{"slug": "vlc", "name": "VLC", "category": "media", "category_name": "Media and creative", "description": "Free, open-source, cross-platform media player for video and audio files and streams.", "recommenders": 12, "commenters": 33, "warners": 6, "score": 8.989, "rising": -2.6, "first": "2025-11-07", "latest": "2026-10-16", "why": "HN commenters recommend VLC as a free, go-to player for general video and audio playback, and as a feature-rich app for offline music on phones.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 12, "neutral": 15, "compare": 1, "warn": 6}, "spark": [1, 1, 2, 2, 0, 1, 1, 3, 0, 0, 1, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["General playback", "Mobile music"], "caveat": "Clunky interface", "short_quote": "On my phone I found VLC [2] to be the best app since it has so many features.", "icon": false, "domain": "videolan.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.videolan.org/vlc/", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["VLC"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters recommend VLC as a free, go-to player for general video and audio playback", "cites": [{"id": 778661427, "item_id": 48666339, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48666339", "by": "flatline", "date": "2026-06-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC still rules the day for general media playback", "excerpt": "Thanks for checking it out! The Alice link is a generated m4b, so it\u2019s sample output that you could likely play back directly in your browser, although that may not have the cover display or chapter listing. I recommend Apple Books or Plappa on iOS, or Audiobookshelf on Android. For desktop, VLC still rules the day for general media playback, but Audibly is a Windows app that has good reviews. There are many public d", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: eBook to audiobook narration with realistic AI voices"}, {"id": 773492356, "item_id": 48343272, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48343272", "by": "fithisux", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "MPClassic or VLC worked fine", "excerpt": "There are many open source alternatives/upgrades to M$$$ products. No reason to keep using them. Literally none. I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004. Some times I needed to use MSOffice for a paper. It was always problematic. I haven't use VS since 2007. I migrated to gcc. Never had a problem. SQLServer? Only for demo and at work just to pull or save data. Postgres always saved the day", "context": "", "use_case": "media player", "switched_from": "Windows Media Player", "story": "Microsoft degrades functionality of perpetually-licensed offline products"}, {"id": 793022883, "item_id": 49563930, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "by": "flaburgan", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "put as many free software as I can (Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, VLC, Gimp...)", "excerpt": "I removed my dual boot in 2009, so the last windows I used on a personal computer was Vista. I switched my close family (parents and even my grand mother) to Linux years ago, nevertheless I still am the tech-savyy go-to person for other people and I am completely disconnected from what's going on the Windows world. Is an antivirus still needed there? Are there some good tools that should always be installed on a comp", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "O&O ShutUp10 \u2013 The antispy tool for Windows 10 and 11"}]}, {"text": ", and as a feature-rich app for offline music on phones.", "cites": [{"id": 742511010, "item_id": 46406938, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46406938", "by": "regenschutz", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "On my phone I found VLC [2] to be the best app since it has so many features.", "excerpt": "I (somewhat) recently switched from using MP3s to using streaming services. Personally, my music taste (and the amount of tracks that I listen to) is way more varied now than it was before, but I suppose that depends both on how you use streaming services and how you use local MP3s. Back when I still used exclusively MP3s, I used Music on Console Player [0] on my personal computer and Snae Player [1] on my school's c", "context": "", "use_case": "playing MP3s on phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 743184961, "item_id": 46449060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46449060", "by": "justarandomname", "date": "2025-12-31", "stance": "compare", "quote": "VLC is actually pretty good on Mobile", "excerpt": "I listen to FLAC's mostly (high quality, loseless audio files - CD quality or better) most of my collection has come from ripping CDs I owned or checked out from the library or albums bought on bandcamp, quobuz, and ototoy. I use Rhythmbox to listen to files on my PC (Linux) - I think they have/had a Windows port at some point. VLC works too but is more cumbersome for large libraries on desktop IMHO. But VLC is actua", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music on mobile", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 789468944, "item_id": 49341809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49341809", "by": "ColdStream", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Only offline files via VLC.", "excerpt": "That is a fair take. Personally, I use my android basically an iPod. Only offline files via VLC. Never hopped on the streaming bandwagon for anything but the most throw away stuff. Yes, I kept all my DVD's from decades back.", "context": "Android user, avoids streaming", "use_case": "offline music playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "I don't enjoy the Internet any more"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is that it feels clunky, especially in how it handles media libraries", "cites": [{"id": 801971696, "item_id": 50123231, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50123231", "by": "mahboi", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky.", "excerpt": "It's older than Tahoe. You can search a word and it'll find pictures containing that object. Not LLM, just vision. Music could be a lot worse. I learned what it's like playing local music on a Samsung phone recently. Had to use ADB to copy files in because Android File Transfer is deprecated. The phone has no Music equivalent, so I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky. Mea", "context": "", "use_case": "playing local music on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple routed a graphite pipe through the iPhone Duo's hinge to dissipate heat"}, {"id": 743184961, "item_id": 46449060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46449060", "by": "justarandomname", "date": "2025-12-31", "stance": "compare", "quote": "VLC is actually pretty good on Mobile", "excerpt": "I listen to FLAC's mostly (high quality, loseless audio files - CD quality or better) most of my collection has come from ripping CDs I owned or checked out from the library or albums bought on bandcamp, quobuz, and ototoy. I use Rhythmbox to listen to files on my PC (Linux) - I think they have/had a Windows port at some point. VLC works too but is more cumbersome for large libraries on desktop IMHO. But VLC is actua", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music on mobile", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 775831393, "item_id": 48489462, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48489462", "by": "al_borland", "date": "2026-06-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off.", "excerpt": "But that\u2019s all I want it to do\u2026 play the video. Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off. I moved to IINA to finally get back to a video Swiss Army knife that just plays video and doesn\u2019t force me into an experience I don\u2019t want\u2026 after tweaking a bunch of settings. A miss Perian, the codec pack for QuickTime, which gave QuickTime and QuickLo", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sweet Jeebus, macOS 27 Golden Gate Removes the Dumb Icons from Menu Items"}]}, {"text": ", along with playback and UI glitches on some Linux setups.", "cites": [{"id": 784670978, "item_id": 49041936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49041936", "by": "MiddleEndian", "date": "2026-07-24", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC can cause the UI to lock up because of some XWayland nonsense", "excerpt": "I use KDE on Bazzite. It has a couple killer UI features over Windows. It can label bluetooth devices (so I can have blue dualsense controller, pink dualsense controller, white dualsense controller, etc.). No clue why this doesn't work in Windows lol. Also the super/win + arrow keys are more predictable, super pgdn is minimize and super pgup is maximize, so I never find myself accidentally minimizing windows when try", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nothing works and everyone is euphoric"}, {"id": 779256899, "item_id": 48703556, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48703556", "by": "ProllyInfamous", "date": "2026-06-27", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC sucks on the MacPro4,1 in Ubuntu (skipping around tears the video, leaving it to lag badly)", "excerpt": "The only \"bummer\" with the 4,1 is: in order to get a bootscreen, you need to either \"hack it\" with Open Core Legacy Patcher (OCLP) -or- purchase a modified-firmware GPU from macvidcards.com (I run his custom VEGA56/firmware, personally; it's faster than most Apple Silicon for Ollama3.1 [about 74 tokens/second]) -or- use a stock Apple GPU with an additional GPU plugged into main display. With OCLP you can run Linux us", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux on Older Hardware: The Complete Revival Guide"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "General playback", "summary": "Seen as a reliable default player for video and audio on the desktop.", "quotes": [{"id": 778661427, "item_id": 48666339, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48666339", "by": "flatline", "date": "2026-06-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC still rules the day for general media playback", "excerpt": "Thanks for checking it out! The Alice link is a generated m4b, so it\u2019s sample output that you could likely play back directly in your browser, although that may not have the cover display or chapter listing. I recommend Apple Books or Plappa on iOS, or Audiobookshelf on Android. For desktop, VLC still rules the day for general media playback, but Audibly is a Windows app that has good reviews. There are many public d", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: eBook to audiobook narration with realistic AI voices"}, {"id": 773492356, "item_id": 48343272, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48343272", "by": "fithisux", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "MPClassic or VLC worked fine", "excerpt": "There are many open source alternatives/upgrades to M$$$ products. No reason to keep using them. Literally none. I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004. Some times I needed to use MSOffice for a paper. It was always problematic. I haven't use VS since 2007. I migrated to gcc. Never had a problem. SQLServer? Only for demo and at work just to pull or save data. Postgres always saved the day", "context": "", "use_case": "media player", "switched_from": "Windows Media Player", "story": "Microsoft degrades functionality of perpetually-licensed offline products"}, {"id": 735105808, "item_id": 45944113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45944113", "by": "lproven", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am a big fan of VLC", "excerpt": "I am a big fan of VLC, and I just wrote an article about it: https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/12/vlc_guru_gong/ But VLC is a multi-function tool that can play audio and video. Foobar is, as far as I can tell, just an audio player. It's more focussed and consequently smaller and simpler. That's what I like about it. I keep both on my machines and I use both... but I use VLC for video, and Foobar for just listening ", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Winamp clone in Swift for macOS"}]}, {"label": "Mobile music", "summary": "Used as the player for offline music files on Android and iOS phones.", "quotes": [{"id": 742511010, "item_id": 46406938, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46406938", "by": "regenschutz", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "On my phone I found VLC [2] to be the best app since it has so many features.", "excerpt": "I (somewhat) recently switched from using MP3s to using streaming services. Personally, my music taste (and the amount of tracks that I listen to) is way more varied now than it was before, but I suppose that depends both on how you use streaming services and how you use local MP3s. Back when I still used exclusively MP3s, I used Music on Console Player [0] on my personal computer and Snae Player [1] on my school's c", "context": "", "use_case": "playing MP3s on phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 743184961, "item_id": 46449060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46449060", "by": "justarandomname", "date": "2025-12-31", "stance": "compare", "quote": "VLC is actually pretty good on Mobile", "excerpt": "I listen to FLAC's mostly (high quality, loseless audio files - CD quality or better) most of my collection has come from ripping CDs I owned or checked out from the library or albums bought on bandcamp, quobuz, and ototoy. I use Rhythmbox to listen to files on my PC (Linux) - I think they have/had a Windows port at some point. VLC works too but is more cumbersome for large libraries on desktop IMHO. But VLC is actua", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music on mobile", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 789468944, "item_id": 49341809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49341809", "by": "ColdStream", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Only offline files via VLC.", "excerpt": "That is a fair take. Personally, I use my android basically an iPod. Only offline files via VLC. Never hopped on the streaming bandwagon for anything but the most throw away stuff. Yes, I kept all my DVD's from decades back.", "context": "Android user, avoids streaming", "use_case": "offline music playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "I don't enjoy the Internet any more"}]}, {"label": "Free software staple", "summary": "Installed alongside other free and open-source essentials on new machines.", "quotes": [{"id": 793022883, "item_id": 49563930, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "by": "flaburgan", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "put as many free software as I can (Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, VLC, Gimp...)", "excerpt": "I removed my dual boot in 2009, so the last windows I used on a personal computer was Vista. I switched my close family (parents and even my grand mother) to Linux years ago, nevertheless I still am the tech-savyy go-to person for other people and I am completely disconnected from what's going on the Windows world. Is an antivirus still needed there? Are there some good tools that should always be installed on a comp", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "O&O ShutUp10 \u2013 The antispy tool for Windows 10 and 11"}, {"id": 778308004, "item_id": 48644250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48644250", "by": "CobaltFire", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC (https://www.videolan.org/)", "excerpt": "Heres my list: Transnomino (https://www.transnomino.com/) StillColor (https://github.com/aiaf/Stillcolor) SublimeText (https://www.sublimetext.com/) Homebrew (https://brew.sh/) VLC (https://www.videolan.org/) Macs Fan Control (https://crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control) Rectangle (https://rectangleapp.com/) NetBird (https://netbird.io/) Obsidian (https://obsidian.md/) Honestly its not huge and most are probably obvious", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 745263698, "item_id": 46578981, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46578981", "by": "raziel2701", "date": "2026-01-11", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "with flatpack I installed vlc, qbittorrent and obsidian", "excerpt": "I bought a thinkpad X1 carbon refurbished for about ~$300. I wanted to travel abroad with a laptop I wouldn't mind getting stolen if it happened. During the installation of Win11 it asked me to create a microsoft account, fuck that. I installed linux mint. Very nice experience overall, so nice to not get assaulted by ads in the start menu. Pleased to see the nightlight functionality (I googled f.lux for linux and tha", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too"}]}, {"label": "Many features", "summary": "Valued as a multi-function tool, including volume boost above 100%.", "quotes": [{"id": 742511010, "item_id": 46406938, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46406938", "by": "regenschutz", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "On my phone I found VLC [2] to be the best app since it has so many features.", "excerpt": "I (somewhat) recently switched from using MP3s to using streaming services. Personally, my music taste (and the amount of tracks that I listen to) is way more varied now than it was before, but I suppose that depends both on how you use streaming services and how you use local MP3s. Back when I still used exclusively MP3s, I used Music on Console Player [0] on my personal computer and Snae Player [1] on my school's c", "context": "", "use_case": "playing MP3s on phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 735105808, "item_id": 45944113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45944113", "by": "lproven", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am a big fan of VLC", "excerpt": "I am a big fan of VLC, and I just wrote an article about it: https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/12/vlc_guru_gong/ But VLC is a multi-function tool that can play audio and video. Foobar is, as far as I can tell, just an audio player. It's more focussed and consequently smaller and simpler. That's what I like about it. I keep both on my machines and I use both... but I use VLC for video, and Foobar for just listening ", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Winamp clone in Swift for macOS"}, {"id": 795802432, "item_id": 49737652, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49737652", "by": "qingcharles", "date": "2026-09-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use it regularly in say, VLC", "excerpt": "The software has to start clipping the audio above \"100%\", but I use it regularly in say, VLC, because I might want the volume slightly higher without increasing my whole system volume just to hear a quiet section. I rarely notice any degradation at 150%.", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback with volume boost", "switched_from": "", "story": "Performance Improvements in .NET 11"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Clunky interface", "summary": "Some find it clunky, especially for managing large music libraries.", "quotes": [{"id": 801971696, "item_id": 50123231, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50123231", "by": "mahboi", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky.", "excerpt": "It's older than Tahoe. You can search a word and it'll find pictures containing that object. Not LLM, just vision. Music could be a lot worse. I learned what it's like playing local music on a Samsung phone recently. Had to use ADB to copy files in because Android File Transfer is deprecated. The phone has no Music equivalent, so I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky. Mea", "context": "", "use_case": "playing local music on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple routed a graphite pipe through the iPhone Duo's hinge to dissipate heat"}, {"id": 743184961, "item_id": 46449060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46449060", "by": "justarandomname", "date": "2025-12-31", "stance": "compare", "quote": "VLC is actually pretty good on Mobile", "excerpt": "I listen to FLAC's mostly (high quality, loseless audio files - CD quality or better) most of my collection has come from ripping CDs I owned or checked out from the library or albums bought on bandcamp, quobuz, and ototoy. I use Rhythmbox to listen to files on my PC (Linux) - I think they have/had a Windows port at some point. VLC works too but is more cumbersome for large libraries on desktop IMHO. But VLC is actua", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music on mobile", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 769529345, "item_id": 48095584, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48095584", "by": "afandian", "date": "2026-05-11", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "VLC can do this, but not as simply as I used to be able to", "excerpt": "They removed the speed and pitch adjuster in QuickTime player, some time in the past decade, I forget when. That was a useful feature to me. It's not on the site, and I don't care _quite_ enough to figure out how to add it. That's the problem with built-in software that \"does it all\" and crowds out the market for other software. One day it might not do it all. (VLC can do this, but not as simply as I used to be able ", "context": "", "use_case": "speed and pitch adjustment", "switched_from": "", "story": "Killed by Apple"}]}, {"label": "Forced media library", "summary": "One user disliked that played videos get added to a media library they couldn't turn off.", "quotes": [{"id": 775831393, "item_id": 48489462, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48489462", "by": "al_borland", "date": "2026-06-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off.", "excerpt": "But that\u2019s all I want it to do\u2026 play the video. Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off. I moved to IINA to finally get back to a video Swiss Army knife that just plays video and doesn\u2019t force me into an experience I don\u2019t want\u2026 after tweaking a bunch of settings. A miss Perian, the codec pack for QuickTime, which gave QuickTime and QuickLo", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sweet Jeebus, macOS 27 Golden Gate Removes the Dumb Icons from Menu Items"}]}, {"label": "Linux glitches", "summary": "Reports of UI lockups under XWayland and video tearing on older Mac hardware running Ubuntu.", "quotes": [{"id": 784670978, "item_id": 49041936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49041936", "by": "MiddleEndian", "date": "2026-07-24", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC can cause the UI to lock up because of some XWayland nonsense", "excerpt": "I use KDE on Bazzite. It has a couple killer UI features over Windows. It can label bluetooth devices (so I can have blue dualsense controller, pink dualsense controller, white dualsense controller, etc.). No clue why this doesn't work in Windows lol. Also the super/win + arrow keys are more predictable, super pgdn is minimize and super pgup is maximize, so I never find myself accidentally minimizing windows when try", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nothing works and everyone is euphoric"}, {"id": 779256899, "item_id": 48703556, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48703556", "by": "ProllyInfamous", "date": "2026-06-27", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC sucks on the MacPro4,1 in Ubuntu (skipping around tears the video, leaving it to lag badly)", "excerpt": "The only \"bummer\" with the 4,1 is: in order to get a bootscreen, you need to either \"hack it\" with Open Core Legacy Patcher (OCLP) -or- purchase a modified-firmware GPU from macvidcards.com (I run his custom VEGA56/firmware, personally; it's faster than most Apple Silicon for Ollama3.1 [about 74 tokens/second]) -or- use a stock Apple GPU with an additional GPU plugged into main display. With OCLP you can run Linux us", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux on Older Hardware: The Complete Revival Guide"}]}, {"label": "Missing features", "summary": "Users cite no backward frame step and subtitle trouble when streaming over a local network.", "quotes": [{"id": 733633185, "item_id": 45852074, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45852074", "by": "gyomu", "date": "2025-11-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the maintainers explain (with bad attitude) why this functionality is technically impossible", "excerpt": "I used VLC until I looked for a backward frame step functionality. I then found this thread on the VLC forums where the maintainers explain (with bad attitude) why this functionality is technically impossible. Everyone points out that mpv supports it, but the maintainers double down and say they\u2019re Doing It Wrong and it shouldn\u2019t be possible. So anyways, I switched to mpv. https://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=2", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "VLC's Jean-Baptiste Kempf Receives the European SFS Award 2025"}, {"id": 769731440, "item_id": 48108215, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48108215", "by": "s20n", "date": "2026-05-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used to stream movies from my desktop over the local network with VLC and the main issue I faced was that I could never get the subtitles to work.", "excerpt": "I used to stream movies from my desktop over the local network with VLC and the main issue I faced was that I could never get the subtitles to work. I took a quick look at this repository and it doesn't look like they support subtitles either.", "context": "", "use_case": "streaming movies over LAN", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rtwatch: Watch videos with friends using WebRTC"}]}, {"label": "Battery drain", "summary": "On iPhone with AR glasses, it keeps the phone screen on and drains battery faster.", "quotes": [{"id": 794167010, "item_id": 49635438, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49635438", "by": "drewg123", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Others (VLC, HBO) leave the screen on and burn battery at 2x-3x the rate", "excerpt": "3+ year old XREAL Air AR Glasses. I bought them to code more effectively on my laptop at my then girlfriend (now wife)'s house. The display was too pixely and distracting for me to code on. However, its plenty good enough for videos. For videos I mostly use it with my phone (16 pro). Some apps are great (Netflix, AppleTV) and are smart enough to turn off the iPhone screen. Others (VLC, HBO) leave the screen on and bu", "context": "", "use_case": "watching video with AR glasses", "switched_from": "", "story": "iPhone Duo"}]}], "who": [{"by": "flaburgan", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "date": "2026-09-04"}, {"by": "ColdStream", "context": "Android user, avoids streaming", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49341809", "date": "2026-08-17"}, {"by": "pugio", "context": "parent with a baby", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48800997", "date": "2026-07-05"}, {"by": "UomoNeroNero", "context": "multi-monitor desktop user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46888097", "date": "2026-02-04"}, {"by": "pmontra", "context": "uses a tablet as smart TV", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46255843", "date": "2025-12-13"}], "tags": ["for offline music", "for Android users", "for de-Googled phones", "for Linux users"], "use_cases": ["video playback", "media player", "media playback", "playing local music on android", "music playback on old phone", "playing downloaded videos"], "compared": [{"slug": "firefox", "name": "Firefox", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "mpv", "name": "mpv", "co": 1, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "winamp", "name": "Winamp", "co": 1, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "haruna", "name": "Haruna", "co": 1, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "libreoffice", "name": "LibreOffice", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "iina", "name": "IINA", "co": 1, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "gimp", "name": "GIMP", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46406311", "title": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48643848", "title": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50068203", "title": "Apple routed a graphite pipe through the iPhone Duo's hinge to dissipate heat", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49925261", "title": "Sudo \u2013 A dedicated music player designed around listening to music", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49842764", "title": "PipePipe: NewPipe hard fork implementing SponsorBlock", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49711424", "title": "Performance Improvements in .NET 11", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"warn": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1, "compare": 1}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 2, "neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 2}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {"warn": 2, "recommend": 3}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 3, "warn": 1}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 2}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 1, "warn": 1, "neutral": 2}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 1, "warn": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 801971696, "item_id": 50123231, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50123231", "by": "mahboi", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky.", "excerpt": "It's older than Tahoe. You can search a word and it'll find pictures containing that object. Not LLM, just vision. Music could be a lot worse. I learned what it's like playing local music on a Samsung phone recently. Had to use ADB to copy files in because Android File Transfer is deprecated. The phone has no Music equivalent, so I use VLC, which everyone swears is perfect for this but it's actually super clunky. Mea", "context": "", "use_case": "playing local music on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple routed a graphite pipe through the iPhone Duo's hinge to dissipate heat"}, {"id": 798824928, "item_id": 49926558, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926558", "by": "rsync", "date": "2026-10-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "no software installed except for VLC", "excerpt": "I use and maintain an \"ipod\" in the form of an old pixel 3 with 128 GB of memory that has no SIM card and no software installed except for VLC. It stays in airplane mode. It has a real headphone jack.", "context": "", "use_case": "music playback on old phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sudo \u2013 A dedicated music player designed around listening to music"}, {"id": 797768018, "item_id": 49860501, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49860501", "by": "ciefa", "date": "2026-09-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "VLC to play downloaded videos", "excerpt": "Nowadays I use Morphe for Youtube and Reddit. Seal Plus for downloading and VLC to play downloaded videos. NewPipe was so buggy for me in the past, I've avoided it. Did it get better? Any reason to use it over Morphe?", "context": "", "use_case": "playing downloaded videos", "switched_from": "", "story": "PipePipe: NewPipe hard fork implementing SponsorBlock"}, {"id": 795802432, "item_id": 49737652, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49737652", "by": "qingcharles", "date": "2026-09-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use it regularly in say, VLC", "excerpt": "The software has to start clipping the audio above \"100%\", but I use it regularly in say, VLC, because I might want the volume slightly higher without increasing my whole system volume just to hear a quiet section. I rarely notice any degradation at 150%.", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback with volume boost", "switched_from": "", "story": "Performance Improvements in .NET 11"}, {"id": 794167010, "item_id": 49635438, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49635438", "by": "drewg123", "date": "2026-09-09", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Others (VLC, HBO) leave the screen on and burn battery at 2x-3x the rate", "excerpt": "3+ year old XREAL Air AR Glasses. I bought them to code more effectively on my laptop at my then girlfriend (now wife)'s house. The display was too pixely and distracting for me to code on. However, its plenty good enough for videos. For videos I mostly use it with my phone (16 pro). Some apps are great (Netflix, AppleTV) and are smart enough to turn off the iPhone screen. Others (VLC, HBO) leave the screen on and bu", "context": "", "use_case": "watching video with AR glasses", "switched_from": "", "story": "iPhone Duo"}, {"id": 793022883, "item_id": 49563930, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49563930", "by": "flaburgan", "date": "2026-09-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "put as many free software as I can (Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, VLC, Gimp...)", "excerpt": "I removed my dual boot in 2009, so the last windows I used on a personal computer was Vista. I switched my close family (parents and even my grand mother) to Linux years ago, nevertheless I still am the tech-savyy go-to person for other people and I am completely disconnected from what's going on the Windows world. Is an antivirus still needed there? Are there some good tools that should always be installed on a comp", "context": "Linux user, tech go-to person for family", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "O&O ShutUp10 \u2013 The antispy tool for Windows 10 and 11"}, {"id": 790293809, "item_id": 49393363, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49393363", "by": "yjftsjthsd-h", "date": "2026-08-21", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I just use VLC", "excerpt": "I'd also very strongly recommend F-Droid. TBH I can't really speak to the quality of music apps on it - I just use VLC - but it doesn't require an account and it has lots of good apps.", "context": "", "use_case": "music playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Using an old Android phone as a music player"}, {"id": 789468944, "item_id": 49341809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49341809", "by": "ColdStream", "date": "2026-08-17", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Only offline files via VLC.", "excerpt": "That is a fair take. Personally, I use my android basically an iPod. Only offline files via VLC. Never hopped on the streaming bandwagon for anything but the most throw away stuff. Yes, I kept all my DVD's from decades back.", "context": "Android user, avoids streaming", "use_case": "offline music playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "I don't enjoy the Internet any more"}, {"id": 784670978, "item_id": 49041936, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49041936", "by": "MiddleEndian", "date": "2026-07-24", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC can cause the UI to lock up because of some XWayland nonsense", "excerpt": "I use KDE on Bazzite. It has a couple killer UI features over Windows. It can label bluetooth devices (so I can have blue dualsense controller, pink dualsense controller, white dualsense controller, etc.). No clue why this doesn't work in Windows lol. Also the super/win + arrow keys are more predictable, super pgdn is minimize and super pgup is maximize, so I never find myself accidentally minimizing windows when try", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nothing works and everyone is euphoric"}, {"id": 784090417, "item_id": 49005651, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49005651", "by": "pmontra", "date": "2026-07-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "My SO uses it to view movies with VLC and TV via TVHeadend.", "excerpt": "I never sell anything, everything finds a new life. I got a Sony Xperia Compact from maybe 2016. I use it as a bicycle navigator / recorder. Recently it stopped reading SIMs, probably rusty contacts, but all I need is wifi to update OSMAnd and send me the tracks I recorded. I also have a very old tablet, maybe 2014. My SO uses it to view movies with VLC and TV via TVHeadend.", "context": "", "use_case": "playing movies", "switched_from": "", "story": "ScreenWall \u2013 Turn old phones into synced widgets for your space"}, {"id": 783807522, "item_id": 48987970, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48987970", "by": "muppetman", "date": "2026-07-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "you have to use VLC to play it", "excerpt": "Because Plex worked amazingly ~5-6 years ago, while Jellyfin was still very early stage. It'd sort of work. So there's a lot of \"Well I'm already using Plex\" inertia. Plus Plex has very lovely, polished clients, you can easily invite people, share your library with others etc etc. Once they got all that of course, then the changes/fees/ads/bloat started. Jellyfin is great, it's all I've ever used. But it's still very", "context": "", "use_case": "playing offline downloaded files", "switched_from": "", "story": "Jellyfin founder Andrew leaves team"}, {"id": 780815953, "item_id": 48800997, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48800997", "by": "pugio", "date": "2026-07-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "direct with, say, VLC", "excerpt": "AI + hardware has really helped my wife and I get more sleep. I had an esp32-box-3 lying around from a lapsed \"voice agent\" project from a year or two ago. Had a baby. Baby moved to another room, sleep trained. Baby either: 1. wakes up a few times a night, babbles for a bit, goes back to sleep OR 2. baby wakes up and fusses for N (=10) minutes, at which point parents need to go in and settle (that's the sleep trainin", "context": "parent with a baby", "use_case": "playing audio stream", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Age of Personalized Hardware Is Coming"}, {"id": 779256899, "item_id": 48703556, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48703556", "by": "ProllyInfamous", "date": "2026-06-27", "stance": "warn", "quote": "VLC sucks on the MacPro4,1 in Ubuntu (skipping around tears the video, leaving it to lag badly)", "excerpt": "The only \"bummer\" with the 4,1 is: in order to get a bootscreen, you need to either \"hack it\" with Open Core Legacy Patcher (OCLP) -or- purchase a modified-firmware GPU from macvidcards.com (I run his custom VEGA56/firmware, personally; it's faster than most Apple Silicon for Ollama3.1 [about 74 tokens/second]) -or- use a stock Apple GPU with an additional GPU plugged into main display. With OCLP you can run Linux us", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Linux on Older Hardware: The Complete Revival Guide"}, {"id": 778661427, "item_id": 48666339, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48666339", "by": "flatline", "date": "2026-06-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC still rules the day for general media playback", "excerpt": "Thanks for checking it out! The Alice link is a generated m4b, so it\u2019s sample output that you could likely play back directly in your browser, although that may not have the cover display or chapter listing. I recommend Apple Books or Plappa on iOS, or Audiobookshelf on Android. For desktop, VLC still rules the day for general media playback, but Audibly is a Windows app that has good reviews. There are many public d", "context": "", "use_case": "desktop media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: eBook to audiobook narration with realistic AI voices"}, {"id": 778345642, "item_id": 48646602, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48646602", "by": "k310", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Ones I actually use.", "excerpt": "Ublock-origin with Firefox, Audacity, Batch Photo Resizer, calibre, cardflow, Diffraction, Ejimo and Ultra Character Map (try finding emojis without them), Libre Office, Paprika Recipe Manager, Samurai Safe, SeaMonkey (who else edits HTML?) GIMP, Darktable, RawTherapee, Super Photo Upscaler, Sublime Text, VLC, Clearview (and why isn't epub supported natively?), PhotoSync (share photos with all platforms), GhostText f", "context": "", "use_case": "media player", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 778308004, "item_id": 48644250, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48644250", "by": "CobaltFire", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC (https://www.videolan.org/)", "excerpt": "Heres my list: Transnomino (https://www.transnomino.com/) StillColor (https://github.com/aiaf/Stillcolor) SublimeText (https://www.sublimetext.com/) Homebrew (https://brew.sh/) VLC (https://www.videolan.org/) Macs Fan Control (https://crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control) Rectangle (https://rectangleapp.com/) NetBird (https://netbird.io/) Obsidian (https://obsidian.md/) Honestly its not huge and most are probably obvious", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 775831393, "item_id": 48489462, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48489462", "by": "al_borland", "date": "2026-06-11", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off.", "excerpt": "But that\u2019s all I want it to do\u2026 play the video. Now it adds those videos to a media library for some reason. I never want this and I never found a way to turn it off. I moved to IINA to finally get back to a video Swiss Army knife that just plays video and doesn\u2019t force me into an experience I don\u2019t want\u2026 after tweaking a bunch of settings. A miss Perian, the codec pack for QuickTime, which gave QuickTime and QuickLo", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Sweet Jeebus, macOS 27 Golden Gate Removes the Dumb Icons from Menu Items"}, {"id": 773492356, "item_id": 48343272, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48343272", "by": "fithisux", "date": "2026-05-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "MPClassic or VLC worked fine", "excerpt": "There are many open source alternatives/upgrades to M$$$ products. No reason to keep using them. Literally none. I have been a happy exclusive only user of OO/LibeOffice since 2004. Some times I needed to use MSOffice for a paper. It was always problematic. I haven't use VS since 2007. I migrated to gcc. Never had a problem. SQLServer? Only for demo and at work just to pull or save data. Postgres always saved the day", "context": "", "use_case": "media player", "switched_from": "Windows Media Player", "story": "Microsoft degrades functionality of perpetually-licensed offline products"}, {"id": 769731440, "item_id": 48108215, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48108215", "by": "s20n", "date": "2026-05-12", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I used to stream movies from my desktop over the local network with VLC and the main issue I faced was that I could never get the subtitles to work.", "excerpt": "I used to stream movies from my desktop over the local network with VLC and the main issue I faced was that I could never get the subtitles to work. I took a quick look at this repository and it doesn't look like they support subtitles either.", "context": "", "use_case": "streaming movies over LAN", "switched_from": "", "story": "Rtwatch: Watch videos with friends using WebRTC"}, {"id": 769529345, "item_id": 48095584, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48095584", "by": "afandian", "date": "2026-05-11", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "VLC can do this, but not as simply as I used to be able to", "excerpt": "They removed the speed and pitch adjuster in QuickTime player, some time in the past decade, I forget when. That was a useful feature to me. It's not on the site, and I don't care _quite_ enough to figure out how to add it. That's the problem with built-in software that \"does it all\" and crowds out the market for other software. One day it might not do it all. (VLC can do this, but not as simply as I used to be able ", "context": "", "use_case": "speed and pitch adjustment", "switched_from": "", "story": "Killed by Apple"}, {"id": 766687232, "item_id": 47917952, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47917952", "by": "trinsic2", "date": "2026-04-26", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use VLC for my music.", "excerpt": "I use VLC for my music. Did you know if you uninstall the music app you can't play music though another music app?", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: An app is silently installing itself on my iPhone every day"}, {"id": 766248099, "item_id": 47890506, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47890506", "by": "majora2007", "date": "2026-04-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "Kavita (note: I'm the developer), FMD2, qBittorrent, VLC, Firefox", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are your top open source apps/software?"}, {"id": 756937170, "item_id": 47308573, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47308573", "by": "Imustaskforhelp", "date": "2026-03-09", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "So I used copyparty[0] and used VLC and set a username and password.", "excerpt": "Jellyfin is nice but I could never understand how to setup when all I wanted was to watch videos from server for example. So I used copyparty[0] and used VLC and set a username and password. I recommend copyparty if you just want something quick and easy actually. Just try it out on cheap VPS and just run it and forget it. https://github.com/9001/copyparty", "context": "", "use_case": "playing videos from server", "switched_from": "", "story": "US Court of Appeals: TOS may be updated by email, use may imply consent [pdf]"}, {"id": 755404129, "item_id": 47212758, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47212758", "by": "diacritical", "date": "2026-03-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Videos play fine on VLC with the integrated GPU.", "excerpt": "Sorry for the late reply. I can't recommend specific HW as I'm not using anything new or beefy and I'm not running any CPU or GPU intensive things on Qubes. There's the Qubes Hardware Compatibility List (HCL) where people have added their hardware: https://www.qubes-os.org/hcl/ If and when I decide to upgrade, I'll also ask in the forums. Not all hardware supports all the features required for the security. Some hard", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": null}, {"id": 752744332, "item_id": 47046520, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47046520", "by": "sandreas", "date": "2026-02-17", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "VLC - Video-Player", "excerpt": "I personally tend to own two Phones. One all-day carry GrapheneOS device (Pixel 8) and an older WiFi and at home only iPhone for all payment and ensurance stuff. This is inconvenient in some ways, but at least it is sort of privacy as good as it gets while still being able to run official apps when I need them at home. To de-google the phone, I use F-Droid as primary App store, Aurora as fallback for non-f-droid Apps", "context": "", "use_case": "video player", "switched_from": "", "story": "GrapheneOS \u2013 Break Free from Google and Apple"}, {"id": 750209552, "item_id": 46888097, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46888097", "by": "UomoNeroNero", "date": "2026-02-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I also always keep VLC running in a super-minimized state (web radio).", "excerpt": "I think it\u2019s interesting to reconsider the idea of having floating widgets in an era of powerful CPUs/GPUs and multi-monitor setups. Personally, I love having my \u201cwidgets\u201d active on the third monitor (the one I dedicate to \u201cfrivolous stuff\u201d when I\u2019m not drowning in open windows). I always keep two \u201cold-school\u201d draggable widgets active: a \"macro keyboard shortcut remider\" and a \u201cdiabetes monitoring dashboard\u201d (unfortu", "context": "multi-monitor desktop user", "use_case": "web radio playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Microsoft Has Killed Widgets Six Times. Here's Why They Keep Coming Back"}, {"id": 745263698, "item_id": 46578981, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46578981", "by": "raziel2701", "date": "2026-01-11", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "with flatpack I installed vlc, qbittorrent and obsidian", "excerpt": "I bought a thinkpad X1 carbon refurbished for about ~$300. I wanted to travel abroad with a laptop I wouldn't mind getting stolen if it happened. During the installation of Win11 it asked me to create a microsoft account, fuck that. I installed linux mint. Very nice experience overall, so nice to not get assaulted by ads in the start menu. Pleased to see the nightlight functionality (I googled f.lux for linux and tha", "context": "", "use_case": "media playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "I dumped Windows 11 for Linux, and you should too"}, {"id": 743570448, "item_id": 46473153, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46473153", "by": "mikewarot", "date": "2026-01-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I used to use WinAmp, but these days I just us VLC to play them.", "excerpt": "I've got quite a few of my MP3s that I ripped from my CDs now on my smartphone. For a few of the ones that I missed before.... the purge, you can usually find them on YouTube or elsewhere. I used to use WinAmp, but these days I just us VLC to play them. I miss the good old days when you could use Napster to find music, then go to Best Buy and get the CD to keep forever.", "context": "", "use_case": "playing MP3s", "switched_from": "Winamp", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 743461648, "item_id": 46466353, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46466353", "by": "linolevan", "date": "2026-01-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I'm not the OP of the claim (and I love VLC)", "excerpt": "I'm not the OP of the claim (and I love VLC) but maybe they're referring to this early 2018 issue: https://trac.videolan.org/vlc/ticket/19723 which seems to be being actively worked on. There's also https://code.videolan.org/videolan/vlc/-/issues/25651 but that's an off by one error so likely not really relevant to video playback for the average user.", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "What You Need to Know Before Touching a Video File"}, {"id": 743184961, "item_id": 46449060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46449060", "by": "justarandomname", "date": "2025-12-31", "stance": "compare", "quote": "VLC is actually pretty good on Mobile", "excerpt": "I listen to FLAC's mostly (high quality, loseless audio files - CD quality or better) most of my collection has come from ripping CDs I owned or checked out from the library or albums bought on bandcamp, quobuz, and ototoy. I use Rhythmbox to listen to files on my PC (Linux) - I think they have/had a Windows port at some point. VLC works too but is more cumbersome for large libraries on desktop IMHO. But VLC is actua", "context": "", "use_case": "playing music on mobile", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 742511010, "item_id": 46406938, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46406938", "by": "regenschutz", "date": "2025-12-27", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "On my phone I found VLC [2] to be the best app since it has so many features.", "excerpt": "I (somewhat) recently switched from using MP3s to using streaming services. Personally, my music taste (and the amount of tracks that I listen to) is way more varied now than it was before, but I suppose that depends both on how you use streaming services and how you use local MP3s. Back when I still used exclusively MP3s, I used Music on Console Player [0] on my personal computer and Snae Player [1] on my school's c", "context": "", "use_case": "playing MP3s on phone", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: How to go back to listening to MP3s?"}, {"id": 740093488, "item_id": 46255843, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46255843", "by": "pmontra", "date": "2025-12-13", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Basically I need VLC and not much more.", "excerpt": "I use a tablet as smart TV. As a bonus it's portable around my house. I'll look into Linux tablets when Android will get too obnoxious to bear. Are they a thing? Basically I need VLC and not much more.", "context": "uses a tablet as smart TV", "use_case": "media playback on tablet", "switched_from": "", "story": "LG TV's new software update installed MS Copilot, which cannot be deleted"}, {"id": 735105808, "item_id": 45944113, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45944113", "by": "lproven", "date": "2025-11-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I am a big fan of VLC", "excerpt": "I am a big fan of VLC, and I just wrote an article about it: https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/12/vlc_guru_gong/ But VLC is a multi-function tool that can play audio and video. Foobar is, as far as I can tell, just an audio player. It's more focussed and consequently smaller and simpler. That's what I like about it. I keep both on my machines and I use both... but I use VLC for video, and Foobar for just listening ", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "Winamp clone in Swift for macOS"}, {"id": 733633185, "item_id": 45852074, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45852074", "by": "gyomu", "date": "2025-11-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the maintainers explain (with bad attitude) why this functionality is technically impossible", "excerpt": "I used VLC until I looked for a backward frame step functionality. I then found this thread on the VLC forums where the maintainers explain (with bad attitude) why this functionality is technically impossible. Everyone points out that mpv supports it, but the maintainers double down and say they\u2019re Doing It Wrong and it shouldn\u2019t be possible. So anyways, I switched to mpv. https://forum.videolan.org/viewtopic.php?f=2", "context": "", "use_case": "video playback", "switched_from": "", "story": "VLC's Jean-Baptiste Kempf Receives the European SFS Award 2025"}]}