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mpv

A minimalist command-line media player.

mpv is a small, scriptable media player descended from the MPlayer codebase, with a major rewrite that simplified the internals and produced a much cleaner architecture. The default UI is famously minimal — no menus, just keyboard shortcuts and a small on-screen control overlay — and the entire UI surface is configurable through input.conf.

Lua scripting and the JSON IPC interface let users extend the player with custom shortcuts, overlays, library integrations, and remote control. The libmpv library packages the same player as a library that other applications embed. SMPlayer, Plex's internal player, mpv.net, and many other front-ends use libmpv.

mpv is GPL-2.0+ (with parts LGPL). It is widely deployed among power users, particularly anime watchers (where high-quality upscaling, subtitle handling, and aspect-ratio precision matter more than for general video), audiophiles, and command-line- oriented users who want to script playback. The release cadence is steady, and the project's focus on quality over features has kept the codebase maintainable for many years.

Debian/Ubuntu: sudo apt install mpv
Fedora/RHEL:   sudo dnf install mpv
Arch:          sudo pacman -S mpv
macOS:         brew install mpv