I replaced Windows Media Player with this powerful open-source alternative (and it isn’t VLC)
I was never happy with Windows’ built-in media player, so I looked for a replacement. After sifting through a lot of free media players on the web and testing more than a dozen of them, I finally found one that met all my expectations.
It has become stagnant
Microsoft has released countless different versions of Windows Media Player over the years. For a long time, it was actually called “Windows Media Player”, but with the release of Windows 11, it was simply renamed “Media Player”.
Despite the 2022 update to accompany Windows 11, Media Player looks pretty much the same as always.
The only real improvement has been better support for keyboard-only use, which is useful for people who use certain types of accessibility features and for anyone who likes to use their keyboard instead of a mouse.
For a no-frills default media player, this is fine. However, I wanted and needed something a little more capable.
He has no flexibility
One of Media Player’s major flaws is its lack of flexibility. Many, if not most, third-party media apps allow you to adjust playback. You can adjust filters for video or audio, choose different rendering engines, change audio output, apply filters, and more.
Media Player has almost none of that: you get an equalizer, that’s all.
If you’re the type of person who likes to tweak things, or if you find yourself in a situation where it’s difficult to tweak something. necessaryyou are absolutely out of luck.
It is not customizable
Although aesthetic customization isn’t as important as a media player’s functional flexibility, Windows Media Player (2022) doesn’t win any points in either department.
You get a predefined set of buttons in a specific order. You can swap it between light and dark themes.
If you want to do anything more complex than that, you need a different program.
I wanted everything Media Player isn’t
There are dozens of good replacements for Media Player, including the very popular VLC. Some of them are expensive proprietary programs, but most of them are free and open source.
Since I won’t be playing Blu-ray discs, none of the proprietary options are necessary for my needs.
I needed four things from a media player:
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Support for a wide range of file formats out of the box. Media Player isn’t the worst here, so any replacement should be as good, if not better.
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This should be flexible. If I have to apply some sort of audio or video filter, it must be integrated. The ability to add external plugins for enhanced functionality would be a bonus.
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It should be easy to customize. I don’t need to massively rework a UI, but the ability to change the look and behavior of the interface is a plus.
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It should be light.
I tested over 10 different open source players, and several of them were excellent. However, Media Player Classic – Black Edition (MPC-BE) stood out from the crowd.
MPC-BE is open source and powerful
It has everything I want in a media player
When I first opened MPC-BE, the first thing that struck me was the interface. It was dark, easy on the eyes, and there was a useful mix of options available in a few menu items, a significant improvement over Windows 11’s native media player.
Despite its simple user interface, under the hood, MPC-BE is a media player with exceptional performance. I tested every weird video file format I could find, and it played them all instantly without any intervention from me, which is a huge improvement over Media Player.
It also supports hardware acceleration, essential in any modern media player, which allows your graphics card to handle the decoding of video files. It ensures that you can play high-resolution videos without bogging down your processor or turning your video into a slow, choppy mess.
He’s a king of customization
No matter how capable the MPC-BE is, it gets even better once you start exploring the advanced settings and customization options it has. You can apply filters to change brightness, contrast, hue and saturation, change your audio or video rendering engine, or adjust a number of parameters related to sound processing. In the past, I’ve really liked the ability to replace the video renderer with MadVR, as it can correct the washed out effect you experience when playing HDR content on an SDR display.
MPC-BE includes a range of built-in filters to handle different file formats and hardware configurations, and can even accept external filters if the included ones don’t do what you need.
You can also make changes to the user interface, keyboard shortcuts, etc.
Find the shows you really like
MPC-BE isn’t the only good media player I’ve tested. VLC is a great option if you’re looking for something free and open source. Both Mpv and PotPlayer are more minimalist options, if that’s closer to what you’re looking for.
