command). The semantics of this flag might change in the future. Set it only
if you don't rely on the effects of this command being fully realized when it
returns. See Synchronous vs. Asynchronous.
sync Allow synchronous execution (if possible). Normally, all commands are synchronous
by default, but some are asynchronous by default for compatibility with older
behavior.
All of the osd prefixes are still overridden by the global --osd-level settings.
Synchronous vs. Asynchronous
The async and sync prefix matter only for how the issuer of the command waits on the
completion of the command. Normally it does not affect how the command behaves by itself.
There are the following cases:
• Normal input.conf commands are always run asynchronously. Slow running commands are
queued up or run in parallel.
• "Multi" input.conf commands (1 key binding, concatenated with ;) will be executed in
order, except for commands that are async (either prefixed with async, or async by
default for some commands). The async commands are run in a detached manner, possibly in
parallel to the remaining sync commands in the list.
• Normal Lua and libmpv commands (e.g. mpv_command()) are run in a blocking manner, unless
the async prefix is used, or the command is async by default. This means in the sync
case the caller will block, even if the core continues playback. Async mode runs the
command in a detached manner.
• Async libmpv command API (e.g. mpv_command_async()) never blocks the caller, and always
notify their completion with a message. The sync and async prefixes make no difference.
• Lua also provides APIs for running async commands, which behave similar to the C
counterparts.
• In all cases, async mode can still run commands in a synchronous manner, even in
detached mode. This can for example happen in cases when a command does not have an
asynchronous implementation. The async libmpv API still never blocks the caller in these
cases.
Before mpv 0.29.0, the async prefix was only used by screenshot commands, and made them
run the file saving code in a detached manner. This is the default now, and async changes
behavior only in the ways mentioned above.
Currently the following commands have different waiting characteristics with sync vs.
async: sub-add, audio-add, sub-reload, audio-reload, rescan-external-files, screenshot,
screenshot-to-file, dump-cache, ab-loop-dump-cache.
Asynchronous command details
On the API level, every asynchronous command is bound to the context which started it. For
example, an asynchronous command started by mpv_command_async is bound to the mpv_handle
passed to the function. Only this mpv_handle receives the completion notification
(MPV_EVENT_COMMAND_REPLY), and only this handle can abort a still running command
directly. If the mpv_handle is destroyed, any still running async. commands started by it
are terminated.
The scripting APIs and JSON IPC give each script/connection its own implicit mpv_handle.
If the player is closed, the core may abort all pending async. commands on its own (like a
forced mpv_abort_async_command() call for each pending command on behalf of the API user).
This happens at the same time MPV_EVENT_SHUTDOWN is sent, and there is no way to prevent
this.
Input Sections
Input sections group a set of bindings, and enable or disable them at once. In
input.conf, each key binding is assigned to an input section, rather than actually having
explicit text sections.
See also: enable-section and disable-section commands.
Predefined bindings:
default
Bindings without input section are implicitly assigned to this section. It is
enabled by default during normal playback.
encode Section which is active in encoding mode. It is enabled exclusively, so that
bindings in the default sections are ignored.
Properties
Properties are used to set mpv options during runtime, or to query arbitrary information.
They can be manipulated with the set/add/cycle commands, and retrieved with show-text, or
anything else that uses property expansion. (See Property Expansion.)
The property name is annotated with RW to indicate whether the property is generally
writable.
If an option is referenced, the property will normally take/return exactly the same values
as the option. In these cases, properties are merely a way to change an option at runtime.
Property list
NOTE:
Most options can be set at runtime via properties as well. Just remove the leading --
from the option name. These are not documented below, see OPTIONS instead. Only
properties which do not exist as option with the same name, or which have very
different behavior from the options are documented below.
Properties marked as (RW) are writeable, while those that aren't are read-only.
audio-speed-correction, video-speed-correction
Factor multiplied with speed at which the player attempts to play the file. Usually
it's exactly 1. (Display sync mode will make this useful.)
OSD formatting will display it in the form of +1.23456%, with the number being (raw
- 1) * 100 for the given raw property value.
display-sync-active
Whether --video-sync=display is actually active.
filename
Currently played file, with path stripped. If this is an URL, try to undo percent
encoding as well. (The result is not necessarily correct, but looks better for
display purposes. Use the path property to get an unmodified filename.)
This has a sub-property:
filename/no-ext
Like the filename property, but if the text contains a ., strip all text
after the last .. Usually this removes the file extension.
file-size
Length in bytes of the source file/stream. (This is the same as ${stream-end}. For
segmented/multi-part files, this will return the size of the main or manifest file,
whatever it is.)
estimated-frame-count
Total number of frames in current file.
NOTE:
This is only an estimate. (It's computed from two unreliable quantities: fps and
stream length.)
estimated-frame-number
Number of current frame in current stream.
NOTE:
This is only an estimate. (It's computed from two unreliable quantities: fps and
possibly rounded timestamps.)
pid Process-id of mpv.
path Full path of the currently played file. Usually this is exactly the same string you
pass on the mpv command line or the loadfile command, even if it's a relative path.
If you expect an absolute path, you will have to determine it yourself, for example
by using the working-directory property.
stream-open-filename
The full path to the currently played media. This is different from path only in
special cases. In particular, if --ytdl=yes is used, and the URL is detected by
youtube-dl, then the script will set this property to the actual media URL. This
property should be set only during the on_load or on_load_fail hooks, otherwise it
will have no effect (or may do something implementation defined in the future). The
property is reset if playback of the current media ends.
media-title
If the currently played file has a title tag, use that.
Otherwise, return the filename property.
file-format
Symbolic name of the file format. In some cases, this is a comma-separated list of
format names, e.g. mp4 is mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2 (the list may grow in the future
for any format).
current-demuxer
Name of the current demuxer. (This is useless.)
(Renamed from demuxer.)
stream-path
Filename (full path) of the stream layer filename. (This is probably useless and is
almost never different from path.)
stream-pos
Raw byte position in source stream. Technically, this returns the position of the
most recent packet passed to a decoder.
stream-end
Raw end position in bytes in source stream.
duration
Duration of the current file in seconds. If the duration is unknown, the property
is unavailable. Note that the file duration is not always exactly known, so this is
an estimate.
This replaces the length property, which was deprecated after the mpv 0.9 release.
(The semantics are the same.)
This has a sub-property:
duration/full
duration with milliseconds.
avsync Last A/V synchronization difference. Unavailable if audio or video is disabled.
total-avsync-change
Total A-V sync correction done. Unavailable if audio or video is disabled.
decoder-frame-drop-count
Video frames dropped by decoder, because video is too far behind audio (when using
--framedrop=decoder). Sometimes, this may be incremented in other situations, e.g.
when video packets are damaged, or the decoder doesn't follow the usual rules.
Unavailable if video is disabled.
frame-drop-count
Frames dropped by VO (when using --framedrop=vo).
mistimed-frame-count
Number of video frames that were not timed correctly in display-sync mode for the
sake of keeping A/V sync. This does not include external circumstances, such as
video rendering being too slow or the graphics driver somehow skipping a vsync. It
does not include rounding errors either (which can happen especially with bad
source timestamps). For example, using the display-desync mode should never change
this value from 0.
vsync-ratio
For how many vsyncs a frame is displayed on average. This is available if
display-sync is active only. For 30 FPS video on a 60 Hz screen, this will be 2.
This is the moving average of what actually has been scheduled, so 24 FPS on 60 Hz
will never remain exactly on 2.5, but jitter depending on the last frame displayed.
vo-delayed-frame-count
Estimated number of frames delayed due to external circumstances in display-sync
mode. Note that in general, mpv has to guess that this is happening, and the guess
can be inaccurate.
percent-pos (RW)
Position in current file (0-100). The advantage over using this instead of
calculating it out of other properties is that it properly falls back to estimating
the playback position from the byte position, if the file duration is not known.
time-pos (RW)
Position in current file in seconds.
This has a sub-property:
time-pos/full
time-pos with milliseconds.
time-start
Deprecated. Always returns 0. Before mpv 0.14, this used to return the start time
of the file (could affect e.g. transport streams). See --rebase-start-time option.
time-remaining
Remaining length of the file in seconds. Note that the file duration is not always
exactly known, so this is an estimate.
This has a sub-property:
time-remaining/full
time-remaining with milliseconds.
audio-pts
Current audio playback position in current file in seconds. Unlike time-pos, this
updates more often than once per frame. For audio-only files, it is mostly
equivalent to time-pos, while for video-only files this property is not available.
This has a sub-property:
audio-pts/full
audio-pts with milliseconds.
playtime-remaining
time-remaining scaled by the current speed.
This has a sub-property:
playtime-remaining/full
playtime-remaining with milliseconds.
playback-time (RW)
Position in current file in seconds. Unlike time-pos, the time is clamped to the
range of the file. (Inaccurate file durations etc. could make it go out of range.
Useful on attempts to seek outside of the file, as the seek target time is
considered the current position during seeking.)
This has a sub-property:
playback-time/full
playback-time with milliseconds.
chapter (RW)
Current chapter number. The number of the first chapter is 0.
edition (RW)
Current MKV edition number. Setting this property to a different value will restart
playback. The number of the first edition is 0.
Before mpv 0.31.0, this showed the actual edition selected at runtime, if you
didn't set the option or property manually. With mpv 0.31.0 and later, this
strictly returns the user-set option or property value, and the current-edition
property was added to return the runtime selected edition (this matters with
--edition=auto, the default).
current-edition
Currently selected edition. This property is unavailable if no file is loaded, or
the file has no editions. (Matroska files make a difference between having no
editions and a single edition, which will be reflected by the property, although in
practice it does not matter.)
chapters
Number of chapters.
editions
Number of MKV editions.
edition-list
List of editions, current entry marked. Currently, the raw property value is
useless.
This has a number of sub-properties. Replace N with the 0-based edition index.
edition-list/count
Number of editions. If there are no editions, this can be 0 or 1 (1 if
there's a useless dummy edition).
edition-list/N/id (RW)
Edition ID as integer. Use this to set the edition property. Currently,
this is the same as the edition index.
edition-list/N/default
Whether this is the default edition.
edition-list/N/title
Edition title as stored in the file. Not always available.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each edition)
"id" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"title" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"default" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
metadata
Metadata key/value pairs.
If the property is accessed with Lua's mp.get_property_native, this returns a table
with metadata keys mapping to metadata values. If it is accessed with the client
API, this returns a MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP, with tag keys mapping to tag values.
For OSD, it returns a formatted list. Trying to retrieve this property as a raw
string doesn't work.
This has a number of sub-properties:
metadata/by-key/<key>
Value of metadata entry <key>.
metadata/list/count
Number of metadata entries.
metadata/list/N/key
Key name of the Nth metadata entry. (The first entry is 0).
metadata/list/N/value
Value of the Nth metadata entry.
metadata/<key>
Old version of metadata/by-key/<key>. Use is discouraged, because the
metadata key string could conflict with other sub-properties.
The layout of this property might be subject to change. Suggestions are welcome how
exactly this property should work.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
(key and string value for each metadata entry)
filtered-metadata
Like metadata, but includes only fields listed in the --display-tags option. This
is the same set of tags that is printed to the terminal.
chapter-metadata
Metadata of current chapter. Works similar to metadata property. It also allows the
same access methods (using sub-properties).
Per-chapter metadata is very rare. Usually, only the chapter name (title) is set.
For accessing other information, like chapter start, see the chapter-list property.
vf-metadata/<filter-label>
Metadata added by video filters. Accessed by the filter label, which, if not
explicitly specified using the @filter-label: syntax, will be <filter-name>NN.
Works similar to metadata property. It allows the same access methods (using
sub-properties).
An example of this kind of metadata are the cropping parameters added by
--vf=lavfi=cropdetect.
af-metadata/<filter-label>
Equivalent to vf-metadata/<filter-label>, but for audio filters.
idle-active
Returns yes/true if no file is loaded, but the player is staying around because of
the --idle option.
(Renamed from idle.)
core-idle
Whether the playback core is paused. This can differ from pause in special
situations, such as when the player pauses itself due to low network cache.
This also returns yes/true if playback is restarting or if nothing is playing at
all. In other words, it's only no/false if there's actually video playing.
(Behavior since mpv 0.7.0.)
cache-speed
Current I/O read speed between the cache and the lower layer (like network). This
gives the number bytes per seconds over a 1 second window (using the type
MPV_FORMAT_INT64 for the client API).
This is the same as demuxer-cache-state/raw-input-rate.
demuxer-cache-duration
Approximate duration of video buffered in the demuxer, in seconds. The guess is
very unreliable, and often the property will not be available at all, even if data
is buffered.
demuxer-cache-time
Approximate time of video buffered in the demuxer, in seconds. Same as
demuxer-cache-duration but returns the last timestamp of buffered data in demuxer.
demuxer-cache-idle
Whether the demuxer is idle, which means that the demuxer cache is filled to the
requested amount, and is currently not reading more data.
demuxer-cache-state
Each entry in seekable-ranges represents a region in the demuxer cache that can be
seeked to, with a start and end fields containing the respective timestamps. If
there are multiple demuxers active, this only returns information about the "main"
demuxer, but might be changed in future to return unified information about all
demuxers. The ranges are in arbitrary order. Often, ranges will overlap for a bit,
before being joined. In broken corner cases, ranges may overlap all over the
place.
The end of a seek range is usually smaller than the value returned by the
demuxer-cache-time property, because that property returns the guessed buffering
amount, while the seek ranges represent the buffered data that can actually be used
for cached seeking.
bof-cached indicates whether the seek range with the lowest timestamp points to the
beginning of the stream (BOF). This implies you cannot seek before this position at
all. eof-cached indicates whether the seek range with the highest timestamp points
to the end of the stream (EOF). If both bof-cached and eof-cached are true, and
there's only 1 cache range, the entire stream is cached.
fw-bytes is the number of bytes of packets buffered in the range starting from the
current decoding position. This is a rough estimate (may not account correctly for
various overhead), and stops at the demuxer position (it ignores seek ranges after
it).
file-cache-bytes is the number of bytes stored in the file cache. This includes all
overhead, and possibly unused data (like pruned data). This member is missing if
the file cache wasn't enabled with --cache-on-disk=yes.
cache-end is demuxer-cache-time. Missing if unavailable.
reader-pts is the approximate timestamp of the start of the buffered range. Missing
if unavailable.
cache-duration is demuxer-cache-duration. Missing if unavailable.
raw-input-rate is the estimated input rate of the network layer (or any other
byte-oriented input layer) in bytes per second. May be inaccurate or missing.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"seekable-ranges" MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"start" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"end" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"bof-cached" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"eof-cached" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"fw-bytes" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"file-cache-bytes" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"cache-end" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"reader-pts" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"cache-duration" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"raw-input-rate" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
Other fields (might be changed or removed in the future):
eof Whether the reader thread has hit the end of the file.
underrun
Whether the reader thread could not satisfy a decoder's request for a new
packet.
idle Whether the thread is currently not reading.
total-bytes
Sum of packet bytes (plus some overhead estimation) of the entire packet
queue, including cached seekable ranges.
demuxer-via-network
Whether the stream demuxed via the main demuxer is most likely played via network.
What constitutes "network" is not always clear, might be used for other types of
untrusted streams, could be wrong in certain cases, and its definition might be
changing. Also, external files (like separate audio files or streams) do not
influence the value of this property (currently).
demuxer-start-time
The start time reported by the demuxer in fractional seconds.
paused-for-cache
Whether playback is paused because of waiting for the cache.
cache-buffering-state
The percentage (0-100) of the cache fill status until the player will unpause
(related to paused-for-cache).
eof-reached
Whether the end of playback was reached. Note that this is usually interesting only
if --keep-open is enabled, since otherwise the player will immediately play the
next file (or exit or enter idle mode), and in these cases the eof-reached property
will logically be cleared immediately after it's set.
seeking
Whether the player is currently seeking, or otherwise trying to restart playback.
(It's possible that it returns yes/true while a file is loaded. This is because the
same underlying code is used for seeking and resyncing.)
mixer-active
Whether the audio mixer is active.
This option is relatively useless. Before mpv 0.18.1, it could be used to infer
behavior of the volume property.
ao-volume (RW)
System volume. This property is available only if mpv audio output is currently
active, and only if the underlying implementation supports volume control. What
this option does depends on the API. For example, on ALSA this usually changes
system-wide audio, while with PulseAudio this controls per-application volume.
ao-mute (RW)
Similar to ao-volume, but controls the mute state. May be unimplemented even if
ao-volume works.
audio-codec
Audio codec selected for decoding.
audio-codec-name
Audio codec.
audio-params
Audio format as output by the audio decoder. This has a number of sub-properties:
audio-params/format
The sample format as string. This uses the same names as used in other
places of mpv.
audio-params/samplerate
Samplerate.
audio-params/channels
The channel layout as a string. This is similar to what the --audio-channels
accepts.
audio-params/hr-channels
As channels, but instead of the possibly cryptic actual layout sent to the
audio device, return a hopefully more human readable form. (Usually only
audio-out-params/hr-channels makes sense.)
audio-params/channel-count
Number of audio channels. This is redundant to the channels field described
above.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"format" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"samplerate" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"channels" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"channel-count" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"hr-channels" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
audio-out-params
Same as audio-params, but the format of the data written to the audio API.
colormatrix
Redirects to video-params/colormatrix. This parameter (as well as similar ones) can
be overridden with the format video filter.
colormatrix-input-range
See colormatrix.
colormatrix-primaries
See colormatrix.
hwdec (RW)
Reflects the --hwdec option.
Writing to it may change the currently used hardware decoder, if possible.
(Internally, the player may reinitialize the decoder, and will perform a seek to
refresh the video properly.) You can watch the other hwdec properties to see
whether this was successful.
Unlike in mpv 0.9.x and before, this does not return the currently active hardware
decoder. Since mpv 0.18.0, hwdec-current is available for this purpose.
hwdec-current
The current hardware decoding in use. If decoding is active, return one of the
values used by the hwdec option/property. no/false indicates software decoding. If
no decoder is loaded, the property is unavailable.
hwdec-interop
This returns the currently loaded hardware decoding/output interop driver. This is
known only once the VO has opened (and possibly later). With some VOs (like gpu),
this might be never known in advance, but only when the decoder attempted to create
the hw decoder successfully. (Using --gpu-hwdec-interop can load it eagerly.) If
there are multiple drivers loaded, they will be separated by ,.
If no VO is active or no interop driver is known, this property is unavailable.
This does not necessarily use the same values as hwdec. There can be multiple
interop drivers for the same hardware decoder, depending on platform and VO.
video-format
Video format as string.
video-codec
Video codec selected for decoding.
width, height
Video size. This uses the size of the video as decoded, or if no video frame has
been decoded yet, the (possibly incorrect) container indicated size.
video-params
Video parameters, as output by the decoder (with overrides like aspect etc.
applied). This has a number of sub-properties:
video-params/pixelformat
The pixel format as string. This uses the same names as used in other places
of mpv.
video-params/hw-pixelformat
The underlying pixel format as string. This is relevant for some cases of
hardware decoding and unavailable otherwise.
video-params/average-bpp
Average bits-per-pixel as integer. Subsampled planar formats use a different
resolution, which is the reason this value can sometimes be odd or
confusing. Can be unavailable with some formats.
video-params/w, video-params/h
Video size as integers, with no aspect correction applied.
video-params/dw, video-params/dh
Video size as integers, scaled for correct aspect ratio.
video-params/crop-x, video-params/crop-y
Crop offset of the source video frame.
video-params/crop-w, video-params/crop-h
Video size after cropping.
video-params/aspect
Display aspect ratio as float.
video-params/aspect-name
Display aspect ratio name as string. The name coresponds to motion picture
film format that introduced given aspect ratio in film.
video-params/par
Pixel aspect ratio.
video-params/sar
Storage aspect ratio.
video-params/sar-name
Storage aspect ratio name as string.
video-params/colormatrix
The colormatrix in use as string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/colorlevels
The colorlevels as string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/primaries
The primaries in use as string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/gamma
The gamma function in use as string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/sig-peak (deprecated)
The video file's tagged signal peak as float.
video-params/light
The light type in use as a string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/chroma-location
Chroma location as string. (Exact values subject to change.)
video-params/rotate
Intended display rotation in degrees (clockwise).
video-params/stereo-in
Source file stereo 3D mode. (See the format video filter's stereo-in
option.)
video-params/alpha
Alpha type. If the format has no alpha channel, this will be unavailable
(but in future releases, it could change to no). If alpha is present, this
is set to straight or premul.
video-params/min-luma
Minimum luminance, as reported by HDR10 metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/max-luma
Maximum luminance, as reported by HDR10 metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/max-cll
Maximum content light level, as reported by HDR10 metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/max-fall
Maximum frame average light level, as reported by HDR10 metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/scene-max-r
MaxRGB of a scene for R component, as reported by HDR10+ metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/scene-max-g
MaxRGB of a scene for G component, as reported by HDR10+ metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/scene-max-b
MaxRGB of a scene for B component, as reported by HDR10+ metadata (in cd/m²)
video-params/max-pq-y
Maximum PQ luminance of a frame, as reported by peak detection (in PQ, 0-1)
video-params/avg-pq-y
Average PQ luminance of a frame, as reported by peak detection (in PQ, 0-1)
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"pixelformat" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"hw-pixelformat" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"w" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"h" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"dw" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"dh" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"aspect" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"par" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"colormatrix" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"colorlevels" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"primaries" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"gamma" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"sig-peak" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"light" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"chroma-location" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"rotate" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"stereo-in" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"average-bpp" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"alpha" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"min-luma" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"max-luma" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"max-cll" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"max-fall" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"scene-max-r" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"scene-max-g" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"scene-max-b" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"max-pq-y" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"avg-pq-y" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
dwidth, dheight
Video display size. This is the video size after filters and aspect scaling have
been applied. The actual video window size can still be different from this, e.g.
if the user resized the video window manually.
These have the same values as video-out-params/dw and video-out-params/dh.
video-dec-params
Exactly like video-params, but no overrides applied.
video-out-params
Same as video-params, but after video filters have been applied. If there are no
video filters in use, this will contain the same values as video-params. Note that
this is still not necessarily what the video window uses, since the user can change
the window size, and all real VOs do their own scaling independently from the
filter chain.
Has the same sub-properties as video-params.
video-frame-info
Approximate information of the current frame. Note that if any of these are used on
OSD, the information might be off by a few frames due to OSD redrawing and frame
display being somewhat disconnected, and you might have to pause and force a
redraw.
This has a number of sub-properties:
video-frame-info/picture-type
The type of the picture. It can be "I" (intra), "P" (predicted), "B" (bi-dir
predicted) or unavailable.
video-frame-info/interlaced
Whether the content of the frame is interlaced.
video-frame-info/tff
If the content is interlaced, whether the top field is displayed first.
video-frame-info/repeat
Whether the frame must be delayed when decoding.
container-fps
Container FPS. This can easily contain bogus values. For videos that use modern
container formats or video codecs, this will often be incorrect.
(Renamed from fps.)
estimated-vf-fps
Estimated/measured FPS of the video filter chain output. (If no filters are used,
this corresponds to decoder output.) This uses the average of the 10 past frame
durations to calculate the FPS. It will be inaccurate if frame-dropping is involved
(such as when framedrop is explicitly enabled, or after precise seeking). Files
with imprecise timestamps (such as Matroska) might lead to unstable results.
window-scale (RW)
Window size multiplier. Setting this will resize the video window to the values
contained in dwidth and dheight multiplied with the value set with this property.
Setting 1 will resize to original video size (or to be exact, the size the video
filters output). 2 will set the double size, 0.5 halves the size.
Note that setting a value identical to its previous value will not resize the
window. That's because this property mirrors the window-scale option, and setting
an option to its previous value is ignored. If this value is set while the window
is in a fullscreen, the multiplier is not applied until the window is taken out of
that state. Writing this property to a maximized window can unmaximize the window
depending on the OS and window manager. If the window does not unmaximize, the
multiplier will be applied if the user unmaximizes the window later.
See current-window-scale for the value derived from the actual window size.
Since mpv 0.31.0, this always returns the previously set value (or the default
value), instead of the value implied by the actual window size. Before mpv 0.31.0,
this returned what current-window-scale returns now, after the window was created.
current-window-scale (RW)
The window-scale value calculated from the current window size. This has the same
value as window-scale if the window size was not changed since setting the option,
and the window size was not restricted in other ways. If the window is
fullscreened, this will return the scale value calculated from the last
non-fullscreen size of the window. The property is unavailable if no video is
active.
When setting this property in the fullscreen or maximized state, the behavior is
the same as window-scale. In all other cases, setting the value of this property
will always resize the window. This does not affect the value of window-scale.
focused
Whether the window has focus. Might not be supported by all VOs.
display-names
Names of the displays that the mpv window covers. On X11, these are the xrandr
names (LVDS1, HDMI1, DP1, VGA1, etc.). On Windows, these are the GDI names
(\.DISPLAY1, \.DISPLAY2, etc.) and the first display in the list will be the one
that Windows considers associated with the window (as determined by the
MonitorFromWindow API.) On macOS these are the Display Product Names as used in the
System Information and only one display name is returned since a window can only be
on one screen.
display-fps
The refresh rate of the current display. Currently, this is the lowest FPS of any
display covered by the video, as retrieved by the underlying system APIs (e.g.
xrandr on X11). It is not the measured FPS. It's not necessarily available on all
platforms. Note that any of the listed facts may change any time without a warning.
estimated-display-fps
The actual rate at which display refreshes seem to occur, measured by system time.
Only available if display-sync mode (as selected by --video-sync) is active.
vsync-jitter
Estimated deviation factor of the vsync duration.
display-width, display-height
The current display's horizontal and vertical resolution in pixels. Whether or not
these values update as the mpv window changes displays depends on the windowing
backend. It may not be available on all platforms.
display-hidpi-scale
The HiDPI scale factor as reported by the windowing backend. If no VO is active, or
if the VO does not report a value, this property is unavailable. It may be saner
to report an absolute DPI, however, this is the way HiDPI support is implemented on
most OS APIs. See also --hidpi-window-scale.
osd-width, osd-height
Last known OSD width (can be 0). This is needed if you want to use the overlay-add
command. It gives you the actual OSD/window size (not including decorations drawn
by the OS window manager).
Alias to osd-dimensions/w and osd-dimensions/h.
osd-par
Last known OSD display pixel aspect (can be 0).
Alias to osd-dimensions/osd-par.
osd-dimensions
Last known OSD dimensions.
Has the following sub-properties (which can be read as MPV_FORMAT_NODE or Lua table
with mp.get_property_native):
osd-dimensions/w
Size of the VO window in OSD render units (usually pixels, but may be scaled
pixels with VOs like xv).
osd-dimensions/h
Size of the VO window in OSD render units,
osd-dimensions/par
Pixel aspect ratio of the OSD (usually 1).
osd-dimensions/aspect
Display aspect ratio of the VO window. (Computing from the properties
above.)
osd-dimensions/mt, osd-dimensions/mb, osd-dimensions/ml, osd-dimensions/mr
OSD to video margins (top, bottom, left, right). This describes the area
into which the video is rendered.
Any of these properties may be unavailable or set to dummy values if the VO window
is not created or visible.
window-id
Read-only - mpv's window id. May not always be available, i.e due to window not
being opened yet or not being supported by the VO.
mouse-pos
Read-only - last known mouse position, normalizd to OSD dimensions.
Has the following sub-properties (which can be read as MPV_FORMAT_NODE or Lua table
with mp.get_property_native):
mouse-pos/x, mouse-pos/y
Last known coordinates of the mouse pointer.
mouse-pos/hover
Boolean - whether the mouse pointer hovers the video window. The coordinates
should be ignored when this value is false, because the video backends
update them only when the pointer hovers the window.
sub-ass-extradata
The current ASS subtitle track's extradata. There is no formatting done. The
extradata is returned as a string as-is. This property is not available for non-ASS
subtitle tracks.
sub-text
The current subtitle text regardless of sub visibility. Formatting is stripped. If
the subtitle is not text-based (i.e. DVD/BD subtitles), an empty string is
returned.
sub-text-ass
Like sub-text, but return the text in ASS format. Text subtitles in other formats
are converted. For native ASS subtitles, events that do not contain any text (but
vector drawings etc.) are not filtered out. If multiple events match with the
current playback time, they are concatenated with line breaks. Contains only the
"Text" part of the events.
This property is not enough to render ASS subtitles correctly, because ASS header
and per-event metadata are not returned. You likely need to do further filtering on
the returned string to make it useful.
secondary-sub-text
Same as sub-text, but for the secondary subtitles.
sub-start
The current subtitle start time (in seconds). If there's multiple current
subtitles, returns the first start time. If no current subtitle is present null is
returned instead.
secondary-sub-start
Same as sub-start, but for the secondary subtitles.
sub-end
The current subtitle end time (in seconds). If there's multiple current subtitles,
return the last end time. If no current subtitle is present, or if it's present but
has unknown or incorrect duration, null is returned instead.
secondary-sub-end
Same as sub-end, but for the secondary subtitles.
playlist-pos (RW)
Current position on playlist. The first entry is on position 0. Writing to this
property may start playback at the new position.
In some cases, this is not necessarily the currently playing file. See explanation
of current and playing flags in playlist.
If there the playlist is empty, or if it's non-empty, but no entry is "current",
this property returns -1. Likewise, writing -1 will put the player into idle mode
(or exit playback if idle mode is not enabled). If an out of range index is written
to the property, this behaves as if writing -1. (Before mpv 0.33.0, instead of
returning -1, this property was unavailable if no playlist entry was current.)
Writing the current value back to the property will have no effect. Use
playlist-play-index to restart the playback of the current entry if desired.
playlist-pos-1 (RW)
Same as playlist-pos, but 1-based.
playlist-current-pos (RW)
Index of the "current" item on playlist. This usually, but not necessarily, the
currently playing item (see playlist-playing-pos). Depending on the exact internal
state of the player, it may refer to the playlist item to play next, or the
playlist item used to determine what to play next.
For reading, this is exactly the same as playlist-pos.
For writing, this only sets the position of the "current" item, without stopping
playback of the current file (or starting playback, if this is done in idle mode).
Use -1 to remove the current flag.
This property is only vaguely useful. If set during playback, it will typically
cause the playlist entry after it to be played next. Another possibly odd
observable state is that if playlist-next is run during playback, this property is
set to the playlist entry to play next (unlike the previous case). There is an
internal flag that decides whether the current playlist entry or the next one
should be played, and this flag is currently inaccessible for API users. (Whether
this behavior will kept is possibly subject to change.)
playlist-playing-pos
Index of the "playing" item on playlist. A playlist item is "playing" if it's being
loaded, actually playing, or being unloaded. This property is set during the
MPV_EVENT_START_FILE (start-file) and the MPV_EVENT_START_END (end-file) events.
Outside of that, it returns -1. If the playlist entry was somehow removed during
playback, but playback hasn't stopped yet, or is in progress of being stopped, it
also returns -1. (This can happen at least during state transitions.)
In the "playing" state, this is usually the same as playlist-pos, except during
state changes, or if playlist-current-pos was written explicitly.
playlist-count
Number of total playlist entries.
playlist-path
The original path of the playlist for the current entry before mpv expanded the
entries. Unavailable if the file was not originally associated with a playlist in
some way.
playlist
Playlist, current entry marked. Currently, the raw property value is useless.
This has a number of sub-properties. Replace N with the 0-based playlist entry
index.
playlist/count
Number of playlist entries (same as playlist-count).
playlist/N/filename
Filename of the Nth entry.
playlist/N/playing
yes/true if the playlist-playing-pos property points to this entry, no/false
or unavailable otherwise.
playlist/N/current
yes/true if the playlist-current-pos property points to this entry, no/false
or unavailable otherwise.
playlist/N/title
Name of the Nth entry. Available if the playlist file contains such fields
and mpv's parser supports it for the given playlist format, or if the
playlist entry has been opened before and a media-title other then then
filename has been acquired.
playlist/N/id
Unique ID for this entry. This is an automatically assigned integer ID that
is unique for the entire life time of the current mpv core instance. Other
commands, events, etc. use this as playlist_entry_id fields.
playlist/N/playlist-path
The original path of the playlist for this entry before mpv expanded it.
Unavailable if the file was not originally associated with a playlist in
some way.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each playlist entry)
"filename" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"current" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG (might be missing; since mpv 0.7.0)
"playing" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG (same)
"title" MPV_FORMAT_STRING (optional)
"id" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
track-list
List of audio/video/sub tracks, current entry marked. Currently, the raw property
value is useless.
This has a number of sub-properties. Replace N with the 0-based track index.
track-list/count
Total number of tracks.
track-list/N/id
The ID as it's used for -sid/--aid/--vid. This is unique within tracks of
the same type (sub/audio/video), but otherwise not.
track-list/N/type
String describing the media type. One of audio, video, sub.
track-list/N/src-id
Track ID as used in the source file. Not always available. (It is missing if
the format has no native ID, if the track is a pseudo-track that does not
exist in this way in the actual file, or if the format is handled by
libavformat, and the format was not whitelisted as having track IDs.)
track-list/N/title
Track title as it is stored in the file. Not always available.
track-list/N/lang
Track language as identified by the file. Not always available.
track-list/N/image
yes/true if this is a video track that consists of a single picture,
no/false or unavailable otherwise. The heuristic used to determine if a
stream is an image doesn't attempt to detect images in codecs normally used
for videos. Otherwise, it is reliable.
track-list/N/albumart
yes/true if this is an image embedded in an audio file or external cover
art, no/false or unavailable otherwise.
track-list/N/default
yes/true if the track has the default flag set in the file, no/false or
unavailable otherwise.
track-list/N/forced
yes/true if the track has the forced flag set in the file, no/false or
unavailable otherwise.
track-list/N/codec
The codec name used by this track, for example h264. Unavailable in some
rare cases.
track-list/N/external
yes/true if the track is an external file, no/false or unavailable
otherwise. This is set for separate subtitle files.
track-list/N/external-filename
The filename if the track is from an external file, unavailable otherwise.
track-list/N/selected
yes/true if the track is currently decoded, no/false or unavailable
otherwise.
track-list/N/main-selection
It indicates the selection order of tracks for the same type. If a track is
not selected, or is selected by the --lavfi-complex, it is not available.
For subtitle tracks, 0 represents the sid, and 1 represents the
secondary-sid.
track-list/N/ff-index
The stream index as usually used by the FFmpeg utilities. Note that this can
be potentially wrong if a demuxer other than libavformat (--demuxer=lavf) is
used. For mkv files, the index will usually match even if the default
(builtin) demuxer is used, but there is no hard guarantee.
track-list/N/decoder-desc
If this track is being decoded, the human-readable decoder name,
track-list/N/demux-w, track-list/N/demux-h
Video size hint as indicated by the container. (Not always accurate.)
track-list/N/demux-crop-x, track-list/N/demux-crop-y
Crop offset of the source video frame.
track-list/N/demux-crop-w, track-list/N/demux-crop-h
Video size after cropping.
track-list/N/demux-channel-count
Number of audio channels as indicated by the container. (Not always accurate
- in particular, the track could be decoded as a different number of
channels.)
track-list/N/demux-channels
Channel layout as indicated by the container. (Not always accurate.)
track-list/N/demux-samplerate
Audio sample rate as indicated by the container. (Not always accurate.)
track-list/N/demux-fps
Video FPS as indicated by the container. (Not always accurate.)
track-list/N/demux-bitrate
Audio average bitrate, in bits per second. (Not always accurate.)
track-list/N/demux-rotation
Video clockwise rotation metadata, in degrees.
track-list/N/demux-par
Pixel aspect ratio.
track-list/N/audio-channels (deprecated)
Deprecated alias for track-list/N/demux-channel-count.
track-list/N/replaygain-track-peak, track-list/N/replaygain-track-gain
Per-track replaygain values. Only available for audio tracks with
corresponding information stored in the source file.
track-list/N/replaygain-album-peak, track-list/N/replaygain-album-gain
Per-album replaygain values. If the file has per-track but no per-album
information, the per-album values will be copied from the per-track values
currently. It's possible that future mpv versions will make these properties
unavailable instead in this case.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each track)
"id" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"type" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"src-id" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"title" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"lang" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"image" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"albumart" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"default" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"forced" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"selected" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"main-selection" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"external" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG
"external-filename" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"codec" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"ff-index" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"decoder-desc" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"demux-w" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-h" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-crop-x" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-crop-y" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-crop-w" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-crop-h" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-channel-count" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-channels" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"demux-samplerate" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-fps" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"demux-bitrate" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-rotation" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"demux-par" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"audio-channels" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"replaygain-track-peak" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"replaygain-track-gain" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"replaygain-album-peak" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
"replaygain-album-gain" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
current-tracks/...
This gives access to currently selected tracks. It redirects to the correct entry
in track-list.
The following sub-entries are defined: video, audio, sub, sub2
For example, current-tracks/audio/lang returns the current audio track's language
field (the same value as track-list/N/lang).
If tracks of the requested type are selected via --lavfi-complex, the first one is
returned.
chapter-list (RW)
List of chapters, current entry marked. Currently, the raw property value is
useless.
This has a number of sub-properties. Replace N with the 0-based chapter index.
chapter-list/count
Number of chapters.
chapter-list/N/title
Chapter title as stored in the file. Not always available.
chapter-list/N/time
Chapter start time in seconds as float.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each chapter)
"title" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"time" MPV_FORMAT_DOUBLE
af, vf (RW)
See --vf/--af and the vf/af command.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each filter entry)
"name" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"label" MPV_FORMAT_STRING [optional]
"enabled" MPV_FORMAT_FLAG [optional]
"params" MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP [optional]
"key" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"value" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
It's also possible to write the property using this format.
seekable
Whether it's generally possible to seek in the current file.
partially-seekable
Whether the current file is considered seekable, but only because the cache is
active. This means small relative seeks may be fine, but larger seeks may fail
anyway. Whether a seek will succeed or not is generally not known in advance.
If this property returns yes/true, so will seekable.
playback-abort
Whether playback is stopped or is to be stopped. (Useful in obscure situations like
during on_load hook processing, when the user can stop playback, but the script has
to explicitly end processing.)
cursor-autohide (RW)
See --cursor-autohide. Setting this to a new value will always update the cursor,
and reset the internal timer.
osd-sym-cc
Inserts the current OSD symbol as opaque OSD control code (cc). This makes sense
only with the show-text command or options which set OSD messages. The control
code is implementation specific and is useless for anything else.
osd-ass-cc
${osd-ass-cc/0} disables escaping ASS sequences of text in OSD, ${osd-ass-cc/1}
enables it again. By default, ASS sequences are escaped to avoid accidental
formatting, and this property can disable this behavior. Note that the properties
return an opaque OSD control code, which only makes sense for the show-text command
or options which set OSD messages.
Example
• --osd-msg3='This is ${osd-ass-cc/0}{\\b1}bold text'
• show-text "This is ${osd-ass-cc/0}{\\b1}bold text"
Any ASS override tags as understood by libass can be used.
Note that you need to escape the \ character, because the string is processed for C
escape sequences before passing it to the OSD code. See Flat command syntax for
details.
A list of tags can be found here: https://aegisub.org/docs/latest/ass_tags/
vo-configured
Whether the VO is configured right now. Usually this corresponds to whether the
video window is visible. If the --force-window option is used, this usually always
returns yes/true.
vo-passes
Contains introspection about the VO's active render passes and their execution
times. Not implemented by all VOs.
This is further subdivided into two frame types, vo-passes/fresh for fresh frames
(which have to be uploaded, scaled, etc.) and vo-passes/redraw for redrawn frames
(which only have to be re-painted). The number of passes for any given subtype can
change from frame to frame, and should not be relied upon.
Each frame type has a number of further sub-properties. Replace TYPE with the frame
type, N with the 0-based pass index, and M with the 0-based sample index.
vo-passes/TYPE/count
Number of passes.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/desc
Human-friendy description of the pass.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/last
Last measured execution time, in nanoseconds.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/avg
Average execution time of this pass, in nanoseconds. The exact timeframe
varies, but it should generally be a handful of seconds.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/peak
The peak execution time (highest value) within this averaging range, in
nanoseconds.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/count
The number of samples for this pass.
vo-passes/TYPE/N/samples/M
The raw execution time of a specific sample for this pass, in nanoseconds.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"TYPE" MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP
"desc" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"last" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"avg" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"peak" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"count" MPV_FORMAT_INT64
"samples" MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MP_FORMAT_INT64
Note that directly accessing this structure via subkeys is not supported, the only
access is through aforementioned MPV_FORMAT_NODE.
perf-info
Further performance data. Querying this property triggers internal collection of
some data, and may slow down the player. Each query will reset some internal state.
Property change notification doesn't and won't work. All of this may change in the
future, so don't use this. The builtin stats script is supposed to be the only
user; since it's bundled and built with the source code, it can use knowledge of
mpv internal to render the information properly. See stats script description for
some details.
video-bitrate, audio-bitrate, sub-bitrate
Bitrate values calculated on the packet level. This works by dividing the bit size
of all packets between two keyframes by their presentation timestamp distance.
(This uses the timestamps are stored in the file, so e.g. playback speed does not
influence the returned values.) In particular, the video bitrate will update only
per keyframe, and show the "past" bitrate. To make the property more UI friendly,
updates to these properties are throttled in a certain way.
The unit is bits per second. OSD formatting turns these values in kilobits (or
megabits, if appropriate), which can be prevented by using the raw property value,
e.g. with ${=video-bitrate}.
Note that the accuracy of these properties is influenced by a few factors. If the
underlying demuxer rewrites the packets on demuxing (done for some file formats),
the bitrate might be slightly off. If timestamps are bad or jittery (like in
Matroska), even constant bitrate streams might show fluctuating bitrate.
How exactly these values are calculated might change in the future.
In earlier versions of mpv, these properties returned a static (but bad) guess
using a completely different method.
packet-video-bitrate, packet-audio-bitrate, packet-sub-bitrate
Old and deprecated properties for video-bitrate, audio-bitrate, sub-bitrate. They
behave exactly the same, but return a value in kilobits. Also, they don't have any
OSD formatting, though the same can be achieved with e.g. ${=video-bitrate}.
These properties shouldn't be used anymore.
audio-device-list
The list of discovered audio devices. This is mostly for use with the client API,
and reflects what --audio-device=help with the command line player returns.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each device entry)
"name" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"description" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
The name is what is to be passed to the --audio-device option (and often a rather
cryptic audio API-specific ID), while description is human readable free form text.
The description is set to the device name (minus mpv-specific <driver>/ prefix) if
no description is available or the description would have been an empty string.
The special entry with the name set to auto selects the default audio output driver
and the default device.
The property can be watched with the property observation mechanism in the client
API and in Lua scripts. (Technically, change notification is enabled the first time
this property is read.)
audio-device (RW)
Set the audio device. This directly reads/writes the --audio-device option, but on
write accesses, the audio output will be scheduled for reloading.
Writing this property while no audio output is active will not automatically enable
audio. (This is also true in the case when audio was disabled due to
reinitialization failure after a previous write access to audio-device.)
This property also doesn't tell you which audio device is actually in use.
How these details are handled may change in the future.
current-vo
Current video output driver (name as used with --vo).
current-ao
Current audio output driver (name as used with --ao).
shared-script-properties (RW)
This is a key/value map of arbitrary strings shared between scripts for general
use. The player itself does not use any data in it (although some builtin scripts
may). The property is not preserved across player restarts.
This is very primitive, inefficient, and annoying to use. It's a makeshift solution
which could go away any time (for example, when a better solution becomes
available). This is also why this property has an annoying name. You should avoid
using it, unless you absolutely have to.
Lua scripting has helpers starting with utils.shared_script_property_. They are
undocumented because you should not use this property. If you still think you must,
you should use the helpers instead of the property directly.
You are supposed to use the change-list command to modify the contents. Reading,
modifying, and writing the property manually could data loss if two scripts update
different keys at the same time due to lack of synchronization. The Lua helpers
take care of this.
(There is no way to ensure synchronization if two scripts try to update the same
key at the same time.)
user-data (RW)
This is a recursive key/value map of arbitrary nodes shared between clients for
general use (i.e. scripts, IPC clients, host applications, etc). The player itself
does not use any data in it (although some builtin scripts may). The property is
not preserved across player restarts.
This is a more powerful replacement for shared-script-properties.
Sub-paths can be accessed directly; e.g. user-data/my-script/state/a can be read,
written, or observed.
The top-level object itself cannot be written directly; write to sub-paths instead.
Converting this property or its sub-properties to strings will give a JSON
representation. If converting a leaf-level object (i.e. not a map or array) and not
using raw mode, the underlying content will be given (e.g. strings will be printed
directly, rather than quoted and JSON-escaped).
working-directory
The working directory of the mpv process. Can be useful for JSON IPC users, because
the command line player usually works with relative paths.
protocol-list
List of protocol prefixes potentially recognized by the player. They are returned
without trailing :// suffix (which is still always required). In some cases, the
protocol will not actually be supported (consider https if ffmpeg is not compiled
with TLS support).
decoder-list
List of decoders supported. This lists decoders which can be passed to --vd and
--ad.
codec Canonical codec name, which identifies the format the decoder can handle.
driver The name of the decoder itself. Often, this is the same as codec. Sometimes
it can be different. It is used to distinguish multiple decoders for the
same codec.
description
Human readable description of the decoder and codec.
When querying the property with the client API using MPV_FORMAT_NODE, or with Lua
mp.get_property_native, this will return a mpv_node with the following contents:
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_ARRAY
MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP (for each decoder entry)
"codec" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"driver" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
"description" MPV_FORMAT_STRING
encoder-list
List of libavcodec encoders. This has the same format as decoder-list. The encoder
names (driver entries) can be passed to --ovc and --oac (without the lavc: prefix
required by --vd and --ad).
demuxer-lavf-list
List of available libavformat demuxers' names. This can be used to check for
support for a specific format or use with --demuxer-lavf-format.
input-key-list
List of Key names, same as output by --input-keylist.
mpv-version
The mpv version/copyright string. Depending on how the binary was built, it might
contain either a release version, or just a git hash.
mpv-configuration
The configuration arguments that were passed to the build system. If the meson
version used to compile mpv is older than 1.1.0, then a hardcoded string of a few,
arbitrary options is displayed instead.
ffmpeg-version
The contents of the av_version_info() API call. This is a string which identifies
the build in some way, either through a release version number, or a git hash. This
applies to Libav as well (the property is still named the same.) This property is
unavailable if mpv is linked against older FFmpeg and Libav versions.
libass-version
The value of ass_library_version(). This is an integer, encoded in a somewhat weird
form (apparently "hex BCD"), indicating the release version of the libass library
linked to mpv.
platform
Returns a string describing what target platform mpv was built for. The value of
this is dependent on what the underlying build system detects. Some of the most
common values are: windows, darwin (macos or ios), linux, android, and freebsd.
Note that this is not a complete listing.
options/<name> (RW)
The value of option --<name>. Most options can be changed at runtime by writing to
this property. Note that many options require reloading the file for changes to
take effect. If there is an equivalent property, prefer setting the property
instead.
There shouldn't be any reason to access options/<name> instead of <name>, except in
situations in which the properties have different behavior or conflicting
semantics.
file-local-options/<name> (RW)
Similar to options/<name>, but when setting an option through this property, the
option is reset to its old value once the current file has stopped playing. Trying
to write an option while no file is playing (or is being loaded) results in an
error.
(Note that if an option is marked as file-local, even options/ will access the
local value, and the old value, which will be restored on end of playback, cannot
be read or written until end of playback.)
option-info/<name>
Additional per-option information.
This has a number of sub-properties. Replace <name> with the name of a top-level
option. No guarantee of stability is given to any of these sub-properties - they
may change radically in the feature.
option-info/<name>/name
The name of the option.
option-info/<name>/type
The name of the option type, like String or Integer. For many complex types,
this isn't very accurate.
option-info/<name>/set-from-commandline
Whether the option was set from the mpv command line. What this is set to if
the option is e.g. changed at runtime is left undefined (meaning it could
change in the future).
option-info/<name>/set-locally
Whether the option was set per-file. This is the case with automatically
loaded profiles, file-dir configs, and other cases. It means the option
value will be restored to the value before playback start when playback
ends.
option-info/<name>/default-value
The default value of the option. May not always be available.
option-info/<name>/min, option-info/<name>/max
Integer minimum and maximum values allowed for the option. Only available if
the options are numeric, and the minimum/maximum has been set internally.
It's also possible that only one of these is set.
option-info/<name>/choices
If the option is a choice option, the possible choices. Choices that are
integers may or may not be included (they can be implied by min and max).
Note that options which behave like choice options, but are not actual
choice options internally, may not have this info available.
property-list
The list of top-level properties.
profile-list
The list of profiles and their contents. This is highly implementation-specific,
and may change any time. Currently, it returns an array of options for each
profile. Each option has a name and a value, with the value currently always being
a string. Note that the options array is not a map, as order matters and duplicate
entries are possible. Recursive profiles are not expanded, and show up as special
profile options.
The profile-restore field is currently missing if it holds the default value
(either because it was not set, or set explicitly to default), but in the future it
might hold the value default.
command-list
The list of input commands. This returns an array of maps, where each map node
represents a command. This map currently only has a single entry: name for the name
of the command. (This property is supposed to be a replacement for --input-cmdlist.
The option dumps some more information, but it's a valid feature request to extend
this property if needed.)
input-bindings
The list of current input key bindings. This returns an array of maps, where each
map node represents a binding for a single key/command. This map has the following
entries:
key The key name. This is normalized and may look slightly different from how it
was specified in the source (e.g. in input.conf).
cmd The command mapped to the key. (Currently, this is exactly the same string
as specified in the source, other than stripping whitespace and comments.
It's possible that it will be normalized in the future.)
is_weak
If set to true, any existing and active user bindings will take priority.
owner If this entry exists, the name of the script (or similar) which added this
binding.
section
Name of the section this binding is part of. This is a rarely used
mechanism. This entry may be removed or change meaning in the future.
priority
A number. Bindings with a higher value are preferred over bindings with a
lower value. If the value is negative, this binding is inactive and will not
be triggered by input. Note that mpv does not use this value internally, and
matching of bindings may work slightly differently in some cases. In
addition, this value is dynamic and can change around at runtime.
comment
If available, the comment following the command on the same line. (For
example, the input.conf entry f cycle bla # toggle bla would result in an
entry with comment = "toggle bla", cmd = "cycle bla".)
This property is read-only, and change notification is not supported. Currently,
there is no mechanism to change key bindings at runtime, other than scripts adding
or removing their own bindings.
Inconsistencies between options and properties
You can access (almost) all options as properties, though there are some caveats with some
properties (due to historical reasons):
vid, aid, sid
While playback is active, these return the actually active tracks. For example, if
you set aid=5, and the currently played file contains no audio track with ID 5, the
aid property will return no.
Before mpv 0.31.0, you could set existing tracks at runtime only.
display-fps
This inconsistent behavior is deprecated. Post-deprecation, the reported value and
the option value are cleanly separated (override-display-fps for the option value).
vf, af If you set the properties during playback, and the filter chain fails to
reinitialize, the option will be set, but the runtime filter chain does not change.
On the other hand, the next video to be played will fail, because the initial
filter chain cannot be created.
This behavior changed in mpv 0.31.0. Before this, the new value was rejected iff a
video (for vf) or an audio (for af) track was active. If playback was not active,
the behavior was the same as the current one.
playlist
The property is read-only and returns the current internal playlist. The option is
for loading playlist during command line parsing. For client API uses, you should
use the loadlist command instead.
profile, include
These are write-only, and will perform actions as they are written to, exactly as
if they were used on the mpv CLI commandline. Their only use is when using libmpv
before mpv_initialize(), which in turn is probably only useful in encoding mode.
Normal libmpv users should use other mechanisms, such as the apply-profile command,
and the mpv_load_config_file API function. Avoid these properties.
Property Expansion
All string arguments to input commands as well as certain options (like
--term-playing-msg) are subject to property expansion. Note that property expansion does
not work in places where e.g. numeric parameters are expected. (For example, the add
command does not do property expansion. The set command is an exception and not a general
rule.)
Example for input.conf
i show-text "Filename: ${filename}"
shows the filename of the current file when pressing the i key
Whether property expansion is enabled by default depends on which API is used (see Flat
command syntax, Commands specified as arrays and Named arguments), but it can always be
enabled with the expand-properties prefix or disabled with the raw prefix, as described in
Input Command Prefixes.
The following expansions are supported:
${NAME}
Expands to the value of the property NAME. If retrieving the property fails, expand
to an error string. (Use ${NAME:} with a trailing : to expand to an empty string
instead.) If NAME is prefixed with =, expand to the raw value of the property (see
section below).
${NAME:STR}
Expands to the value of the property NAME, or STR if the property cannot be
retrieved. STR is expanded recursively.
${?NAME:STR}
Expands to STR (recursively) if the property NAME is available.
${!NAME:STR}
Expands to STR (recursively) if the property NAME cannot be retrieved.
${?NAME==VALUE:STR}
Expands to STR (recursively) if the property NAME expands to a string equal to
VALUE. You can prefix NAME with = in order to compare the raw value of a property
(see section below). If the property is unavailable, or other errors happen when
retrieving it, the value is never considered equal. Note that VALUE can't contain
any of the characters : or }. Also, it is possible that escaping with " or % might
be added in the future, should the need arise.
${!NAME==VALUE:STR}
Same as with the ? variant, but STR is expanded if the value is not equal. (Using
the same semantics as with ?.)
$$ Expands to $.
$} Expands to }. (To produce this character inside recursive expansion.)
$> Disable property expansion and special handling of $ for the rest of the string.
In places where property expansion is allowed, C-style escapes are often accepted as well.
Example:
• \n becomes a newline character
• \\ expands to \
Raw and Formatted Properties
Normally, properties are formatted as human-readable text, meant to be displayed on OSD or
on the terminal. It is possible to retrieve an unformatted (raw) value from a property by
prefixing its name with =. These raw values can be parsed by other programs and follow the
same conventions as the options associated with the properties.
Examples
• ${time-pos} expands to 00:14:23 (if playback position is at 14 minutes 23 seconds)
• ${=time-pos} expands to 863.4 (same time, plus 400 milliseconds - milliseconds are
normally not shown in the formatted case)
Sometimes, the difference in amount of information carried by raw and formatted property
values can be rather big. In some cases, raw values have more information, like higher
precision than seconds with time-pos. Sometimes it is the other way around, e.g. aid shows
track title and language in the formatted case, but only the track number if it is raw.
ON SCREEN CONTROLLER
The On Screen Controller (short: OSC) is a minimal GUI integrated with mpv to offer basic
mouse-controllability. It is intended to make interaction easier for new users and to
enable precise and direct seeking.
The OSC is enabled by default if mpv was compiled with Lua support. It can be disabled
entirely using the --osc=no option.
Using the OSC
By default, the OSC will show up whenever the mouse is moved inside the player window and
will hide if the mouse is not moved outside the OSC for 0.5 seconds or if the mouse leaves
the window.
The Interface
+---------+----------+------------------------------------------+----------+
| pl prev | pl next | title | cache |
+------+--+---+------+---------+-----------+------+-------+-----+-----+----+
| play | skip | skip | time | seekbar | time | audio | sub | vol | fs |
| | back | frwd | elapsed | | left | | | | |
+------+------+------+---------+-----------+------+-------+-----+-----+----+
pl prev
┌──────────────┬────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ play previous file in playlist │
├──────────────┼────────────────────────────────┤
│right-click │ show playlist │
├──────────────┼────────────────────────────────┤
│shift+L-click │ show playlist │
└──────────────┴────────────────────────────────┘
pl next
┌──────────────┬────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ play next file in playlist │
├──────────────┼────────────────────────────┤
│right-click │ show playlist │
├──────────────┼────────────────────────────┤
│shift+L-click │ show playlist │
└──────────────┴────────────────────────────┘
title
Displays current media-title, filename, custom title, or target chapter
name while hovering the seekbar.
┌────────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ show playlist position and │
│ │ length and full title │
├────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│right-click │ show filename │
└────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
cache
Shows current cache fill status
play
┌───────────┬───────────────────┐
│left-click │ toggle play/pause │
└───────────┴───────────────────┘
skip back
┌──────────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ go to beginning of chapter / │
│ │ previous chapter │
├──────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│right-click │ show chapters │
├──────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│shift+L-click │ show chapters │
└──────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
skip frwd
┌──────────────┬────────────────────┐
│left-click │ go to next chapter │
├──────────────┼────────────────────┤
│right-click │ show chapters │
├──────────────┼────────────────────┤
│shift+L-click │ show chapters │
└──────────────┴────────────────────┘
time elapsed
Shows current playback position timestamp
┌───────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ toggle displaying timecodes with │
│ │ milliseconds │
└───────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
seekbar
Indicates current playback position and position of chapters
┌────────────┬───────────────────────┐
│left-click │ seek to position │
├────────────┼───────────────────────┤
│mouse wheel │ seek forward/backward │
└────────────┴───────────────────────┘
time left
Shows remaining playback time timestamp
┌───────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ toggle between total and │
│ │ remaining time │
└───────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
audio and sub
Displays selected track and amount of available tracks
┌──────────────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│left-click │ cycle audio/sub tracks forward │
├──────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│right-click │ cycle audio/sub tracks backwards │
├──────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│shift+L-click │ show available audio/sub tracks │
├──────────────┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│mouse wheel │ cycle audio/sub tracks │
│ │ forward/backwards │
└──────────────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
vol
┌────────────┬────────────────┐
│left-click │ toggle mute │
├────────────┼────────────────┤
│mouse wheel │ volume up/down │
└────────────┴────────────────┘
fs
┌───────────┬───────────────────┐
│left-click │ toggle fullscreen │
└───────────┴───────────────────┘
Key Bindings
These key bindings are active by default if nothing else is already bound to these keys.
In case of collision, the function needs to be bound to a different key. See the Script
Commands section.
┌────┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│del │ Cycles visibility between never │
│ │ / auto (mouse-move) / always │
└────┴──────────────────────────────────┘
Configuration
The OSC offers limited configuration through a config file script-opts/osc.conf placed in
mpv's user dir and through the --script-opts command-line option. Options provided through
the command-line will override those from the config file.
Config Syntax
The config file must exactly follow the following syntax:
# this is a comment
optionA=value1
optionB=value2
# can only be used at the beginning of a line and there may be no spaces around the = or
anywhere else.
Command-line Syntax
To avoid collisions with other scripts, all options need to be prefixed with osc-.
Example:
--script-opts=osc-optionA=value1,osc-optionB=value2
Configurable Options
layout Default: bottombar
The layout for the OSC. Currently available are: box, slimbox, bottombar and
topbar. Default pre-0.21.0 was 'box'.
seekbarstyle
Default: bar
Sets the style of the playback position marker and overall shape of the seekbar:
bar, diamond or knob.
seekbarhandlesize
Default: 0.6
Size ratio of the seek handle if seekbarstyle is set to diamond or knob. This is
relative to the full height of the seekbar.
seekbarkeyframes
Default: yes
Controls the mode used to seek when dragging the seekbar. If set to yes, default
seeking mode is used (usually keyframes, but player defaults and heuristics can
change it to exact). If set to no, exact seeking on mouse drags will be used
instead. Keyframes are preferred, but exact seeks may be useful in cases where
keyframes cannot be found. Note that using exact seeks can potentially make mouse
dragging much slower.
seekrangestyle
Default: inverted
Display seekable ranges on the seekbar. bar shows them on the full height of the
bar, line as a thick line and inverted as a thin line that is inverted over
playback position markers. none will hide them. Additionally, slider will show a
permanent handle inside the seekbar with cached ranges marked inside. Note that
these will look differently based on the seekbarstyle option. Also, slider does not
work with seekbarstyle set to bar.
seekrangeseparate
Default: yes
Controls whether to show line-style seekable ranges on top of the seekbar or
separately if seekbarstyle is set to bar.
seekrangealpha
Default: 200
Alpha of the seekable ranges, 0 (opaque) to 255 (fully transparent).
deadzonesize
Default: 0.5
Size of the deadzone. The deadzone is an area that makes the mouse act like leaving
the window. Movement there won't make the OSC show up and it will hide immediately
if the mouse enters it. The deadzone starts at the window border opposite to the
OSC and the size controls how much of the window it will span. Values between 0.0
and 1.0, where 0 means the OSC will always popup with mouse movement in the window,
and 1 means the OSC will only show up when the mouse hovers it. Default pre-0.21.0
was 0.
minmousemove
Default: 0
Minimum amount of pixels the mouse has to move between ticks to make the OSC show
up. Default pre-0.21.0 was 3.
showwindowed
Default: yes
Enable the OSC when windowed
showfullscreen
Default: yes
Enable the OSC when fullscreen
idlescreen
Default: yes
Show the mpv logo and message when idle
scalewindowed
Default: 1.0
Scale factor of the OSC when windowed.
scalefullscreen
Default: 1.0
Scale factor of the OSC when fullscreen
scaleforcedwindow
Default: 2.0
Scale factor of the OSC when rendered on a forced (dummy) window
vidscale
Default: yes
Scale the OSC with the video no tries to keep the OSC size constant as much as the
window size allows
valign Default: 0.8
Vertical alignment, -1 (top) to 1 (bottom)
halign Default: 0.0
Horizontal alignment, -1 (left) to 1 (right)
barmargin
Default: 0
Margin from bottom (bottombar) or top (topbar), in pixels
boxalpha
Default: 80
Alpha of the background box, 0 (opaque) to 255 (fully transparent)
hidetimeout
Default: 500
Duration in ms until the OSC hides if no mouse movement, must not be negative
fadeduration
Default: 200
Duration of fade out in ms, 0 = no fade
title Default: ${media-title}
String that supports property expansion that will be displayed as OSC title. ASS
tags are escaped, and newlines and trailing slashes are stripped.
tooltipborder
Default: 1
Size of the tooltip outline when using bottombar or topbar layouts
timetotal
Default: no
Show total time instead of time remaining
remaining_playtime
Default: yes
Whether the time-remaining display takes speed into account. yes - how much
playback time remains at the current speed. no - how much video-time remains.
timems Default: no
Display timecodes with milliseconds
tcspace
Default: 100 (allowed: 50-200)
Adjust space reserved for timecodes (current time and time remaining) in the
bottombar and topbar layouts. The timecode width depends on the font, and with some
fonts the spacing near the timecodes becomes too small. Use values above 100 to
increase that spacing, or below 100 to decrease it.
visibility
Default: auto (auto hide/show on mouse move)
Also supports never and always
boxmaxchars
Default: 80
Max chars for the osc title at the box layout. mpv does not measure the text width
on screen and so it needs to limit it by number of chars. The default is
conservative to allow wide fonts to be used without overflow. However, with many
common fonts a bigger number can be used. YMMV.
boxvideo
Default: no
Whether to overlay the osc over the video (no), or to box the video within the
areas not covered by the osc (yes). If this option is set, the osc may overwrite
the --video-margin-ratio-* options, even if the user has set them. (It will not
overwrite them if all of them are set to default values.) Additionally, visibility
must be set to always. Otherwise, this option does nothing.
Currently, this is supported for the bottombar and topbar layout only. The other
layouts do not change if this option is set. Separately, if window controls are
present (see below), they will be affected regardless of which osc layout is in
use.
The border is static and appears even if the OSC is configured to appear only on
mouse interaction. If the OSC is invisible, the border is simply filled with the
background color (black by default).
This currently still makes the OSC overlap with subtitles (if the --sub-use-margins
option is set to yes, the default). This may be fixed later.
This does not work correctly with video outputs like --vo=xv, which render OSD into
the unscaled video.
windowcontrols
Default: auto (Show window controls if there is no window border)
Whether to show window management controls over the video, and if so, which side of
the window to place them. This may be desirable when the window has no decorations,
either because they have been explicitly disabled (border=no) or because the
current platform doesn't support them (eg: gnome-shell with wayland).
The set of window controls is fixed, offering minimize, maximize, and quit. Not all
platforms implement minimize and maximize, but quit will always work.
windowcontrols_alignment
Default: right
If window controls are shown, indicates which side should they be aligned to.
Supports left and right which will place the controls on those respective sides.
greenandgrumpy
Default: no
Set to yes to reduce festivity (i.e. disable santa hat in December.)
livemarkers
Default: yes
Update chapter markers positions on duration changes, e.g. live streams. The
updates are unoptimized - consider disabling it on very low-end systems.
chapters_osd, playlist_osd
Default: yes
Whether to display the chapters/playlist at the OSD when left-clicking the
next/previous OSC buttons, respectively.
chapter_fmt
Default: Chapter: %s
Template for the chapter-name display when hovering the seekbar. Use no to disable
chapter display on hover. Otherwise it's a lua string.format template and %s is
replaced with the actual name.
unicodeminus
Default: no
Use a Unicode minus sign instead of an ASCII hyphen when displaying the remaining
playback time.
Script Commands
The OSC script listens to certain script commands. These commands can bound in input.conf,
or sent by other scripts.
osc-message
Show a message on screen using the OSC. First argument is the message, second the
duration in seconds.
osc-visibility
Controls visibility mode never / auto (on mouse move) / always and also cycle to
cycle between the modes
Example
You could put this into input.conf to hide the OSC with the a key and to set auto mode
(the default) with b:
a script-message osc-visibility never
b script-message osc-visibility auto
osc-idlescreen
Controls the visibility of the mpv logo on idle. Valid arguments are yes, no, and
cycle to toggle between yes and no.
osc-playlist, osc-chapterlist, osc-tracklist
Shows a limited view of the respective type of list using the OSC. First argument
is duration in seconds.
STATS
This builtin script displays information and statistics for the currently played file. It
is enabled by default if mpv was compiled with Lua support. It can be disabled entirely
using the --load-stats-overlay=no option.
Usage
The following key bindings are active by default unless something else is already bound to
them:
┌──┬──────────────────────────────────┐
│i │ Show stats for a fixed duration │
├──┼──────────────────────────────────┤
│I │ Toggle stats (shown until │
│ │ toggled again) │
└──┴──────────────────────────────────┘
While the stats are visible on screen the following key bindings are active, regardless of
existing bindings. They allow you to switch between pages of stats:
┌──┬──────────────────────────────┐
│1 │ Show usual stats │
├──┼──────────────────────────────┤
│2 │ Show frame timings (scroll) │
├──┼──────────────────────────────┤
│3 │ Input cache stats │
├──┼──────────────────────────────┤
│4 │ Active key bindings (scroll) │
├──┼──────────────────────────────┤
│0 │ Internal stuff (scroll) │
└──┴──────────────────────────────┘
On pages which support scroll, these key bindings are also active:
┌─────┬──────────────────────┐
│UP │ Scroll one line up │
├─────┼──────────────────────┤
│DOWN │ Scroll one line down │
└─────┴──────────────────────┘
Configuration
This script can be customized through a config file script-opts/stats.conf placed in mpv's
user directory and through the --script-opts command-line option. The configuration syntax
is described in ON SCREEN CONTROLLER.
Configurable Options
key_page_1
Default: 1
key_page_2
Default: 2
key_page_3
Default: 3
key_page_4
Default: 4
key_page_0
Default: 0
Key bindings for page switching while stats are displayed.
key_scroll_up
Default: UP
key_scroll_down
Default: DOWN
scroll_lines
Default: 1
Scroll key bindings and number of lines to scroll on pages which support it.
duration
Default: 4
How long the stats are shown in seconds (oneshot).
redraw_delay
Default: 1
How long it takes to refresh the displayed stats in seconds (toggling).
persistent_overlay
Default: no
When no, other scripts printing text to the screen can overwrite the displayed
stats. When yes, displayed stats are persistently shown for the respective
duration. This can result in overlapping text when multiple scripts decide to print
text at the same time.
plot_perfdata
Default: yes
Show graphs for performance data (page 2).
plot_vsync_ratio
Default: yes
plot_vsync_jitter
Default: yes
Show graphs for vsync and jitter values (page 1). Only when toggled.
plot_tonemapping_lut
Default: no
Enable tone-mapping LUT visualization automatically. Only when toggled.
flush_graph_data
Default: yes
Clear data buffers used for drawing graphs when toggling.
font Default: sans-serif
Font name. Should support as many font weights as possible for optimal visual
experience.
font_mono
Default: monospace
Font name for parts where monospaced characters are necessary to align text.
Currently, monospaced digits are sufficient.
font_size
Default: 8
Font size used to render text.
font_color
Default: FFFFFF
Font color.
border_size
Default: 0.8
Size of border drawn around the font.
border_color
Default: 262626
Color of drawn border.
alpha Default: 11
Transparency for drawn text.
plot_bg_border_color
Default: 0000FF
Border color used for drawing graphs.
plot_bg_color
Default: 262626
Background color used for drawing graphs.
plot_color
Default: FFFFFF
Color used for drawing graphs.
Note: colors are given as hexadecimal values and use ASS tag order: BBGGRR (blue green
red).
Different key bindings
Additional keys can be configured in input.conf to display the stats:
e script-binding stats/display-stats
E script-binding stats/display-stats-toggle
And to display a certain page directly:
i script-binding stats/display-page-1
e script-binding stats/display-page-2
Active key bindings page
Lists the active key bindings and the commands they're bound to, excluding the interactive
keys of the stats script itself. See also --input-test for more detailed view of each
binding.
The keys are grouped automatically using a simple analysis of the command string, and one
should not expect documentation-level grouping accuracy, however, it should still be
reasonably useful.
Using --idle --script-opts=stats-bindlist=yes will print the list to the terminal and quit
immediately. By default long lines are shortened to 79 chars, and terminal escape
sequences are enabled. A different length limit can be set by changing yes to a number (at
least 40), and escape sequences can be disabled by adding - before the value, e.g.
...=-yes or ...=-120.
Like with --input-test, the list includes bindings from input.conf and from user scripts.
Use --no-config to list only built-in bindings.
Internal stuff page
Most entries shown on this page have rather vague meaning. Likely none of this is useful
for you. Don't attempt to use it. Forget its existence.
Selecting this for the first time will start collecting some internal performance data.
That means performance will be slightly lower than normal for the rest of the time the
player is running (even if the stats page is closed). Note that the stats page itself
uses a lot of CPU and even GPU resources, and may have a heavy impact on performance.
The displayed information is accumulated over the redraw delay (shown as poll-time field).
This adds entries for each Lua script. If there are too many scripts running, parts of the
list will simply be out of the screen, but it can be scrolled.
If the underlying platform does not support pthread per thread times, the displayed times
will be 0 or something random (I suspect that at time of this writing, only Linux provides
the correct via pthread APIs for per thread times).
Most entries are added lazily and only during data collection, which is why entries may
pop up randomly after some time. It's also why the memory usage entries for scripts that
have been inactive since the start of data collection are missing.
Memory usage is approximate and does not reflect internal fragmentation.
JS scripts memory reporting is disabled by default because collecting the data at the JS
side has an overhead and will increase memory usage. It can be enabled by setting the
--js-memory-report option before starting mpv.
If entries have /time and /cpu variants, the former gives the real time (monotonic clock),
while the latter the thread CPU time (only if the corresponding pthread API works and is
supported).
CONSOLE
The console is a REPL for mpv input commands. It is displayed on the video window. It also
shows log messages. It can be disabled entirely using the --load-osd-console=no option.
Keybindings
` Show the console.
ESC and Ctrl+[
Hide the console.
ENTER, Ctrl+j and Ctrl+m
Run the typed command.
Shift+ENTER
Type a literal newline character.
LEFT and Ctrl+b
Move the cursor to the previous character.
RIGHT and Ctrl+f
Move the cursor to the next character.
Ctrl+LEFT and Alt+b
Move the cursor to the beginning of the current word, or if between words, to the
beginning of the previous word.
Ctrl+RIGHT and Alt+f
Move the cursor to the end of the current word, or if between words, to the end of
the next word.
HOME and Ctrl+a
Move the cursor to the start of the current line.
END and Ctrl+e
Move the cursor to the end of the current line.
BACKSPACE and Ctrl+h
Delete the previous character.
Ctrl+d Hide the console if the current line is empty, otherwise delete the next character.
Ctrl+BACKSPACE and Ctrl+w
Delete text from the cursor to the beginning of the current word, or if between
words, to the beginning of the previous word.
Ctrl+DEL and Alt+d
Delete text from the cursor to the end of the current word, or if between words, to
the end of the next word.
Ctrl+u Delete text from the cursor to the beginning of the current line.
Ctrl+k Delete text from the cursor to the end of the current line.
Ctrl+c Clear the current line.
UP and Ctrl+p
Move back in the command history.
DOWN and Ctrl+n
Move forward in the command history.
PGUP Go to the first command in the history.
PGDN Stop navigating the command history.
INSERT Toggle insert mode.
Ctrl+v Paste text (uses the clipboard on X11 and Wayland).
Shift+INSERT
Paste text (uses the primary selection on X11 and Wayland).
TAB and Ctrl+i
Complete the command or property name at the cursor.
Ctrl+l Clear all log messages from the console.
Commands
script-message-to console type <text> [<cursor_pos>]
Show the console and pre-fill it with the provided text, optionally specifying the
initial cursor position as a positive integer starting from 1.
Examples for input.conf
% script-message-to console type "seek absolute-percent; keypress ESC" 6
Enter a percent position to seek to and close the console.
Ctrl+o script-message-to console type "loadfile ''; keypress ESC" 11
Enter a file or URL to play. Tab completes paths in the filesystem.
Known issues
• Pasting text is slow on Windows
• Non-ASCII keyboard input has restrictions
• The cursor keys move between Unicode code-points, not grapheme clusters
Configuration
This script can be customized through a config file script-opts/console.conf placed in
mpv's user directory and through the --script-opts command-line option. The configuration
syntax is described in ON SCREEN CONTROLLER.
Key bindings can be changed in a standard way, see for example stats.lua documentation.
Configurable Options
scale Default: 1
All drawing is scaled by this value, including the text borders and the cursor.
If the VO backend in use has HiDPI scale reporting implemented, the option value is
scaled with the reported HiDPI scale.
font Default: unset (picks a hardcoded font depending on detected platform)
Set the font used for the REPL and the console. This has to be a monospaced font
for the completion suggestions to be aligned correctly.
font_size
Default: 16
Set the font size used for the REPL and the console. This will be multiplied by
"scale".
border_size
Default: 1
Set the font border size used for the REPL and the console.
history_dedup
Default: true
Remove duplicate entries in history as to only keep the latest one. multiplied by
"scale."
font_hw_ratio
Default: 2.0
The ratio of font height to font width. Adjusts table width of completion
suggestions.
LUA SCRIPTING
mpv can load Lua scripts. (See Script location.)
mpv provides the built-in module mp, which contains functions to send commands to the mpv
core and to retrieve information about playback state, user settings, file information,
and so on.
These scripts can be used to control mpv in a similar way to slave mode. Technically, the
Lua code uses the client API internally.
Example
A script which leaves fullscreen mode when the player is paused:
function on_pause_change(name, value)
if value == true then
mp.set_property("fullscreen", "no")
end
end
mp.observe_property("pause", "bool", on_pause_change)
Script location
Scripts can be passed to the --script option, and are automatically loaded from the
scripts subdirectory of the mpv configuration directory (usually ~/.config/mpv/scripts/).
A script can be a single file. The file extension is used to select the scripting backend
to use for it. For Lua, it is .lua. If the extension is not recognized, an error is
printed. (If an error happens, the extension is either mistyped, or the backend was not
compiled into your mpv binary.)
mpv internally loads the script's name by stripping the .lua extension and replacing all
nonalphanumeric characters with _. E.g., my-tools.lua becomes my_tools. If there are
several scripts with the same name, it is made unique by appending a number. This is the
name returned by mp.get_script_name().
Entries with .disable extension are always ignored.
If a script is a directory (either if a directory is passed to --script, or any
sub-directories in the script directory, such as for example
~/.config/mpv/scripts/something/), then the directory represents a single script. The
player will try to load a file named main.x, where x is replaced with the file extension.
For example, if main.lua exists, it is loaded with the Lua scripting backend.
You must not put any other files or directories that start with main. into the script's
top level directory. If the script directory contains for example both main.lua and
main.js, only one of them will be loaded (and which one depends on mpv internals that may
change any time). Likewise, if there is for example main.foo, your script will break as
soon as mpv adds a backend that uses the .foo file extension.
mpv also appends the top level directory of the script to the start of Lua's package path
so you can import scripts from there too. Be aware that this will shadow Lua libraries
that use the same package path. (Single file scripts do not include mpv specific
directories in the Lua package path. This was silently changed in mpv 0.32.0.)
Using a script directory is the recommended way to package a script that consists of
multiple source files, or requires other files (you can use mp.get_script_directory() to
get the location and e.g. load data files).
Making a script a git repository, basically a repository which contains a main.lua file in
the root directory, makes scripts easily updateable (without the dangers of auto-updates).
Another suggestion is to use git submodules to share common files or libraries.
Details on the script initialization and lifecycle
Your script will be loaded by the player at program start from the scripts configuration
subdirectory, or from a path specified with the --script option. Some scripts are loaded
internally (like --osc). Each script runs in its own thread. Your script is first run "as
is", and once that is done, the event loop is entered. This event loop will dispatch
events received by mpv and call your own event handlers which you have registered with
mp.register_event, or timers added with mp.add_timeout or similar. Note that since the
script starts execution concurrently with player initialization, some properties may not
be populated with meaningful values until the relevant subsystems have initialized.
When the player quits, all scripts will be asked to terminate. This happens via a shutdown
event, which by default will make the event loop return. If your script got into an
endless loop, mpv will probably behave fine during playback, but it won't terminate when
quitting, because it's waiting on your script.
Internally, the C code will call the Lua function mp_event_loop after loading a Lua
script. This function is normally defined by the default prelude loaded before your script
(see player/lua/defaults.lua in the mpv sources). The event loop will wait for events and
dispatch events registered with mp.register_event. It will also handle timers added with
mp.add_timeout and similar (by waiting with a timeout).
Since mpv 0.6.0, the player will wait until the script is fully loaded before continuing
normal operation. The player considers a script as fully loaded as soon as it starts
waiting for mpv events (or it exits). In practice this means the player will more or less
hang until the script returns from the main chunk (and mp_event_loop is called), or the
script calls mp_event_loop or mp.dispatch_events directly. This is done to make it
possible for a script to fully setup event handlers etc. before playback actually starts.
In older mpv versions, this happened asynchronously. With mpv 0.29.0, this changes
slightly, and it merely waits for scripts to be loaded in this manner before starting
playback as part of the player initialization phase. Scripts run though initialization in
parallel. This might change again.
mp functions
The mp module is preloaded, although it can be loaded manually with require 'mp'. It
provides the core client API.
mp.command(string)
Run the given command. This is similar to the commands used in input.conf. See
List of Input Commands.
By default, this will show something on the OSD (depending on the command), as if
it was used in input.conf. See Input Command Prefixes how to influence OSD usage
per command.
Returns true on success, or nil, error on error.
mp.commandv(arg1, arg2, ...)
Similar to mp.command, but pass each command argument as separate parameter. This
has the advantage that you don't have to care about quoting and escaping in some
cases.
Example:
mp.command("loadfile " .. filename .. " append")
mp.commandv("loadfile", filename, "append")
These two commands are equivalent, except that the first version breaks if the
filename contains spaces or certain special characters.
Note that properties are not expanded. You can use either mp.command, the
expand-properties prefix, or the mp.get_property family of functions.
Unlike mp.command, this will not use OSD by default either (except for some
OSD-specific commands).
mp.command_native(table [,def])
Similar to mp.commandv, but pass the argument list as table. This has the advantage
that in at least some cases, arguments can be passed as native types. It also
allows you to use named argument.
If the table is an array, each array item is like an argument in mp.commandv() (but
can be a native type instead of a string).
If the table contains string keys, it's interpreted as command with named
arguments. This requires at least an entry with the key name to be present, which
must be a string, and contains the command name. The special entry _flags is
optional, and if present, must be an array of Input Command Prefixes to apply. All
other entries are interpreted as arguments.
Returns a result table on success (usually empty), or def, error on error. def is
the second parameter provided to the function, and is nil if it's missing.
mp.command_native_async(table [,fn])
Like mp.command_native(), but the command is ran asynchronously (as far as
possible), and upon completion, fn is called. fn has three arguments: fn(success,
result, error):
success
Always a Boolean and is true if the command was successful, otherwise
false.
result The result value (can be nil) in case of success, nil otherwise (as
returned by mp.command_native()).
error The error string in case of an error, nil otherwise.
Returns a table with undefined contents, which can be used as argument for
mp.abort_async_command.
If starting the command failed for some reason, nil, error is returned, and fn is
called indicating failure, using the same error value.
fn is always called asynchronously, even if the command failed to start.
mp.abort_async_command(t)
Abort a mp.command_native_async call. The argument is the return value of that
command (which starts asynchronous execution of the command). Whether this works
and how long it takes depends on the command and the situation. The abort call
itself is asynchronous. Does not return anything.
mp.del_property(name)
Delete the given property. See mp.get_property and Properties for more information
about properties. Most properties cannot be deleted.
Returns true on success, or nil, error on error.
mp.get_property(name [,def])
Return the value of the given property as string. These are the same properties as
used in input.conf. See Properties for a list of properties. The returned string is
formatted similar to ${=name} (see Property Expansion).
Returns the string on success, or def, error on error. def is the second parameter
provided to the function, and is nil if it's missing.
mp.get_property_osd(name [,def])
Similar to mp.get_property, but return the property value formatted for OSD. This
is the same string as printed with ${name} when used in input.conf.
Returns the string on success, or def, error on error. def is the second parameter
provided to the function, and is an empty string if it's missing. Unlike
get_property(), assigning the return value to a variable will always result in a
string.
mp.get_property_bool(name [,def])
Similar to mp.get_property, but return the property value as Boolean.
Returns a Boolean on success, or def, error on error.
mp.get_property_number(name [,def])
Similar to mp.get_property, but return the property value as number.
Note that while Lua does not distinguish between integers and floats, mpv internals
do. This function simply request a double float from mpv, and mpv will usually
convert integer property values to float.
Returns a number on success, or def, error on error.
mp.get_property_native(name [,def])
Similar to mp.get_property, but return the property value using the best Lua type
for the property. Most time, this will return a string, Boolean, or number. Some
properties (for example chapter-list) are returned as tables.
Returns a value on success, or def, error on error. Note that nil might be a
possible, valid value too in some corner cases.
mp.set_property(name, value)
Set the given property to the given string value. See mp.get_property and
Properties for more information about properties.
Returns true on success, or nil, error on error.
mp.set_property_bool(name, value)
Similar to mp.set_property, but set the given property to the given Boolean value.
mp.set_property_number(name, value)
Similar to mp.set_property, but set the given property to the given numeric value.
Note that while Lua does not distinguish between integers and floats, mpv internals
do. This function will test whether the number can be represented as integer, and
if so, it will pass an integer value to mpv, otherwise a double float.
mp.set_property_native(name, value)
Similar to mp.set_property, but set the given property using its native type.
Since there are several data types which cannot represented natively in Lua, this
might not always work as expected. For example, while the Lua wrapper can do some
guesswork to decide whether a Lua table is an array or a map, this would fail with
empty tables. Also, there are not many properties for which it makes sense to use
this, instead of set_property, set_property_bool, set_property_number. For these
reasons, this function should probably be avoided for now, except for properties
that use tables natively.
mp.get_time()
Return the current mpv internal time in seconds as a number. This is basically the
system time, with an arbitrary offset.
mp.add_key_binding(key, name|fn [,fn [,flags]])
Register callback to be run on a key binding. The binding will be mapped to the
given key, which is a string describing the physical key. This uses the same key
names as in input.conf, and also allows combinations (e.g. ctrl+a). If the key is
empty or nil, no physical key is registered, but the user still can create own
bindings (see below).
After calling this function, key presses will cause the function fn to be called
(unless the user remapped the key with another binding).
The name argument should be a short symbolic string. It allows the user to remap
the key binding via input.conf using the script-message command, and the name of
the key binding (see below for an example). The name should be unique across other
bindings in the same script - if not, the previous binding with the same name will
be overwritten. You can omit the name, in which case a random name is generated
internally. (Omitting works as follows: either pass nil for name, or pass the fn
argument in place of the name. The latter is not recommended and is handled for
compatibility only.)
The last argument is used for optional flags. This is a table, which can have the
following entries:
repeatable
If set to true, enables key repeat for this specific binding.
complex
If set to true, then fn is called on both key up and down events (as well
as key repeat, if enabled), with the first argument being a table. This
table has the following entries (and may contain undocumented ones):
event Set to one of the strings down, repeat, up or press (the
latter if key up/down can't be tracked).
is_mouse
Boolean Whether the event was caused by a mouse button.
key_name
The name of they key that triggered this, or nil if invoked
artificially. If the key name is unknown, it's an empty
string.
key_text
Text if triggered by a text key, otherwise nil. See
description of script-binding command for details (this field
is equivalent to the 5th argument).
Internally, key bindings are dispatched via the script-message-to or script-binding
input commands and mp.register_script_message.
Trying to map multiple commands to a key will essentially prefer a random binding,
while the other bindings are not called. It is guaranteed that user defined
bindings in the central input.conf are preferred over bindings added with this
function (but see mp.add_forced_key_binding).
Example:
function something_handler()
print("the key was pressed")
end
mp.add_key_binding("x", "something", something_handler)
This will print the message the key was pressed when x was pressed.
The user can remap these key bindings. Then the user has to put the following into
their input.conf to remap the command to the y key:
y script-binding something
This will print the message when the key y is pressed. (x will still work, unless
the user remaps it.)
You can also explicitly send a message to a named script only. Assume the above
script was using the filename fooscript.lua:
y script-binding fooscript/something
mp.add_forced_key_binding(...)
This works almost the same as mp.add_key_binding, but registers the key binding in
a way that will overwrite the user's custom bindings in their input.conf.
(mp.add_key_binding overwrites default key bindings only, but not those by the
user's input.conf.)
mp.remove_key_binding(name)
Remove a key binding added with mp.add_key_binding or mp.add_forced_key_binding.
Use the same name as you used when adding the bindings. It's not possible to remove
bindings for which you omitted the name.
mp.register_event(name, fn)
Call a specific function when an event happens. The event name is a string, and the
function fn is a Lua function value.
Some events have associated data. This is put into a Lua table and passed as
argument to fn. The Lua table by default contains a name field, which is a string
containing the event name. If the event has an error associated, the error field is
set to a string describing the error, on success it's not set.
If multiple functions are registered for the same event, they are run in
registration order, which the first registered function running before all the
other ones.
Returns true if such an event exists, false otherwise.
See Events and List of events for details.
mp.unregister_event(fn)
Undo mp.register_event(..., fn). This removes all event handlers that are equal to
the fn parameter. This uses normal Lua == comparison, so be careful when dealing
with closures.
mp.observe_property(name, type, fn)
Watch a property for changes. If the property name is changed, then the function
fn(name) will be called. type can be nil, or be set to one of none, native, bool,
string, or number. none is the same as nil. For all other values, the new value of
the property will be passed as second argument to fn, using mp.get_property_<type>
to retrieve it. This means if type is for example string, fn is roughly called as
in fn(name, mp.get_property_string(name)).
If possible, change events are coalesced. If a property is changed a bunch of times
in a row, only the last change triggers the change function. (The exact behavior
depends on timing and other things.)
If a property is unavailable, or on error, the value argument to fn is nil. (The
observe_property() call always succeeds, even if a property does not exist.)
In some cases the function is not called even if the property changes. This
depends on the property, and it's a valid feature request to ask for better update
handling of a specific property.
If the type is none or nil, sporadic property change events are possible. This
means the change function fn can be called even if the property doesn't actually
change.
You always get an initial change notification. This is meant to initialize the
user's state to the current value of the property.
mp.unobserve_property(fn)
Undo mp.observe_property(..., fn). This removes all property handlers that are
equal to the fn parameter. This uses normal Lua == comparison, so be careful when
dealing with closures.
mp.add_timeout(seconds, fn [, disabled])
Call the given function fn when the given number of seconds has elapsed. Note that
the number of seconds can be fractional. For now, the timer's resolution may be as
low as 50 ms, although this will be improved in the future.
If the disabled argument is set to true or a truthy value, the timer will wait to
be manually started with a call to its resume() method.
This is a one-shot timer: it will be removed when it's fired.
Returns a timer object. See mp.add_periodic_timer for details.
mp.add_periodic_timer(seconds, fn [, disabled])
Call the given function periodically. This is like mp.add_timeout, but the timer is
re-added after the function fn is run.
Returns a timer object. The timer object provides the following methods:
stop() Disable the timer. Does nothing if the timer is already disabled.
This will remember the current elapsed time when stopping, so that
resume() essentially unpauses the timer.
kill() Disable the timer. Resets the elapsed time. resume() will restart the
timer.
resume()
Restart the timer. If the timer was disabled with stop(), this will
resume at the time it was stopped. If the timer was disabled with
kill(), or if it's a previously fired one-shot timer (added with
add_timeout()), this starts the timer from the beginning, using the
initially configured timeout.
is_enabled()
Whether the timer is currently enabled or was previously disabled
(e.g. by stop() or kill()).
timeout (RW)
This field contains the current timeout period. This value is not
updated as time progresses. It's only used to calculate when the
timer should fire next when the timer expires.
If you write this, you can call t:kill() ; t:resume() to reset the
current timeout to the new one. (t:stop() won't use the new timeout.)
oneshot (RW)
Whether the timer is periodic (false) or fires just once (true). This
value is used when the timer expires (but before the timer callback
function fn is run).
Note that these are methods, and you have to call them using : instead of . (Refer
to https://www.lua.org/manual/5.2/manual.html#3.4.9 .)
Example:
seconds = 0
timer = mp.add_periodic_timer(1, function()
print("called every second")
# stop it after 10 seconds
seconds = seconds + 1
if seconds >= 10 then
timer:kill()
end
end)
mp.get_opt(key)
Return a setting from the --script-opts option. It's up to the user and the script
how this mechanism is used. Currently, all scripts can access this equally, so you
should be careful about collisions.
mp.get_script_name()
Return the name of the current script. The name is usually made of the filename of
the script, with directory and file extension removed. If there are several scripts
which would have the same name, it's made unique by appending a number. Any
nonalphanumeric characters are replaced with _.
Example
The script /path/to/foo-script.lua becomes foo_script.
mp.get_script_directory()
Return the directory if this is a script packaged as directory (see Script location
for a description). Return nothing if this is a single file script.
mp.osd_message(text [,duration])
Show an OSD message on the screen. duration is in seconds, and is optional (uses
--osd-duration by default).
Advanced mp functions
These also live in the mp module, but are documented separately as they are useful only in
special situations.
mp.get_wakeup_pipe()
Calls mpv_get_wakeup_pipe() and returns the read end of the wakeup pipe. This is
deprecated, but still works. (See client.h for details.)
mp.get_next_timeout()
Return the relative time in seconds when the next timer (mp.add_timeout and
similar) expires. If there is no timer, return nil.
mp.dispatch_events([allow_wait])
This can be used to run custom event loops. If you want to have direct control what
the Lua script does (instead of being called by the default event loop), you can
set the global variable mp_event_loop to your own function running the event loop.
From your event loop, you should call mp.dispatch_events() to dequeue and dispatch
mpv events.
If the allow_wait parameter is set to true, the function will block until the next
event is received or the next timer expires. Otherwise (and this is the default
behavior), it returns as soon as the event loop is emptied. It's strongly
recommended to use mp.get_next_timeout() and mp.get_wakeup_pipe() if you're
interested in properly working notification of new events and working timers.
mp.register_idle(fn)
Register an event loop idle handler. Idle handlers are called before the script
goes to sleep after handling all new events. This can be used for example to delay
processing of property change events: if you're observing multiple properties at
once, you might not want to act on each property change, but only when all change
notifications have been received.
mp.unregister_idle(fn)
Undo mp.register_idle(fn). This removes all idle handlers that are equal to the fn
parameter. This uses normal Lua == comparison, so be careful when dealing with
closures.
mp.enable_messages(level)
Set the minimum log level of which mpv message output to receive. These messages
are normally printed to the terminal. By calling this function, you can set the
minimum log level of messages which should be received with the log-message event.
See the description of this event for details. The level is a string, see msg.log
for allowed log levels.
mp.register_script_message(name, fn)
This is a helper to dispatch script-message or script-message-to invocations to Lua
functions. fn is called if script-message or script-message-to (with this script as
destination) is run with name as first parameter. The other parameters are passed
to fn. If a message with the given name is already registered, it's overwritten.
Used by mp.add_key_binding, so be careful about name collisions.
mp.unregister_script_message(name)
Undo a previous registration with mp.register_script_message. Does nothing if the
name wasn't registered.
mp.create_osd_overlay(format)
Create an OSD overlay. This is a very thin wrapper around the osd-overlay command.
The function returns a table, which mostly contains fields that will be passed to
osd-overlay. The format parameter is used to initialize the format field. The data
field contains the text to be used as overlay. For details, see the osd-overlay
command.
In addition, it provides the following methods:
update()
Commit the OSD overlay to the screen, or in other words, run the osd-overlay
command with the current fields of the overlay table. Returns the result of
the osd-overlay command itself.
remove()
Remove the overlay from the screen. A update() call will add it again.
Example:
ov = mp.create_osd_overlay("ass-events")
ov.data = "{\\an5}{\\b1}hello world!"
ov:update()
The advantage of using this wrapper (as opposed to running osd-overlay directly) is
that the id field is allocated automatically.
mp.get_osd_size()
Returns a tuple of osd_width, osd_height, osd_par. The first two give the size of
the OSD in pixels (for video outputs like --vo=xv, this may be "scaled" pixels).
The third is the display pixel aspect ratio.
May return invalid/nonsense values if OSD is not initialized yet.
mp.msg functions
This module allows outputting messages to the terminal, and can be loaded with require
'mp.msg'.
msg.log(level, ...)
The level parameter is the message priority. It's a string and one of fatal, error,
warn, info, v, debug, trace. The user's settings will determine which of these
messages will be visible. Normally, all messages are visible, except v, debug and
trace.
The parameters after that are all converted to strings. Spaces are inserted to
separate multiple parameters.
You don't need to add newlines.
msg.fatal(...), msg.error(...), msg.warn(...), msg.info(...), msg.verbose(...),
msg.debug(...), msg.trace(...)
All of these are shortcuts and equivalent to the corresponding msg.log(level, ...)
call.
mp.options functions
mpv comes with a built-in module to manage options from config-files and the command-line.
All you have to do is to supply a table with default options to the read_options function.
The function will overwrite the default values with values found in the config-file and
the command-line (in that order).
options.read_options(table [, identifier [, on_update]])
A table with key-value pairs. The type of the default values is important for
converting the values read from the config file or command-line back. Do not use
nil as a default value!
The identifier is used to identify the config-file and the command-line options.
These needs to unique to avoid collisions with other scripts. Defaults to
mp.get_script_name() if the parameter is nil or missing.
The on_update parameter enables run-time updates of all matching option values via
the script-opts option/property. If any of the matching options changes, the values
in the table (which was originally passed to the function) are changed, and
on_update(list) is called. list is a table where each updated option has a
list[option_name] = true entry. There is no initial on_update() call. This never
re-reads the config file. script-opts is always applied on the original config
file, ignoring previous script-opts values (for example, if an option is removed
from script-opts at runtime, the option will have the value in the config file).
table entries are only written for option values whose values effectively change
(this is important if the script changes table entries independently).
Example implementation:
local options = {
optionA = "defaultvalueA",
optionB = -0.5,
optionC = true,
}
require "mp.options".read_options(options, "myscript")
print(options.optionA)
The config file will be stored in script-opts/identifier.conf in mpv's user folder.
Comment lines can be started with # and stray spaces are not removed. Boolean values will
be represented with yes/no.
Example config:
# comment
optionA=Hello World
optionB=9999
optionC=no
Command-line options are read from the --script-opts parameter. To avoid collisions, all
keys have to be prefixed with identifier-.
Example command-line:
--script-opts=myscript-optionA=TEST,myscript-optionB=0,myscript-optionC=yes
mp.utils functions
This built-in module provides generic helper functions for Lua, and have strictly speaking
nothing to do with mpv or video/audio playback. They are provided for convenience. Most
compensate for Lua's scarce standard library.
Be warned that any of these functions might disappear any time. They are not strictly part
of the guaranteed API.
utils.getcwd()
Returns the directory that mpv was launched from. On error, nil, error is returned.
utils.readdir(path [, filter])
Enumerate all entries at the given path on the filesystem, and return them as
array. Each entry is a directory entry (without the path). The list is unsorted
(in whatever order the operating system returns it).
If the filter argument is given, it must be one of the following strings:
files List regular files only. This excludes directories, special files (like
UNIX device files or FIFOs), and dead symlinks. It includes UNIX symlinks
to regular files.
dirs List directories only, or symlinks to directories. . and .. are not
included.
normal Include the results of both files and dirs. (This is the default.)
all List all entries, even device files, dead symlinks, FIFOs, and the . and
.. entries.
On error, nil, error is returned.
utils.file_info(path)
Stats the given path for information and returns a table with the following
entries:
mode protection bits (on Windows, always 755 (octal) for directories and 644
(octal) for files)
size size in bytes
atime time of last access
mtime time of last modification
ctime time of last metadata change
is_file
Whether path is a regular file (boolean)
is_dir Whether path is a directory (boolean)
mode and size are integers. Timestamps (atime, mtime and ctime) are integer
seconds since the Unix epoch (Unix time). The booleans is_file and is_dir are
provided as a convenience; they can be and are derived from mode.
On error (e.g. path does not exist), nil, error is returned.
utils.split_path(path)
Split a path into directory component and filename component, and return them. The
first return value is always the directory. The second return value is the trailing
part of the path, the directory entry.
utils.join_path(p1, p2)
Return the concatenation of the 2 paths. Tries to be clever. For example, if p2 is
an absolute path, p2 is returned without change.
utils.subprocess(t)
Runs an external process and waits until it exits. Returns process status and the
captured output. This is a legacy wrapper around calling the subprocess command
with mp.command_native. It does the following things:
• copy the table t
• rename cancellable field to playback_only
• rename max_size to capture_size
• set capture_stdout field to true if unset
• set name field to subprocess
• call mp.command_native(copied_t)
• if the command failed, create a dummy result table
• copy error_string to error field if the string is non-empty
• return the result table
It is recommended to use mp.command_native or mp.command_native_async directly,
instead of calling this legacy wrapper. It is for compatibility only.
See the subprocess documentation for semantics and further parameters.
utils.subprocess_detached(t)
Runs an external process and detaches it from mpv's control.
The parameter t is a table. The function reads the following entries:
args Array of strings of the same semantics as the args used in the subprocess
function.
The function returns nil.
This is a legacy wrapper around calling the run command with mp.commandv and other
functions.
utils.getpid()
Returns the process ID of the running mpv process. This can be used to identify the
calling mpv when launching (detached) subprocesses.
utils.get_env_list()
Returns the C environment as a list of strings. (Do not confuse this with the Lua
"environment", which is an unrelated concept.)
utils.parse_json(str [, trail])
Parses the given string argument as JSON, and returns it as a Lua table. On error,
returns nil, error. (Currently, error is just a string reading error, because there
is no fine-grained error reporting of any kind.)
The returned value uses similar conventions as mp.get_property_native() to
distinguish empty objects and arrays.
If the trail parameter is true (or any value equal to true), then trailing
non-whitespace text is tolerated by the function, and the trailing text is returned
as 3rd return value. (The 3rd return value is always there, but with trail set, no
error is raised.)
utils.format_json(v)
Format the given Lua table (or value) as a JSON string and return it. On error,
returns nil, error. (Errors usually only happen on value types incompatible with
JSON.)
The argument value uses similar conventions as mp.set_property_native() to
distinguish empty objects and arrays.
utils.to_string(v)
Turn the given value into a string. Formats tables and their contents. This doesn't
do anything special; it is only needed because Lua is terrible.
Events
Events are notifications from player core to scripts. You can register an event handler
with mp.register_event.
Note that all scripts (and other parts of the player) receive events equally, and there's
no such thing as blocking other scripts from receiving events.
Example:
function my_fn(event)
print("start of playback!")
end
mp.register_event("file-loaded", my_fn)
For the existing event types, see List of events.
Extras
This documents experimental features, or features that are "too special" to guarantee a
stable interface.
mp.add_hook(type, priority, fn)
Add a hook callback for type (a string identifying a certain kind of hook). These
hooks allow the player to call script functions and wait for their result
(normally, the Lua scripting interface is asynchronous from the point of view of
the player core). priority is an arbitrary integer that allows ordering among hooks
of the same kind. Using the value 50 is recommended as neutral default value.
fn(hook) is the function that will be called during execution of the hook. The
parameter passed to it (hook) is a Lua object that can control further aspects
about the currently invoked hook. It provides the following methods:
defer()
Returning from the hook function should not automatically continue the
hook. Instead, the API user wants to call hook:cont() on its own at a
later point in time (before or after the function has returned).
cont() Continue the hook. Doesn't need to be called unless defer() was called.
See Hooks for currently existing hooks and what they do - only the hook list is
interesting; handling hook execution is done by the Lua script function
automatically.
JAVASCRIPT
JavaScript support in mpv is near identical to its Lua support. Use this section as
reference on differences and availability of APIs, but otherwise you should refer to the
Lua documentation for API details and general scripting in mpv.
Example
JavaScript code which leaves fullscreen mode when the player is paused:
function on_pause_change(name, value) {
if (value == true)
mp.set_property("fullscreen", "no");
}
mp.observe_property("pause", "bool", on_pause_change);
Similarities with Lua
mpv tries to load a script file as JavaScript if it has a .js extension, but otherwise,
the documented Lua options, script directories, loading, etc apply to JavaScript files
too.
Script initialization and lifecycle is the same as with Lua, and most of the Lua functions
at the modules mp, mp.utils, mp.msg and mp.options are available to JavaScript with
identical APIs - including running commands, getting/setting properties, registering
events/key-bindings/hooks, etc.
Differences from Lua
No need to load modules. mp, mp.utils, mp.msg and mp.options are preloaded, and you can
use e.g. var cwd = mp.utils.getcwd(); without prior setup.
Errors are slightly different. Where the Lua APIs return nil for error, the JavaScript
ones return undefined. Where Lua returns something, error JavaScript returns only
something - and makes error available via mp.last_error(). Note that only some of the
functions have this additional error value - typically the same ones which have it in Lua.
Standard APIs are preferred. For instance setTimeout and JSON.stringify are available, but
mp.add_timeout and mp.utils.format_json are not.
No standard library. This means that interaction with anything outside of mpv is limited
to the available APIs, typically via mp.utils. However, some file functions were added,
and CommonJS require is available too - where the loaded modules have the same privileges
as normal scripts.
Language features - ECMAScript 5
The scripting backend which mpv currently uses is MuJS - a compatible minimal ES5
interpreter. As such, String.substring is implemented for instance, while the common but
non-standard String.substr is not. Please consult the MuJS pages on language features and
platform support - https://mujs.com .
Unsupported Lua APIs and their JS alternatives
mp.add_timeout(seconds, fn) JS: id = setTimeout(fn, ms)
mp.add_periodic_timer(seconds, fn) JS: id = setInterval(fn, ms)
utils.parse_json(str [, trail]) JS: JSON.parse(str)
utils.format_json(v) JS: JSON.stringify(v)
utils.to_string(v) see dump below.
mp.get_next_timeout() see event loop below.
mp.dispatch_events([allow_wait]) see event loop below.
Scripting APIs - identical to Lua
(LE) - Last-Error, indicates that mp.last_error() can be used after the call to test for
success (empty string) or failure (non empty reason string). Where the Lua APIs use nil
to indicate error, JS APIs use undefined.
mp.command(string) (LE)
mp.commandv(arg1, arg2, ...) (LE)
mp.command_native(table [,def]) (LE)
id = mp.command_native_async(table [,fn]) (LE) Notes: id is true-thy on success, error is
empty string on success.
mp.abort_async_command(id)
mp.del_property(name) (LE)
mp.get_property(name [,def]) (LE)
mp.get_property_osd(name [,def]) (LE)
mp.get_property_bool(name [,def]) (LE)
mp.get_property_number(name [,def]) (LE)
mp.get_property_native(name [,def]) (LE)
mp.set_property(name, value) (LE)
mp.set_property_bool(name, value) (LE)
mp.set_property_number(name, value) (LE)
mp.set_property_native(name, value) (LE)
mp.get_time()
mp.add_key_binding(key, name|fn [,fn [,flags]])
mp.add_forced_key_binding(...)
mp.remove_key_binding(name)
mp.register_event(name, fn)
mp.unregister_event(fn)
mp.observe_property(name, type, fn)
mp.unobserve_property(fn)
mp.get_opt(key)
mp.get_script_name()
mp.get_script_directory()
mp.osd_message(text [,duration])
mp.get_wakeup_pipe()
mp.register_idle(fn)
mp.unregister_idle(fn)
mp.enable_messages(level)
mp.register_script_message(name, fn)
mp.unregister_script_message(name)
mp.create_osd_overlay(format)
mp.get_osd_size() (returned object has properties: width, height, aspect)
mp.msg.log(level, ...)
mp.msg.fatal(...)
mp.msg.error(...)
mp.msg.warn(...)
mp.msg.info(...)
mp.msg.verbose(...)
mp.msg.debug(...)
mp.msg.trace(...)
mp.utils.getcwd() (LE)
mp.utils.readdir(path [, filter]) (LE)
mp.utils.file_info(path) (LE) Note: like lua - this does NOT expand meta-paths like ~~/foo
(other JS file functions do expand meta paths).
mp.utils.split_path(path)
mp.utils.join_path(p1, p2)
mp.utils.subprocess(t)
mp.utils.subprocess_detached(t)
mp.utils.get_env_list()
mp.utils.getpid() (LE)
mp.add_hook(type, priority, fn(hook))
mp.options.read_options(obj [, identifier [, on_update]]) (types: string/boolean/number)
Additional utilities
mp.last_error()
If used after an API call which updates last error, returns an empty string if the
API call succeeded, or a non-empty error reason string otherwise.
Error.stack (string)
When using try { ... } catch(e) { ... }, then e.stack is the stack trace of the
error - if it was created using the Error(...) constructor.
print (global)
A convenient alias to mp.msg.info.
dump (global)
Like print but also expands objects and arrays recursively.
mp.utils.getenv(name)
Returns the value of the host environment variable name, or undefined if the
variable is not defined.
mp.utils.get_user_path(path)
Trivial wrapper of the expand-path mpv command, returns a string. read_file,
write_file, append_file and require already expand the path internally and accept
mpv meta-paths like ~~desktop/foo.
mp.utils.read_file(fname [,max])
Returns the content of file fname as string. If max is provided and not negative,
limit the read to max bytes.
mp.utils.write_file(fname, str)
(Over)write file fname with text content str. fname must be prefixed with file://
as simple protection against accidental arguments switch, e.g.
mp.utils.write_file("file://~/abc.txt", "hello world").
mp.utils.append_file(fname, str)
Same as mp.utils.write_file if the file fname does not exist. If it does exist then
append instead of overwrite.
Note: read_file, write_file and append_file throw on errors, allow text content only.
mp.get_time_ms()
Same as mp.get_time() but in ms instead of seconds.
mp.get_script_file()
Returns the file name of the current script.
exit() (global)
Make the script exit at the end of the current event loop iteration. Note: please
remove added key bindings before calling exit().
mp.utils.compile_js(fname, content_str)
Compiles the JS code content_str as file name fname (without loading anything from
the filesystem), and returns it as a function. Very similar to a Function
constructor, but shows at stack traces as fname.
mp.module_paths
Global modules search paths array for the require function (see below).
Timers (global)
The standard HTML/node.js timers are available:
id = setTimeout(fn [,duration [,arg1 [,arg2...]]])
id = setTimeout(code_string [,duration])
clearTimeout(id)
id = setInterval(fn [,duration [,arg1 [,arg2...]]])
id = setInterval(code_string [,duration])
clearInterval(id)
setTimeout and setInterval return id, and later call fn (or execute code_string) after
duration ms. Interval also repeat every duration.
duration has a minimum and default value of 0, code_string is a plain string which is
evaluated as JS code, and [,arg1 [,arg2..]] are used as arguments (if provided) when
calling back fn.
The clear...(id) functions cancel timer id, and are irreversible.
Note: timers always call back asynchronously, e.g. setTimeout(fn) will never call fn
before returning. fn will be called either at the end of this event loop iteration or at a
later event loop iteration. This is true also for intervals - which also never call back
twice at the same event loop iteration.
Additionally, timers are processed after the event queue is empty, so it's valid to use
setTimeout(fn) as a one-time idle observer.
CommonJS modules and require(id)
CommonJS Modules are a standard system where scripts can export common functions for use
by other scripts. Specifically, a module is a script which adds properties (functions,
etc) to its pre-existing exports object, which another script can access with
require(module-id). This runs the module and returns its exports object. Further calls to
require for the same module will return its cached exports object without running the
module again.
Modules and require are supported, standard compliant, and generally similar to node.js.
However, most node.js modules won't run due to missing modules such as fs, process, etc,
but some node.js modules with minimal dependencies do work. In general, this is for mpv
modules and not a node.js replacement.
A .js file extension is always added to id, e.g. require("./foo") will load the file
./foo.js and return its exports object.
An id which starts with ./ or ../ is relative to the script or module which require it.
Otherwise it's considered a top-level id (CommonJS term).
Top-level id is evaluated as absolute filesystem path if possible, e.g. /x/y or ~/x.
Otherwise it's considered a global module id and searched according to mp.module_paths in
normal array order, e.g. require("x") tries to load x.js at one of the array paths, and id
foo/x tries to load x.js inside dir foo at one of the paths.
The mp.module_paths array is empty by default except for scripts which are loaded as a
directory where it contains one item - <directory>/modules/ . The array may be updated
from a script (or using custom init - see below) which will affect future calls to require
for global module id's which are not already loaded/cached.
No global variable, but a module's this at its top lexical scope is the global object -
also in strict mode. If you have a module which needs global as the global object, you
could do this.global = this; before require.
Functions and variables declared at a module don't pollute the global object.
Custom initialization
After mpv initializes the JavaScript environment for a script but before it loads the
script - it tries to run the file init.js at the root of the mpv configuration directory.
Code at this file can update the environment further for all scripts. E.g. if it contains
mp.module_paths.push("/foo") then require at all scripts will search global module id's
also at /foo (do NOT do mp.module_paths = ["/foo"]; because this will remove existing
paths - like <script-dir>/modules for scripts which load from a directory).
The custom-init file is ignored if mpv is invoked with --no-config.
Before mpv 0.34, the file name was .init.js (with dot) at the same dir.
The event loop
The event loop poll/dispatch mpv events as long as the queue is not empty, then processes
the timers, then waits for the next event, and repeats this forever.
You could put this code at your script to replace the built-in event loop, and also print
every event which mpv sends to your script:
function mp_event_loop() {
var wait = 0;
do {
var e = mp.wait_event(wait);
dump(e); // there could be a lot of prints...
if (e.event != "none") {
mp.dispatch_event(e);
wait = 0;
} else {
wait = mp.process_timers() / 1000;
if (wait != 0) {
mp.notify_idle_observers();
wait = mp.peek_timers_wait() / 1000;
}
}
} while (mp.keep_running);
}
mp_event_loop is a name which mpv tries to call after the script loads. The internal
implementation is similar to this (without dump though..).
e = mp.wait_event(wait) returns when the next mpv event arrives, or after wait seconds if
positive and no mpv events arrived. wait value of 0 returns immediately (with e.event ==
"none" if the queue is empty).
mp.dispatch_event(e) calls back the handlers registered for e.event, if there are such
(event handlers, property observers, script messages, etc).
mp.process_timers() calls back the already-added, non-canceled due timers, and returns the
duration in ms till the next due timer (possibly 0), or -1 if there are no pending timers.
Must not be called recursively.
mp.notify_idle_observers() calls back the idle observers, which we do when we're about to
sleep (wait != 0), but the observers may add timers or take non-negligible duration to
complete, so we re-calculate wait afterwards.
mp.peek_timers_wait() returns the same values as mp.process_timers() but without doing
anything. Invalid result if called from a timer callback.
Note: exit() is also registered for the shutdown event, and its implementation is a simple
mp.keep_running = false.
JSON IPC
mpv can be controlled by external programs using the JSON-based IPC protocol. It can be
enabled by specifying the path to a unix socket or a named pipe using the option
--input-ipc-server. Clients can connect to this socket and send commands to the player or
receive events from it.
WARNING:
This is not intended to be a secure network protocol. It is explicitly insecure: there
is no authentication, no encryption, and the commands themselves are insecure too. For
example, the run command is exposed, which can run arbitrary system commands. The
use-case is controlling the player locally. This is not different from the MPlayer
slave protocol.
Socat example
You can use the socat tool to send commands (and receive replies) from the shell. Assuming
mpv was started with:
mpv file.mkv --input-ipc-server=/tmp/mpvsocket
Then you can control it using socat:
> echo '{ "command": ["get_property", "playback-time"] }' | socat - /tmp/mpvsocket
{"data":190.482000,"error":"success"}
In this case, socat copies data between stdin/stdout and the mpv socket connection.
See the --idle option how to make mpv start without exiting immediately or playing a file.
It's also possible to send input.conf style text-only commands:
> echo 'show-text ${playback-time}' | socat - /tmp/mpvsocket
But you won't get a reply over the socket. (This particular command shows the playback
time on the player's OSD.)
Command Prompt example
Unfortunately, it's not as easy to test the IPC protocol on Windows, since Windows ports
of socat (in Cygwin and MSYS2) don't understand named pipes. In the absence of a simple
tool to send and receive from bidirectional pipes, the echo command can be used to send
commands, but not receive replies from the command prompt.
Assuming mpv was started with:
mpv file.mkv --input-ipc-server=\\.\pipe\mpvsocket
You can send commands from a command prompt:
echo show-text ${playback-time} >\\.\pipe\mpvsocket
To be able to simultaneously read and write from the IPC pipe, like on Linux, it's
necessary to write an external program that uses overlapped file I/O (or some wrapper like
.NET's NamedPipeClientStream.)
You can open the pipe in PuTTY as "serial" device. This is not very comfortable, but gives
a way to test interactively without having to write code.
Protocol
The protocol uses UTF-8-only JSON as defined by RFC-8259. Unlike standard JSON, "u" escape
sequences are not allowed to construct surrogate pairs. To avoid getting conflicts, encode
all text characters including and above codepoint U+0020 as UTF-8. mpv might output broken
UTF-8 in corner cases (see "UTF-8" section below).
Clients can execute commands on the player by sending JSON messages of the following form:
{ "command": ["command_name", "param1", "param2", ...] }
where command_name is the name of the command to be executed, followed by a list of
parameters. Parameters must be formatted as native JSON values (integers, strings,
booleans, ...). Every message must be terminated with \n. Additionally, \n must not appear
anywhere inside the message. In practice this means that messages should be minified
before being sent to mpv.
mpv will then send back a reply indicating whether the command was run correctly, and an
additional field holding the command-specific return data (it can also be null).
{ "error": "success", "data": null }
mpv will also send events to clients with JSON messages of the following form:
{ "event": "event_name" }
where event_name is the name of the event. Additional event-specific fields can also be
present. See List of events for a list of all supported events.
Because events can occur at any time, it may be difficult at times to determine which
response goes with which command. Commands may optionally include a request_id which, if
provided in the command request, will be copied verbatim into the response. mpv does not
interpret the request_id in any way; it is solely for the use of the requester. The only
requirement is that the request_id field must be an integer (a number without fractional
parts in the range -2^63..2^63-1). Using other types is deprecated and will currently show
a warning. In the future, this will raise an error.
For example, this request:
{ "command": ["get_property", "time-pos"], "request_id": 100 }
Would generate this response:
{ "error": "success", "data": 1.468135, "request_id": 100 }
If you don't specify a request_id, command replies will set it to 0.
All commands, replies, and events are separated from each other with a line break
character (\n).
If the first character (after skipping whitespace) is not {, the command will be
interpreted as non-JSON text command, as they are used in input.conf (or
mpv_command_string() in the client API). Additionally, lines starting with # and empty
lines are ignored.
Currently, embedded 0 bytes terminate the current line, but you should not rely on this.
Data flow
Currently, the mpv-side IPC implementation does not service the socket while a command is
executed and the reply is written. It is for example not possible that other events, that
happened during the execution of the command, are written to the socket before the reply
is written.
This might change in the future. The only guarantee is that replies to IPC messages are
sent in sequence.
Also, since socket I/O is inherently asynchronous, it is possible that you read unrelated
event messages from the socket, before you read the reply to the previous command you
sent. In this case, these events were queued by the mpv side before it read and started
processing your command message.
If the mpv-side IPC implementation switches away from blocking writes and blocking command
execution, it may attempt to send events at any time.
You can also use asynchronous commands, which can return in any order, and which do not
block IPC protocol interaction at all while the command is executed in the background.
Asynchronous commands
Command can be run asynchronously. This behaves exactly as with normal command execution,
except that execution is not blocking. Other commands can be sent while it's executing,
and command completion can be arbitrarily reordered.
The async field controls this. If present, it must be a boolean. If missing, false is
assumed.
For example, this initiates an asynchronous command:
{ "command": ["screenshot"], "request_id": 123, "async": true }
And this is the completion:
{"request_id":123,"error":"success","data":null}
By design, you will not get a confirmation that the command was started. If a command is
long running, sending the message will not lead to any reply until much later when the
command finishes.
Some commands execute synchronously, but these will behave like asynchronous commands that
finished execution immediately.
Cancellation of asynchronous commands is available in the libmpv API, but has not yet been
implemented in the IPC protocol.
Commands with named arguments
If the command field is a JSON object, named arguments are expected. This is described in
the C API mpv_command_node() documentation (the MPV_FORMAT_NODE_MAP case). In some cases,
this may make commands more readable, while some obscure commands basically require using
named arguments.
Currently, only "proper" commands (as listed by List of Input Commands) support named
arguments.
Commands
In addition to the commands described in List of Input Commands, a few extra commands can
also be used as part of the protocol:
client_name
Return the name of the client as string. This is the string ipc-N with N being an
integer number.
get_time_us
Return the current mpv internal time in microseconds as a number. This is basically
the system time, with an arbitrary offset.
get_property
Return the value of the given property. The value will be sent in the data field of
the replay message.
Example:
{ "command": ["get_property", "volume"] }
{ "data": 50.0, "error": "success" }
get_property_string
Like get_property, but the resulting data will always be a string.
Example:
{ "command": ["get_property_string", "volume"] }
{ "data": "50.000000", "error": "success" }
set_property
Set the given property to the given value. See Properties for more information
about properties.
Example:
{ "command": ["set_property", "pause", true] }
{ "error": "success" }
set_property_string
Alias for set_property. Both commands accept native values and strings.
observe_property
Watch a property for changes. If the given property is changed, then an event of
type property-change will be generated
Example:
{ "command": ["observe_property", 1, "volume"] }
{ "error": "success" }
{ "event": "property-change", "id": 1, "data": 52.0, "name": "volume" }
WARNING:
If the connection is closed, the IPC client is destroyed internally, and the
observed properties are unregistered. This happens for example when sending
commands to a socket with separate socat invocations. This can make it seem
like property observation does not work. You must keep the IPC connection open
to make it work.
observe_property_string
Like observe_property, but the resulting data will always be a string.
Example:
{ "command": ["observe_property_string", 1, "volume"] }
{ "error": "success" }
{ "event": "property-change", "id": 1, "data": "52.000000", "name": "volume" }
unobserve_property
Undo observe_property or observe_property_string. This requires the numeric id
passed to the observed command as argument.
Example:
{ "command": ["unobserve_property", 1] }
{ "error": "success" }
request_log_messages
Enable output of mpv log messages. They will be received as events. The parameter
to this command is the log-level (see mpv_request_log_messages C API function).
Log message output is meant for humans only (mostly for debugging). Attempting to
retrieve information by parsing these messages will just lead to breakages with
future mpv releases. Instead, make a feature request, and ask for a proper event
that returns the information you need.
enable_event, disable_event
Enables or disables the named event. Mirrors the mpv_request_event C API function.
If the string all is used instead of an event name, all events are enabled or
disabled.
By default, most events are enabled, and there is not much use for this command.
get_version
Returns the client API version the C API of the remote mpv instance provides.
See also: DOCS/client-api-changes.rst.
UTF-8
Normally, all strings are in UTF-8. Sometimes it can happen that strings are in some
broken encoding (often happens with file tags and such, and filenames on many Unixes are
not required to be in UTF-8 either). This means that mpv sometimes sends invalid JSON. If
that is a problem for the client application's parser, it should filter the raw data for
invalid UTF-8 sequences and perform the desired replacement, before feeding the data to
its JSON parser.
mpv will not attempt to construct invalid UTF-8 with broken "u" escape sequences. This
includes surrogate pairs.
JSON extensions
The following non-standard extensions are supported:
• a list or object item can have a trailing ","
• object syntax accepts "=" in addition of ":"
• object keys can be unquoted, if they start with a character in "A-Za-z_" and contain
only characters in "A-Za-z0-9_"
• byte escapes with "xAB" are allowed (with AB being a 2 digit hex number)
Example:
{ objkey = "value\x0A" }
Is equivalent to:
{ "objkey": "value\n" }
Alternative ways of starting clients
You can create an anonymous IPC connection without having to set --input-ipc-server. This
is achieved through a mpv pseudo scripting backend that starts processes.
You can put .run file extension in the mpv scripts directory in its config directory (see
the FILES section for details), or load them through other means (see Script location).
These scripts are simply executed with the OS native mechanism (as if you ran them in the
shell). They must have a proper shebang and have the executable bit set.
When executed, a socket (the IPC connection) is passed to them through file descriptor
inheritance. The file descriptor is indicated as the special command line argument
--mpv-ipc-fd=N, where N is the numeric file descriptor.
The rest is the same as with a normal --input-ipc-server IPC connection. mpv does not
attempt to observe or other interact with the started script process.
This does not work in Windows yet.
CHANGELOG
There is no real changelog, but you can look at the following things:
• The release changelog, which should contain most user-visible changes, including new
features and bug fixes:
https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/releases
• The git log, which is the "real" changelog
• The file https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/blob/master/DOCS/interface-changes.rst
documents changes to the command and user interface, such as options and properties. (It
usually documents breaking changes only, additions and enhancements are often not
listed.)
• C API changes are listed in
https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/blob/master/DOCS/client-api-changes.rst
• The file mplayer-changes.rst in the DOCS sub directory on the git repository, which used
to be in place of this section. It documents some changes that happened since mplayer2
forked off MPlayer. (Not updated anymore.)
EMBEDDING INTO OTHER PROGRAMS (LIBMPV)
mpv can be embedded into other programs as video/audio playback backend. The recommended
way to do so is using libmpv. See libmpv/client.h in the mpv source code repository. This
provides a C API. Bindings for other languages might be available (see wiki).
Since libmpv merely allows access to underlying mechanisms that can control mpv, further
documentation is spread over a few places:
• https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv/blob/master/libmpv/client.h
• https://mpv.io/manual/master/#options
• https://mpv.io/manual/master/#list-of-input-commands
• https://mpv.io/manual/master/#properties
• https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv-examples/tree/master/libmpv
C PLUGINS
You can write C plugins for mpv. These use the libmpv API, although they do not use the
libmpv library itself.
They are enabled by default if compiler supports linking with the -rdynamic flag on
Linux/BSD platforms. On Windows the are always enabled.
C plugins location
C plugins are put into the mpv scripts directory in its config directory (see the FILES
section for details). They must have a .so or .dll file extension. They can also be
explicitly loaded with the --script option.
API
A C plugin must export the following function:
int mpv_open_cplugin(mpv_handle *handle)
The plugin function will be called on loading time. This function does not return as long
as your plugin is loaded (it runs in its own thread). The handle will be deallocated as
soon as the plugin function returns.
The return value is interpreted as error status. A value of 0 is interpreted as success,
while -1 signals an error. In the latter case, the player prints an uninformative error
message that loading failed.
Return values other than 0 and -1 are reserved, and trigger undefined behavior.
Within the plugin function, you can call libmpv API functions. The handle is created by
mpv_create_client() (or actually an internal equivalent), and belongs to you. You can call
mpv_wait_event() to wait for things happening, and so on.
Note that the player might block until your plugin calls mpv_wait_event() for the first
time. This gives you a chance to install initial hooks etc. before playback begins.
The details are quite similar to Lua scripts.
Linkage to libmpv
The current implementation requires that your plugins are not linked against libmpv. What
your plugins use are not symbols from a libmpv binary, but symbols from the mpv host
binary.
On Windows to make symbols from the host binary available, you have to define
MPV_CPLUGIN_DYNAMIC_SYM when compiling cplugin. This will load symbols dynamically, before
calling mpv_open_cplugin().
Examples
See:
• https://github.com/mpv-player/mpv-examples/tree/master/cplugins
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
There are a number of environment variables that can be used to control the behavior of
mpv.
HOME, XDG_CONFIG_HOME
Used to determine mpv config directory. If XDG_CONFIG_HOME is not set,
$HOME/.config/mpv is used.
$HOME/.mpv is always added to the list of config search paths with a lower
priority.
MPV_HOME
Directory where mpv looks for user settings. Overrides HOME, and mpv will try to
load the config file as $MPV_HOME/mpv.conf.
MPV_VERBOSE (see also -v and --msg-level)
Set the initial verbosity level across all message modules (default: 0). This is
an integer, and the resulting verbosity corresponds to the number of --v options
passed to the command line.
MPV_LEAK_REPORT
If set to 1, enable internal talloc leak reporting. If set to another value,
disable leak reporting. If unset, use the default, which normally is 0. If mpv was
built with --enable-ta-leak-report, the default is 1. If leak reporting was
disabled at compile time (NDEBUG in custom CFLAGS), this environment variable is
ignored.
LADSPA_PATH
Specifies the search path for LADSPA plugins. If it is unset, fully qualified path
names must be used.
DISPLAY
Standard X11 display name to use.
FFmpeg/Libav:
This library accesses various environment variables. However, they are not
centrally documented, and documenting them is not our job. Therefore, this list is
incomplete.
Notable environment variables:
http_proxy
URL to proxy for http:// and https:// URLs.
no_proxy
List of domain patterns for which no proxy should be used. List entries are
separated by ,. Patterns can include *.
libdvdcss:
DVDCSS_CACHE
Specify a directory in which to store title key values. This will speed up
descrambling of DVDs which are in the cache. The DVDCSS_CACHE directory is
created if it does not exist, and a subdirectory is created named after the
DVD's title or manufacturing date. If DVDCSS_CACHE is not set or is empty,
libdvdcss will use the default value which is ${HOME}/.dvdcss/ under Unix
and the roaming application data directory (%APPDATA%) under Windows. The
special value "off" disables caching.
DVDCSS_METHOD
Sets the authentication and decryption method that libdvdcss will use to
read scrambled discs. Can be one of title, key or disc.
key is the default method. libdvdcss will use a set of calculated player
keys to try to get the disc key. This can fail if the drive does not
recognize any of the player keys.
disc is a fallback method when key has failed. Instead of using player
keys, libdvdcss will crack the disc key using a brute force
algorithm. This process is CPU intensive and requires 64 MB of memory
to store temporary data.
title is the fallback when all other methods have failed. It does not rely
on a key exchange with the DVD drive, but rather uses a crypto attack
to guess the title key. On rare cases this may fail because there is
not enough encrypted data on the disc to perform a statistical
attack, but on the other hand it is the only way to decrypt a DVD
stored on a hard disc, or a DVD with the wrong region on an RPC2
drive.
DVDCSS_RAW_DEVICE
Specify the raw device to use. Exact usage will depend on your operating
system, the Linux utility to set up raw devices is raw(8) for instance.
Please note that on most operating systems, using a raw device requires
highly aligned buffers: Linux requires a 2048 bytes alignment (which is the
size of a DVD sector).
DVDCSS_VERBOSE
Sets the libdvdcss verbosity level.
0 Outputs no messages at all.
1 Outputs error messages to stderr.
2 Outputs error messages and debug messages to stderr.
DVDREAD_NOKEYS
Skip retrieving all keys on startup. Currently disabled.
HOME FIXME: Document this.
EXIT CODES
Normally mpv returns 0 as exit code after finishing playback successfully. If errors
happen, the following exit codes can be returned:
1 Error initializing mpv. This is also returned if unknown options are passed to
mpv.
2 The file passed to mpv couldn't be played. This is somewhat fuzzy: currently,
playback of a file is considered to be successful if initialization was mostly
successful, even if playback fails immediately after initialization.
3 There were some files that could be played, and some files which couldn't (using
the definition of success from above).
4 Quit due to a signal, Ctrl+c in a VO window (by default), or from the default
quit key bindings in encoding mode.
Note that quitting the player manually will always lead to exit code 0, overriding the
exit code that would be returned normally. Also, the quit input command can take an exit
code: in this case, that exit code is returned.
FILES
Note that this section assumes Linux/BSD. On other platforms the paths may be different.
For Windows-specifics, see FILES ON WINDOWS section.
/usr/local/etc/mpv/mpv.conf
mpv system-wide settings (depends on --prefix passed to configure - mpv in default
configuration will use /usr/local/etc/mpv/ as config directory, while most Linux
distributions will set it to /etc/mpv/).
~/.cache/mpv
The standard cache directory. Certain options within mpv may cause it to write
cache files to disk. This can be overridden by environment variables, in ascending
order:
1 If $XDG_CACHE_HOME is set, then the derived cache directory will be
$XDG_CACHE_HOME/mpv.
2 If $MPV_HOME is set, then the derived cache directory will be $MPV_HOME.
If the directory does not exist, mpv will try to create it automatically.
~/.config/mpv
The standard configuration directory. This can be overridden by environment
variables, in ascending order:
1 If $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is set, then the derived configuration directory will be
$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/mpv.
2 If $MPV_HOME is set, then the derived configuration directory will be
$MPV_HOME.
If this directory, nor the original configuration directory (see below) do not
exist, mpv tries to create this directory automatically.
~/.mpv/
The original (pre 0.5.0) configuration directory. It will continue to be read if
present. If this directory is present and the standard configuration directory is
not present, then cache files and watch later config files will also be written to
this directory.
If both this directory and the standard configuration directory are present,
configuration will be read from both with the standard configuration directory
content taking precedence. However, you should fully migrate to the standard
directory and a warning will be shown in this situation.
~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf
mpv user settings (see CONFIGURATION FILES section)
~/.config/mpv/input.conf
key bindings (see INPUT.CONF section)
~/.config/mpv/fonts.conf
Fontconfig fonts.conf that is customized for mpv. You should include system
fonts.conf in this file or mpv would not know about fonts that you already have in
the system.
Only available when libass is built with fontconfig.
~/.config/mpv/subfont.ttf
fallback subtitle font
~/.config/mpv/fonts/
Default location for --sub-fonts-dir (see Subtitles) and --osd-fonts-dir (see OSD).
~/.config/mpv/scripts/
All files in this directory are loaded as if they were passed to the --script
option. They are loaded in alphabetical order.
The --load-scripts=no option disables loading these files.
See Script location for details.
~/.local/state/mpv/watch_later/
Contains temporary config files needed for resuming playback of files with the
watch later feature. See for example the Q key binding, or the quit-watch-later
input command.
This can be overridden by environment variables, in ascending order:
1 If $XDG_STATE_HOME is set, then the derived watch later directory will be
$XDG_STATE_HOME/mpv/watch_later.
2 If $MPV_HOME is set, then the derived watch later directory will be
$MPV_HOME/watch_later.
Each file is a small config file which is loaded if the corresponding media file is
loaded. It contains the playback position and some (not necessarily all) settings
that were changed during playback. The filenames are hashed from the full paths of
the media files. It's in general not possible to extract the media filename from
this hash. However, you can set the --write-filename-in-watch-later-config option,
and the player will add the media filename to the contents of the resume config
file.
~/.config/mpv/script-opts/osc.conf
This is loaded by the OSC script. See the ON SCREEN CONTROLLER docs for details.
Other files in this directory are specific to the corresponding scripts as well,
and the mpv core doesn't touch them.
FILES ON WINDOWS
On win32 (if compiled with MinGW, but not Cygwin), the default config file locations are
different. They are generally located under %APPDATA%/mpv/. For example, the path to
mpv.conf is %APPDATA%/mpv/mpv.conf, which maps to a system and user-specific path, for
example
C:\users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\mpv\mpv.conf
You can find the exact path by running echo %APPDATA%\mpv\mpv.conf in cmd.exe.
Other config files (such as input.conf) are in the same directory. See the FILES section
above.
The cache directory is located at %LOCALAPPDATA%/mpv/cache.
The watch_later directory is located at %LOCALAPPDATA%/mpv/watch_later.
The environment variable $MPV_HOME completely overrides these, like on UNIX.
If a directory named portable_config next to the mpv.exe exists, all config will be loaded
from this directory only. Watch later config files and cache files are written to this
directory as well. (This exists on Windows only and is redundant with $MPV_HOME. However,
since Windows is very scripting unfriendly, a wrapper script just setting $MPV_HOME, like
you could do it on other systems, won't work. portable_config is provided for convenience
to get around this restriction.)
Config files located in the same directory as mpv.exe are loaded with lower priority. Some
config files are loaded only once, which means that e.g. of 2 input.conf files located in
two config directories, only the one from the directory with higher priority will be
loaded.
A third config directory with the lowest priority is the directory named mpv in the same
directory as mpv.exe. This used to be the directory with the highest priority, but is now
discouraged to use and might be removed in the future.
Note that mpv likes to mix / and \ path separators for simplicity. kernel32.dll accepts
this, but cmd.exe does not.
FILES ON MACOS
On macOS the watch later directory is located at ~/.config/mpv/watch_later/ and the cache
directory is set to ~/Library/Caches/io.mpv/. These directories can't be overwritten by
enviroment variables. Everything else is the same as FILES.
COPYRIGHT
GPLv2+
MPV(1)