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🎥 Command line media player
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##############a media player##############
:Copyright: GPLv2+:Manual section: 1:Manual group: multimedia
.. contents:: Table of Contents
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 videofile formats, audio and video codecs, and subtitle types. Special input URLtypes are available to read input from a variety of sources other than diskfiles. Depending on platform, a variety of different video and audio outputmethods are supported.
Usage examples to get you started quickly can be found at the end of this manpage.
INTERACTIVE CONTROL===================
mpv has a fully configurable, command-driven control layer which allows youto control mpv using keyboard, mouse, or remote control (there is noLIRC 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`` fora list of default bindings. User ``input.conf`` files and Lua scripts candefine additional key bindings.
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.
[ 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 between normal and playback time/duration.
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.
L Toggle infinite looping.
Ctrl + and Ctrl - Adjust audio delay (A/V sync) by +/- 0.1 seconds.
u Switch between applying no style overrides 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 t Move subtitles up/down.
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.
(The following keys are valid only when using a video output that supports thecorresponding 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.
Alt+0 (and command+0 on OSX) Resize video window to half its original size.
Alt+1 (and command+1 on OSX) Resize video window to its original size.
Alt+2 (and command+2 on OSX) Resize video window to double its original size.
command + f (OSX 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.
If you miss some older key bindings, look at ``etc/restore-old-bindings.conf``in the mpv git repository.
Mouse Control-------------
button 3 and button 4 Seek backward/forward 1 minute.
button 5 and button 6 Decrease/increase volume.
USAGE=====
Command line arguments starting with ``-`` are interpreted as options,everything else as filenames or URLs. All options except *flag* options (orchoice options which include ``yes``) require a parameter in the form``--option=value``.
One exception is the lone ``-`` (without anything else), which means media datawill be read from stdin. Also, ``--`` (without anything else) will make theplayer 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 withthe *XXX* option or if *XXX* is compiled in.
Legacy option syntax--------------------
The ``--option=value`` syntax is not strictly enforced, and the alternativelegacy syntax ``-option value`` and ``--option value`` will also work. This ismostly for compatibility with MPlayer. Using these should be avoided. Theirsemantics can change any time in the future.
For example, the alternative syntax will consider an argument following theoption 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 optionchanges and its parameter becomes optional, then a command line using thealternative syntax will break.
Currently, the parser makes no difference whether an option starts with ``--``or a single ``-``. This might also change in the future, and ``--option value``might always interpret ``value`` as filename in order to reduce ambiguities.
Escaping spaces and other special characters--------------------------------------------
Keep in mind that the shell will partially parse and mangle the arguments youpass to mpv. For example, you might need to quote or escape options andfilenames:
``mpv "filename with spaces.mkv" --title="window title"``
It gets more complicated if the suboption parser is involved. The suboptionparser puts several options into a single string, and passes them to acomponent at once, instead of using multiple options on the level of thecommand 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. Ifan option contains spaces or characters like ``,`` or ``:``, you need to quotethem:
``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'suseful with shells that don't interpret these characters in the middle ofan 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 externalscripts and programs.
It is started with ``%`` and has the following format::
%n%string_of_length_n
.. admonition:: Examples
``mpv '--vf=foo:option1=%11%quoted text' test.avi``
Or in a script:
``mpv --vf=foo:option1=%`expr length "$NAME"`%"$NAME" test.avi``
Suboptions passed to the client API are also subject to escaping. Using``mpv_set_option_string()`` is exactly like passing ``--name=data`` to thecommand line (but without shell processing of the string). Some optionssupport passing values in a more structured way instead of flat strings, andcan avoid the suboption parsing mess. For example, ``--vf`` supports``MPV_FORMAT_NODE``, which lets you pass suboptions as a nested data structureof maps and arrays.
Paths-----
Some care must be taken when passing arbitrary paths and filenames to mpv. Forexample, paths starting with ``-`` will be interpreted as options. Likewise,if a path contains the sequence ``://``, the string before that might beinterpreted as protocol prefix, even though ``://`` can be part of a legalUNIX path. To avoid problems with arbitrary paths, you should be sure thatabsolute paths passed to mpv start with ``/``, and prefix relative paths with``./``.
Using the ``file://`` pseudo-protocol is discouraged, because it involvesstrange URL unescaping rules.
The name ``-`` itself is interpreted as stdin, and will cause mpv to disableconsole controls. (Which makes it suitable for playing data piped to stdin.)
The special argument ``--`` can be used to stop mpv from interpreting thefollowing 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 theneed to escape special characters. To work this around, the path can beadditionally 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``~~/`` expands to the mpv configuration directory (usually ``~/.config/mpv/``).``~/`` expands to the user's home directory. (The trailing ``/`` is alwaysrequired.) There are the following paths as well:
================ ===============================================================Name Meaning================ ===============================================================``~~home/`` same as ``~~/````~~global/`` the global config path, if available (not on win32)``~~osxbundle/`` the OSX bundle resource path (OSX only)``~~desktop/`` the path to the desktop (win32, OSX)================ ===============================================================
Per-File Options----------------
When playing multiple files, any option given on the command line usuallyaffects 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 notreset when a new file is played.
Sometimes, it is useful to change options per-file. This can be achieved byadding the special per-file markers ``--{`` and ``--}``. (Note that you mustescape 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 currentfile stops playing. If option ``--c`` is changed during playback of``file2.mkv``, it is reset when advancing to ``file3.mkv``. This only affectsfile-local options. The option ``--a`` is never reset here.
List Options------------
Some options which store lists of option values can have action suffixes. Forexample, you can set a ``,``-separated list of filters with ``--vf``, but theoption also allows you to append filters with ``--vf-append``.
Options for filenames do not use ``,`` as separator, but ``:`` (Unix) or ``;``(Windows).
============= ===============================================Suffix Meaning============= ===============================================-add Append 1 or more items (may become alias for -append)-append Append single item (avoids need for escaping)-clr Clear the option-del Delete an existing item by integer index-pre Prepend 1 or more items-set Set a list of items============= ===============================================
Although some operations allow specifying multiple ``,``-separated items, usingthis is strongly discouraged and deprecated, except for ``-set``.
Without suffix, the action taken is normally ``-set``.
Some options (like ``--sub-file``, ``--audio-file``, ``--glsl-shader``) arealiases for the proper option with ``-append`` action. For example,``--sub-file`` is an alias for ``--sub-files-append``.
Some options only support a subset of the above.
Playing DVDs------------
DVDs can be played with the ``dvd://[title]`` syntax. The optionaltitle specifier is a number which selects between separate videostreams on the DVD. If no title is given (``dvd://``) then the longesttitle is selected automatically by the library. This is usually whatyou want. mpv does not support DVD menus.
DVDs which have been copied on to a hard drive or other mountedfilesystem (by e.g. the ``dvdbackup`` tool) are accommodated byspecifying the path to the local copy: ``--dvd-device=PATH``.Alternatively, running ``mpv PATH`` should auto-detect a DVD directorytree and play the longest title.
.. note:: DVD library choices
mpv uses a different default DVD library than MPlayer. MPlayer uses libdvdread by default, and mpv uses libdvdnav by default. Both libraries are developed in parallel, but libdvdnav is intended to support more sophisticated DVD features such as menus and multi-angle playback. mpv uses libdvdnav for files specified as either ``dvd://...`` or ``dvdnav://...``. To use libdvdread, which will produce behavior more like MPlayer, specify ``dvdread://...`` instead. Some users have experienced problems when using libdvdnav, in which playback gets stuck in a DVD menu stream. These problems are reported to go away when auto-selecting the title (``dvd://`` rather than ``dvd://1``) or when using libdvdread (e.g. ``dvdread://0``). There are also outstanding bugs in libdvdnav with seeking backwards and forwards in a video stream. Specify ``dvdread://...`` to fix such problems.
.. note:: DVD subtitles DVDs use image-based subtitles. Image subtitles are implemented as a bitmap video stream which can be superimposed over the main movie. mpv's subtitle styling and positioning options and keyboard shortcuts generally do not work with image-based subtitles. Exceptions include options like ``--stretch-dvd-subs`` and ``--stretch-image-subs-to-screen``.
CONFIGURATION FILES===================
Location and Syntax-------------------
You can put all of the options in configuration files which will be read everytime mpv is run. The system-wide configuration file 'mpv.conf' is in yourconfiguration directory (e.g. ``/etc/mpv`` or ``/usr/local/etc/mpv``), theuser-specific one is ``~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf``. For details and platformspecifics (in particular Windows paths) see the `FILES`_ section.
User-specific options override system-wide options and options given on thecommand line override either. The syntax of the configuration files is``option=value``. Everything after a *#* is considered a comment. Optionsthat work without values can be enabled by setting them to *yes* and disabled bysetting them to *no*. Even suboptions can be specified in this way.
.. admonition:: Example configuration file
::
# Use GPU-accelerated video output by default. vo=gpu # Use quotes for text that can contain spaces: status-msg="Time: ${time-pos}"
Escaping spaces and special characters--------------------------------------
This is done like with command line options. The shell is not involved here,but option values still need to be quoted as a whole if it contains certaincharacters like spaces. A config entry can be quoted with ``"``,as well as with the fixed-length syntax (``%n%``) mentioned before. This is likepassing the exact contents of the quoted string as command line option. C-styleescapes are currently _not_ interpreted on this level, although some options dothis manually. (This is a mess and should probably be changed at some point.)
Putting Command Line Options into the Configuration File--------------------------------------------------------
Almost all command line options can be put into the configuration file. Hereis 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 aconfiguration 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 directoryas 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 afile-specific configuration file is found in the same directory, nofile-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 directoryas the file played and then tries to load any file-specific configuration.
Profiles--------
To ease working with different configurations, profiles can be defined in theconfiguration files. A profile starts with its name in square brackets,e.g. ``[my-profile]``. All following options will be part of the profile. Adescription (shown by ``--profile=help``) can be defined with the``profile-desc`` option. To end the profile, start another one or use theprofile name ``default`` to continue with normal options.
.. admonition:: 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=123400 demuxer-readahead-secs=20
[slow] profile-desc="some profile name" # reference a builtin profile profile=gpu-hq
[fast] vo=vdpau
# using a profile again extends it [slow] framedrop=no # you can also include other profiles profile=big-cache
Auto profiles-------------
Some profiles are loaded automatically. The following example demonstrates this:
.. admonition:: Auto profile loading
::
[protocol.dvd] profile-desc="profile for dvd:// streams" alang=en
[extension.flv] profile-desc="profile for .flv files" vf=flip
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 there are no other auto profiles.
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 firstavailable number - no files will be overwritten. In pseudo-GUI mode, thescreenshot will be saved somewhere else. See `PSEUDO GUI MODE`_.
A screenshot will usually contain the unscaled video contents at the end of thevideo filter chain and subtitles. By default, ``S`` takes screenshots withoutsubtitles, while ``s`` includes subtitles.
Unlike with MPlayer, the ``screenshot`` video filter is not required. Thisfilter was never required in mpv, and has been removed.
TERMINAL STATUS LINE====================
During playback, mpv shows the playback status on the terminal. It looks likesomething 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. Inputproperties, that can be used to get the same information manually, are alsolisted.
- ``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) (``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.- 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. (``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 happens only if decoder frame dropping is enabled with the ``--framedrop`` options. (``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 the sum of the demuxer forward cache size and the *additional* data buffered in the stream cache in kilobytes. (``demuxer-cache-duration``, ``demuxer-cache-state``, ``cache-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.
``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 (enabled by default for mpv CLI) only looks at http 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.
``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 directory directly.
``title`` can be: ``longest`` or ``first`` (selects the default playlist); ``mpls/<number>`` (selects <number>.mpls playlist); ``<number>`` (select playlist with the same index). You can list the available playlists with ``--msg-level=bd=v``.
``bluray://`` is an alias.
``dvd://[title|[starttitle]-endtitle][/device]`` ``--dvd-device=PATH``
Play a DVD. DVD menus are not supported. 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, and to work around outstanding dvdnav bugs (see "DVD library choices" above).
``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://[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.
``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.
``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.
``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`_), whichis not a full GUI and is not meant to be. However, to compensate for the lackof expected GUI behavior, mpv will in some cases start with some settingschanged 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 OSX- if you manually use ``--player-operation-mode=pseudo-gui`` on the command line
This mode applies options from the builtin profile ``builtin-pseudo-gui``, butonly if these haven't been set in the user's config file or on the command line.Also, for compatibility with the old pseudo-gui behavior, the options in the``pseudo-gui`` profile are applied unconditionally. In addition, the profilemakes sure to enable the pseudo-GUI mode, so that ``--profile=pseudo-gui``works like in older mpv releases. The profiles are currently defined as follows:
::
[builtin-pseudo-gui] terminal=no force-window=yes idle=once screenshot-directory=~~desktop/ [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.
.. 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:: stats.rst
.. include:: lua.rst
.. include:: javascript.rst
.. include:: ipc.rst
.. include:: changes.rst
.. include:: libmpv.rst
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES=====================
There are a number of environment variables that can be used to control thebehavior of mpv.
``HOME``, ``XDG_CONFIG_HOME`` Used to determine mpv config directory. If ``XDG_CONFIG_HOME`` is not set, ``$HOME/.config/mpv`` is used.
``$HOME/.mpv`` is always added to the list of config search paths with a lower priority.
``XDG_CONFIG_DIRS`` If set, XDG-style system configuration directories are used. Otherwise, the UNIX convention (``PREFIX/etc/mpv/``) is used.
``MPV_HOME`` Directory where mpv looks for user settings. Overrides ``HOME``, and mpv will try to load the config file as ``$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.
``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=====
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/``).
``~/.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/`` 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 above) to include additional fonts, which is more memory-efficient.
``~/.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, and sub-directories and files with no ``.lua`` extension are ignored. The ``--load-scripts=no`` option disables loading these files.
``~/.config/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.
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/lua-settings/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.
Note that the environment variables ``$XDG_CONFIG_HOME`` and ``$MPV_HOME`` canoverride the standard directory ``~/.config/mpv/``.
Also, the old config location at ``~/.mpv/`` is still read, and if the XDGvariant does not exist, will still be preferred.
FILES ON WINDOWS================
On win32 (if compiled with MinGW, but not Cygwin), the default config filelocations are different. They are generally located under ``%APPDATA%/mpv/``.For example, the path to mpv.conf is ``%APPDATA%/mpv/mpv.conf``, which maps toa system and user-specific path, for example
``C:\users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\mpv\mpv.conf``
You can find the exact path by running ``echo %APPDATA%\mpv\mpv.conf`` in cmd.exe.
Other config files (such as ``input.conf``) are in the same directory. See the`FILES`_ section above.
The environment variable ``$MPV_HOME`` completely overrides these, like onUNIX.
If a directory named ``portable_config`` next to the mpv.exe exists, allconfig will be loaded from this directory only. Watch later config files arewritten to this directory as well. (This exists on Windows only and is redundantwith ``$MPV_HOME``. However, since Windows is very scripting unfriendly, awrapper script just setting ``$MPV_HOME``, like you could do it on othersystems, won't work. ``portable_config`` is provided for convenience to getaround this restriction.)
Config files located in the same directory as ``mpv.exe`` are loaded withlower priority. Some config files are loaded only once, which means thate.g. of 2 ``input.conf`` files located in two config directories, only theone 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 thehighest priority, but is now discouraged to use and might be removed in thefuture.
Note that mpv likes to mix ``/`` and ``\`` path separators for simplicity.kernel32.dll accepts this, but cmd.exe does not.