mpv ### ############## a media player ############## :Copyright: GPLv2+ :Manual section: 1 :Manual group: multimedia 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, joystick or remote control (with LIRC). See the ``--input-`` options for ways to customize it. 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 work always; see ``sub_seek`` command. [ and ] Decrease/increase current playback speed by 10%. { and } Halve/double current playback speed. BACKSPACE Reset playback speed to normal. < and > Go backward/forward in the playlist. ENTER Go forward in the playlist. p / 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. / 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. f Toggle fullscreen (see also ``--fs``). ESC Exit fullscreen mode. T Toggle stay-on-top (see also ``--ontop``). w and e Decrease/increase pan-and-scan range. o (also P) Show progression bar, elapsed time and total duration on the OSD. O Toggle OSD states: none / seek / seek + timer / seek + timer + total time. d Toggle frame dropping states: none / skip display / skip decoding (see ``--framedrop``). v Toggle subtitle visibility. j and J Cycle through the available subtitles. x and z Adjust subtitle delay by +/- 0.1 seconds. l Set/clear A-B loop points. See ``ab_loop`` command for details. Ctrl + and Ctrl - Adjust audio delay by +/- 0.1 seconds. V Toggle subtitle VSFilter aspect compatibility mode. See ``--ass-vsfilter-aspect-compat`` for more info. r and t Move subtitles up/down. s Take a screenshot. S Take a screenshot, without subtitles. (Whether this works depends on VO driver support.) I Show filename on the OSD. 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. (The following keys are valid only when using a video output that supports the corresponding adjustment, or the software equalizer (``--vf=eq``).) 1 and 2 Adjust contrast. 3 and 4 Adjust brightness. 5 and 6 Adjust gamma. 7 and 8 Adjust saturation. (The following keys are valid only on OS X.) command + 0 Resize video window to half its original size. (On other platforms, you can bind keys to change the ``window-scale`` property.) command + 1 Resize video window to its original size. command + 2 Resize video window to double its original size. command + f Toggle fullscreen (see also ``--fs``). command + [ and command + ] Set video window alpha. (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. (The following keys are only valid if you compiled with TV or DVB input support.) h and k Select previous/next channel. Mouse Control ------------- button 3 and button 4 Seek backward/forward 1 minute. button 5 and button 6 Decrease/increase volume. USAGE ===== 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. .. note:: The suboption parser (used for example for ``--ao=pcm`` suboptions) supports a special kind of string-escaping intended for use with external GUIs. It has the following format:: %n%string_of_length_n .. admonition:: Examples ``mpv --ao=pcm:file=%10%C:test.wav test.avi`` Or in a script: ``mpv --ao=pcm:file=%`expr length "$NAME"`%"$NAME" test.avi`` 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 relative paths with ``./``. 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.) 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 ``%n%string_of_length_n`` syntax (see above). Some mpv options interpret paths starting with ``~``. Currently, the prefix ``~~/`` expands to the mpv configuration directory (usually ``~/.config/mpv/``). ``~/`` expands to the user's home directory. (The trailing ``/`` is always required.) 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. 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``. User-specific options override system-wide options and options given on the command line override either. The syntax of the configuration files is ``option=``; 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*. Even suboptions can be specified in this way. .. admonition:: Example configuration file :: # Use opengl video output by default. vo=opengl # Use quotes for text that can contain spaces: status-msg="Time: ${time-pos}" 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. .. admonition:: Example mpv profile :: [vo.vdpau] # Use hardware decoding (might break playback of some h264 files) hwdec=vdpau [protocol.dvd] profile-desc="profile for dvd:// streams" vf=pp=hb/vb/dr/al/fd alang=en [extension.flv] profile-desc="profile for .flv files" vf=flip [ao.alsa] device=spdif 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 ``shotNNNN.jpg`` will be saved in the working directory, using the first available number - no files will be overwritten. 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. The ``screenshot`` video filter is not required when using a recommended GUI video output driver. It should normally not be added to the config file, as taking screenshots is handled by the VOs, and adding the screenshot filter will break hardware decoding. (The filter may still be useful for taking screenshots at a certain point within the video chain when using multiple video filters.) 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 (or ``00:00:00`` if unknown) (``length`` 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. - 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. Also can be incremented on "hiccups" and when the video frame couldn't be displayed on time. (``vo-drop-frame-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 should almost never happen, unless decoder-framedropping is enabled with one of the ``--framedrop`` options, the stream contains errors, or a weird codec is in use. (``drop-frame-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 *additional* data buffered in the stream cache in kilobytes. (``demuxer-cache-duration`` and ``cached-used`` properties.) 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. ``-`` Play data from stdin. ``smb://PATH`` Play a path from Samba share. ``bd://[title][/device]`` ``--bluray-device=PATH`` Play a Blu-Ray disc. Currently, this does not accept ISO files. Instead, you must mount the ISO file as filesystem, and point ``--bluray-device`` to the mounted directly. ``bdnav://[title][/device]`` Play a Blu-Ray disc, with navigation features enabled. This feature is permanently experimental. ``dvd://[title|[starttitle]-endtitle][/device]`` ``--dvd-device=PATH`` Play a DVD. If you want dvdnav menus, use ``dvd://menu``. If no title is given, the longest title is auto-selected. ``dvdnav://`` is an old alias for ``dvd://`` and does exactly the same thing. ``dvdread://...:`` Play a DVD using the old libdvdread code. This is what MPlayer and older mpv versions use for ``dvd://``. Use is discouraged. It's provided only for compatibility and for transition. ``tv://[channel][/input_id]`` ``--tv-...`` Analogue TV via V4L. Also useful for webcams. (Linux only.) ``pvr://`` ``--pvr-...`` PVR. (Linux only.) ``dvb://[cardnumber@]channel`` ``--dvbin-...`` Digital TV via DVB. (Linux only.) ``mf://[filemask|@listfile]`` ``--mf-...`` Play a series of images as video. ``cdda://track[-endtrack][:speed][/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. For example, ``mpv av://lavfi:mandelbrot`` makes use of the libavfilter wrapper included in libavdevice, and will use the ``mandelbrot`` source filter to generate input data. ``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. ``edl://[edl specification as in edl-mpv.rst]`` Stitch together parts of multiple files and play them. ``null://`` Simulate an empty file. ``memory://data`` Use the ``data`` part as source data. .. include:: options.rst .. include:: ao.rst .. include:: vo.rst .. include:: af.rst .. include:: vf.rst .. include:: encode.rst .. include:: input.rst .. include:: osc.rst .. include:: lua.rst .. include:: ipc.rst .. include:: changes.rst 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. ``$HOME/.mpv`` is always added to the list of config search paths with a lower priority. ``XDG_CONFIG_DIRS`` If set, XDG-style system configuration directories are used. Otherwise, the UNIX convention (``PREFIX/etc/mpv/``) is used. ``TERM`` Used to determine terminal type. ``MPV_HOME`` Directory where mpv looks for user settings. Overrides ``HOME``, and mpv will try to load the config file as ``$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. Note that this can cause trouble with multithreading, so only developers should use this. ``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 and 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). 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 ===== ``/usr/local/etc/mpv/mpv.conf`` mpv system-wide settings (depends on ``--prefix`` passed to configure) ``~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf`` mpv user settings ``~/.config/mpv/input.conf`` key bindings (see `INPUT.CONF`_ section) ``~/.config/mpv/lua/`` All files in this directly are loaded as if they were passed to the ``--lua`` option. They are loaded in alphabetical order, and sub-directories and files with no ``.lua`` extension are ignored. The ``--load-scripts=no`` option disables loading these files. Note that the environment variables ``$XDG_CONFIG_HOME`` and ``$MPV_HOME`` can override the standard directory ``~/.config/mpv/``. Also, the old config location at ``~/.mpv/`` is still read, and if the XDG variant does not exist, will still be preferred. FILES ON WINDOWS ================ On win32 (if compiled with MinGW, but not Cygwin), the default config file locations are different: ``%APPDATA%/mpv/mpv.conf`` Preferred mpv config file. This maps to a system and user-specific path, for example ``C:\users\USERNAME\Application Data\mpv\mpv.conf``. You can find the exact path by running ``echo %APPDATA%\mpv\mpv.conf`` in cmd.exe. ``%APPDATA%/mpv/input.conf`` key bindings (see `INPUT.CONF`_ section) ``%APPDATA%/mpv/lua/`` equivalent of ``~/.config/mpv/lua/`` on Unix. The environment variable ``$MPV_HOME`` completely overrides these, like on UNIX. 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 lowest priority is the directory named ``mpv`` in the same directory as ``mpv.exe``. This used to be the directory with 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. EXAMPLES OF MPV USAGE ===================== Blu-ray playback: - ``mpv bd:////path/to/disc`` - ``mpv bd:// --bluray-device=/path/to/disc`` Play in Japanese with English subtitles: ``mpv dvd://1 --alang=ja --slang=en`` Play only chapters 5, 6, 7: ``mpv dvd://1 --chapter=5-7`` Play only titles 5, 6, 7: ``mpv dvd://5-7`` Play a multi-angle DVD: ``mpv dvd://1 --dvd-angle=2`` Play from a different DVD device: ``mpv dvd://1 --dvd-device=/dev/dvd2`` Play DVD video from a directory with VOB files: ``mpv dvd://1 --dvd-device=/path/to/directory/`` Stream from HTTP: ``mpv http://example.com/example.avi`` Stream using RTSP: ``mpv rtsp://server.example.com/streamName`` Play a libavfilter graph: ``mpv avdevice://lavfi:mandelbrot`` AUTHORS ======= mpv is a MPlayer fork based on mplayer2, which in turn is a fork of MPlayer. MPlayer was initially written by Arpad Gereoffy. See the ``AUTHORS`` file for a list of some of the many other contributors. MPlayer is (C) 2000-2013 The MPlayer Team This man page was written mainly by Gabucino, Jonas Jermann and Diego Biurrun.