Someone reviewed v on Mar 19, 2023

Pros:

Cons:

Bottom Line:

Frublo reviewed v1.9.23 on Aug 27, 2022

Pros: stable operation, opens all video formats, easy installation

Cons: does not remember the place of the video pause when reopening

Bottom Line: I have been using this player as my main one for more than 10 years. It works stably and smoothly plays videos of any format. Sometimes I used other players to experiment, but I kept coming back to this one.

Someone reviewed v on Jul 5, 2022

Pros: 555

Cons: 555

Bottom Line: 555

kaero85 reviewed v1.9.21.19 Development Build on May 10, 2022

Pros: convenient and simple interface
good performance
support for a vast number of languages

Cons: There are no particular cons. If it's not a browser and can't run my favorite https://www.soirishcasino.com/ it's a great player.

Bottom Line: I recommend using this video player by default.

Zootopia3001 reviewed v1.7.11 on Mar 15, 2017

This hasn't been updated on SourceForge for a couple versions now. I like to get the standalone filters to go with the player but all that's available now is for version 1.7.9 along with its accompanying older version player. This new version player also no longer plays well with Shark007's codecs, which I use on my home theater system PC. The player now crashes on DVD movie play right off the bat and the AC3 audio on any video file has a funny noise that pops up in the background off and on, and may or not be related to the Shark007 codecs package install. I have now switched to MPC-BE instead, which works well with Shark007 codecs. The only thing this player has going for it now is the subtitle download capabilities, of which MPC-BE sorely lacks, so I keep MPC-HC on hand just in case I need to download a subtitle file for a movie if needed, although I could just do that directly online to Subscene, Subscene has never failed to provide a subtitle file for a movie, especially for foreign language parts only.

Unless you're using K-lite codec pack, look elsewhere for a player. As mentioned above, MC-BE works well, and VLC payer is another option, that has most all the internal codecs you would most likely need.

3 stars, but only being that it could work well with K-lite codec pack, a codec pack I personally don't care to use

LakotaElf reviewed v1.7.10 on Nov 23, 2015

Excellent software and works great, does as it says it will do, I have no problems with this at all.

And I got this version a week ago, how come beta news is so slow with updates these days?????

newbizk9 reviewed v1.7.8.230 Beta on May 29, 2015

this media player will take place other players http://crickprediction.com/

CyberDoc999 reviewed v1.7.7.90 Beta on Nov 5, 2014

Now you can use this with smooth video project! IF you PC can handle it
60 frames per second ooh la la!

CyberDoc999 reviewed v1.7.7.90 Beta on Nov 5, 2014

Now you can use this with smooth video project! IF you PC can handle it
60 frames per second ooh la la!

BANDIT- reviewed v1.7.3 on Feb 6, 2014

I used this for many years, but for some reason It went Sticky during
a Fast Search/Seek in .flv files..... I had to switch to KMplayer...
Sorry @MPC-HC ..... You're only an alternative now .. 3*

Anyone else got Issues with Fast Seeking thru .flv files..??
VideoReDo H264 is the best.. Incl Frame accurate Editing & V.fast ReCode

Zootopia3001 reviewed v1.7.0 on Sep 30, 2013

Went back to MPC 1.6.2. Later versions have no center channel sound. Couldn't find an option to set to 2.1 stereo. Guess the new folks at MPC assume everyone has 5.1 theater speakers for their rig.

Once the original developer left, versions since 1.6.2 have been bells, whistles and tinkering more than anything else.

some guy reviewed v1.7.0.7670 Beta on Aug 1, 2013

Great player this and the k-lite codec pack is a must have, only complaint I have is it does not play nice with some DVDs navigation

inkowyouknow reviewed v1.7.0.7592 Beta on Jul 13, 2013

Still the best from the original media player classic that saw off the disastrous ad riddle real player to where we are today, this is the best.

Zootopia3001 reviewed v1.7.0.7592 Beta on Jul 11, 2013

Even though I have personally switched to the MPlayer/SMPlayer combo, I give this player 4 stars. Installed with the Mega Codec Pack it should play almost anything, if not everything. The only drawback for me is that I cannot use this player to view content on an HDTV via s-video cable. Screen is blank, only volume. I now use SMPlayer as my default player to achieve this. QuickTime can do it too, but QuickTime Player is very limited nowadays.

LakotaElf reviewed v1.7.0.7562 Beta on Jul 3, 2013

Excellent, the proper link for this right now is:
http://nightly.mpc-hc.or...C-HC.1.7.0.7567.x64.exe

nusushika reviewed v1.7.0.7562 Beta on Jul 3, 2013

@TROLL: What a "nice" video file has been troubling you that you just have simply installed more than 20 players on your system? That's weird, isn't it?

Media Player Classic - Home Cinema bundled with K-Lite Codec Pack works perfectly for me every time.

HeilNizar reviewed v1.6.5.6366 on Dec 17, 2012

Great lite player.
I just don't know why they keep writing that empty key to the registry even when running it in portable mode, I contacted them and they lied about fixing it.

xsnred reviewed v1.6.4.6052 on Oct 2, 2012

I use VLC for PC viewing of media. Am I missing something by not using MPC? The only thing is that VLC is not available in 64bit yet and I don't feel like downloading every codec to play a certain file with MPC. Someone please enlighten me about this, Thanks for any info. I give it 5 stars cause it has always been a favorite of everyone but I have never used it except back in the days of Windows 95.

SineWave reviewed v1.6.4.6052 on Oct 1, 2012

Mr. Flemens. 99% of the Windows users use Windows XP or 7 and you give this extraordinarily stable and great player one star because it supposedly crashed your Windows 8? That's rather childish, isn't it?

I have never seen MPC crash any OS that I installed, and if I ever encounter that, I will first blame the bad drivers, because that sounds rather logical to me.

Artem S. Tashkinov reviewed v1.6.4.6052 on Oct 1, 2012

@Flemens

User applications cannot crash an OS, if they do - you have problems with your OS.

FatBastard reviewed v1.6.4.6052 on Oct 1, 2012

Impressive program.
To get 5 stars it needs to be able to play iso-files.

Flemens reviewed v1.6.4.6052 on Oct 1, 2012

Not compatible with Windows 8 64 bit. Causes BSOD "DPC_WATCHDOG_VIOLATION.

TROLL reviewed v1.6.2.4902 on Jul 20, 2012

No audio sound.
All other player from Windows to VLC and more than 20 player in my system has sound, except this.
Shame Gabest, isnt?

HeilNizar reviewed v1.6.2.4902 on Jul 15, 2012

Updater for it, written by me.

Landsnes reviewed v1.6.2.4902 on Jul 11, 2012

Works!

Don't know what people with program issues are talking about. On my Win7 64bit system there are no issues with this player what so ever.

Fine tune the settings and you'll have excellent video quality. Combine with K-Lite's 64bit codec pack for increased flexibility.

SineWave reviewed v1.6.2.4902 on Jun 6, 2012

Mr. Troll... why is it such a problem to install an older version that you like? I always just do that and don't update any more, at least for the time being. Btw. it's simply a problem with your PC of some kind as it works great for me. Never jump to conclusions so quickly. But yeah, huge majority of people wouldn't admit it's their operating system, or drivers, or some program in the background that is being problematic. I'm into computer maintenance of rather sensitive audio and video workstations for like 15 years and I know what I'm talking about. So install the perfect version that works for you and... don't be a troll. :)) This is a fabulous player that I'm using since I installed Windows 2000... I never felt a need to change it. d= ;) cheers!

However, I would agree that MPC and MPC-HC are playing a little weird from version to version. I was most satisfied with 1.2 and 1.4 versions. For me they started being a bit problematic since v1.5. Too many features, I guess... if they kept it simple and bug-free, it would be better. We don't use 90% of the features anyway. I know I don't. I play the movie, fullscreen, close it when the film is over. What else do you need? Should it make pizza for you? :)) If I was a developer I would put all my effort into getting rid of BUGS. Not one single feature more. Being a bugless program is a GREATEST FEATURE of them ALL. ;) 5 stars nevertheless. This is one of the 15 and a half programs I have installed on my workstation.

TROLL reviewed v1.6.0.4014 on Mar 10, 2012

What the hell happened with MPC-HC play 1080p video?
Cpu load 85% Gpu load 25%
I DONT BELIEVE ! ! !
in Splash Cpu 10% Gpu 65%
some month before this two player was on same low cpu
What the hell happened with this amazing player?
a really big 1 star after waitng month by month and go worster and worster the measure results

carlo_tor reviewed v1.6.0.4014 on Feb 8, 2012

MPC-HC was a good player up to version 1.5.xx.
Something changed, couple of months ago: all the last releases are full of bugs, real beta's or even alpha's.
Stay away of all 1.6.x.x

Uriel reviewed v1.6.0.4014 on Jan 30, 2012

Requires QuickTime and/or Real Player. Why? So Apple can market you?

Artem S. Tashkinov reviewed v1.6.0.4014 on Jan 30, 2012

changelog is posted here: http://mpc-hc.sourceforge.net/History.html

Download Media Player reviewed v1.5.2.3456 on Dec 26, 2011

It is a great chatting application.

moog reviewed v1.5.2.3456 on Jul 31, 2011

the best player

Virtual_ManPL reviewed v1.5.0.2827 on Mar 12, 2011

5/5

Virtual_ManPL reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 11, 2011

5/5

doviewy reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 7, 2011

Such a wonderful topic for me.......
http://www.campusbug.com/blogs/view.php?id=17889

Vimes reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 5, 2011

Excellent media player which is light on its resources when used and seems to play everything that I need it to do.

Excellent and well supported.

degaban reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

i like to use it than windows media player

HeilNizar reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

1 Star less because:
-Slow on close when saving position (If that option is enabled).
-Writes to Appdata even when using the portable version.

For the rest, the best.

Input Overload reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

Works well, no problems.

matt2971 reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

@sinewave: "AVI is a *container* format that can contain a plethora of differently encoded video and audio streams. It's not like MP4, for instance. AVI is like MKV."

You're half right and half wrong. Yes, AVI and MKV are containers rather than codecs, but so is MP4. MP4s usually contain MPEG H.264/AVC video streams with AAC audio, but can also contain other formats.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_Part_14

Anyway, MPC-HC is great as a player in it's own right, and great for those who don't want to bother with any other installations for video.

Personally, I find it best to install ffdshow and use the built in codecs and splitters as a fallback:

- install ffdshow
- In MPCs Internal Filters, tick everything
- In MPC's "Options / External Filters", add "ffdshow video decoder" and set it to preferred.

The same can be done with "ffdshow audio decoder" if required.

The only other video playpack tool I have installed is VLC. I don't find it quite as responsive as MPC, but need it for certain streaming functions.

There's one other gotcha, just for MPC/FFDshow x64 users, and that's regarding other applications that use do video thumbnailing, like XNview. If the thumbnailing application is x86, then it won't be able to use the x64 decoders and splitters. For that reason you may also have to install the x86 version of ffdshow, and perhaps an x86 MPC for testing playback (I just use the original MPC standalone rather than a full MPC-HC).

Computer video is so darn complicated you have to be an IT expert to navigate it sometimes. Blame the lack of standard and proprietary formats. Anyway, that landscape taken for granted, as I started off this long post by saying, MPC-HC is great for your average user.

ilev reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

Why would anyone install the application when there is a portable version ?

traumadoc reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 4, 2011

Other people are moaning all over here ...

The program runs fine - install a codec pack and it runs more effectively.

RUNTIME ERRORS have NOTHING to do with the program, installer, setup, etc. In this case you need to install MS vbruntime packages on your system. Or, download the zip package with the .exe and not an installer.

There is nothing wrong with this release ... it's user system error - that simple

some guy reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 3, 2011

Media Player Classic - Home Cinema (32-bit) 1.5.1.2903 got a error during installation Direct Run-time not installed on my windows 7 32 bit latest beta SP1 service pack installed

SineWave reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 3, 2011

What does that mean: "doesn't play and crash with AVI"? AVI is a *container* format that can contain a plethora of differently encoded video and audio streams. It's not like MP4, for instance. AVI is like MKV. So if it can't play a certain AVI you should analyse the file with MediaInfo and install the codec that plays the streams contained within *that particular* AVI.

I've been using MPC-HC and MPC for many years now and encountered a bug here and there, but whenever I try some other program I find it rubbish in comparison. Usually mindlessly bloated rubbish with a fabulous, beautifully rendered GUI. Well, I don't care about the beautiful GUI, all I care is to play the film from the beginning to the end properly. And btw - you don't see the GUI in full screen eh? ;) That doesn't mean I think MPC GUI is bad or bad looking, I love it's simplicity. I love programs that are functional and stable, not beautiful, or "beautiful" and [usually] prone to crashes. In my huge experience [I've been working in IT for like 15 years] the more "beautiful" the program - the more crashes and instability, not to mention the sluggishness in comparison to a simple GUIs.

Regarding codecs, it is recommendable to use ffdshow [tryouts] with it and then you can combine the different decoders from either MPC or FFDShow as you find it appropriate. Not the ICL one. ICL ffdshow is a bit more unstable even though it's a bit speedier, in my experience. I do test both ICL and normal versions.

This program is a blast! :) Thank you SO MUCH for continuing the development of it! MPC-HC and FFDShow. Btw. providing th edirectshow filters separately is also a fabulous idea. Thumbs up on hands and feet, too. :)

Cheers!

CyberDoc999 reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 3, 2011

Once again Phat Esther is leaving a review that is incoherent and false. it would be nice if Phat Esther’s incoherent ramblings would cease to exist. Phat Esther’s review makes no sense this program is perfect and plays every file.

deda reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 3, 2011

With K-Lite codecs is unbeateable

Phat Esther reviewed v1.5.1.2903 on Mar 3, 2011

Waiting for the changelog 1.5.1.2903 and I hard interesting which ticket what was fixed bug cause working avi again for long time crashing.

CodecPack reviewed v1.5.0.2827 on Feb 8, 2011

The internal filters have various limitations. That is why external filters are often preferable. For example the internal Matroska splitter does not support stuff like preferred streams, while Haali splitter does. The internal H.264 decoder is not multi-threaded, so ffdshow will give much better performance (when not using DXVA).

reviewer reviewed v1.5.0.2827 on Feb 7, 2011

Why would you need K-Lite codec pack with this? It has its own decoders built in.

some guy reviewed v1.5.0.2827 on Feb 7, 2011

very light weight + with the K-lite codec pack it rocks!

Mirrebex reviewed v1.4.2499.0 on Oct 19, 2010

Fast and stable.. thank god. I was having problems with the 32bit version.. it´s all good now..

war593122 reviewed v1.4.2499.0 on Sep 14, 2010

Sweet, finally a new stable build.

war593122 reviewed v1.4.2499.0 on Sep 14, 2010

Finally a new stable build. :D

Virtual_ManPL reviewed v1.4.2499.0 on Sep 10, 2010

5/5 for this version !!!

Virtual_ManPL reviewed v1.4.2499.0 on Sep 10, 2010

5/5
best so far 64bit player xD

TGB72 reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Aug 23, 2010

Probably the best player around in terms of video quality and features but the interface is a crap, the worst is that the authors are not thinking in change this and there are a many fanboys that support this position claiming (ridiculously) that an update in the interface would cause more resource consumption. The authors say that they guide by the scientific method at time to develop this app, so I'm wondering how rational and scientific is to have tons of options duplicated in the context menu and the menu bar? or how logic is to have a playlist and cannot select/remove multiple files or at least have an option to clean the playlist?
Like I said is the best player in terms of video quality but the development team is incredible stubborn and sometimes ridiculous at time to defend this ugly interface.
I'm not asking for skin support but just would like to see MPC-HC with an interface similar to Splayer and the logic in menus of foobar2k, that can't increase the resource usage and if it does it cannot be more than a couple of KB (we are running Pcs with 2GB of RAM or more, please)

Chocobito reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Feb 24, 2010

Incredible good player, is the most light in resource, a couple of clone exist out there like Haihaisoft Player and Splayer (all bases in MPC-HC source) but this is the best. ALSO DVD playback work like a charm not like a dumb user comments down here.

Virtual_ManPL reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Sep 18, 2009

Awesome player... no need to install codec pack, if someone need to know ;)
I finally swap to this player form "The KMPlayer", because of s***ty slow development and more and more not fixed bugs...

but still nice will be when this player will contains A=>B repeat ;p
and need more nice GUI...

emanresU deriseD reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Sep 3, 2009

I forgot to add:

- No ability to perform key/mouse control, such as Ctrl + mouse wheel to move +/- 5 seconds in the video.

Phat Esther reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Aug 29, 2009

not able play dvd
previous versions play all format
what happened with open .ifo
very very serious problem if an dvd player not play dvd

Banquo the win9x same the winxp understand ? WIN9XP
just some byte different in kernel.vxd for the xp programs dont running
change modded kernel.vxd and all XP program running on 9X too tada eh
xp not new operating system how changed some byte and the whole world buy it upgrade ha ha ha

anomoly reviewed v1.3.1249.0 on Aug 27, 2009

Zip versions 32 & 64 bit with standalone filters
http://sourceforge.net/projects/mpc-hc/files/
can't go wrong

emanresU deriseD reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Jun 5, 2009

It's pretty funny that they consider "Homecinema" an actual compound word. It's even funnier that the Fileforum editors "correct it" in the listing, even though when they do so, they get the name of the application wrong. (I know it doesn't matter, I'm just saying...)

Some things that make me stick with the slow and unstable KMPlayer:

- Lack of A-B repeat
- Lack of automatic playback position saving
- Cannot play incomplete video files

Banquo reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Mar 18, 2009

analphatester: "not working on win9x"

Who uses Win9x anymore? It doesn't work on MS-DOS either, or CP/M.

Here in the present century it works just fine though.

photonboy reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 12, 2008

I now use for all my content including High-Def BluRay/HD-DVD rips primarily in Matroska.

I can now use the High-Def decoders when the settings are correct (overlay mixer for XP; EVR for Vista, enable DXVA via AVC and VC-1 etc).

Tested on an ATI HD3870 desktop and NVidia 8600M GS notebook. In XP the ATI system used 44% of the CPU for "wmplayerc.exe" to run a 1080p BluRay rip with DXVA disabled and only 3% once I enabled the hardware decoders.

My TOTAL CPU usage to playback a 1080p BluRay rip of Hellboy (mine of course) was 5% under XP. Add a few percent under Vista. CPU was an AMD X2-4800+ but it sounds like maybe even an Intel Atom might work in conjunction with ATI or NVidia hardware decoders and MPlayerc Home Cinema with the settings correctly setup to use them.

Use the Task Manager (CTRL-ALT-DEL) and monitor "mplayerc.exe" to see if you have the correct settings. I recommend setting up a K-Lite Standard Codec pack and overwrite the regular MPlayer Classic (in the K-Lite installed folder on C:/Program Files..) with this one.

analphatester reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 10, 2008

not working on win9x

horsecharles reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 8, 2008

Support for multi-monitors is a real potential homerun:

I work with a lot of web-embedded content..I'm going to try making it the default player for everything.

moog reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 8, 2008

best of the best

cowgaR reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 8, 2008

question: is it better than VLC (VideoLAN) for Windows 0.9.8a?

I've put the same question to VLC. I've used MPC years ago but stopped when original developement stopped. Having 2 branches reminds me of mess in the process of releasing the project.

flibberyGiveIt reviewed v1.2.908.0 on Dec 8, 2008

One of the few no nonsense players: One of the
even fewer that let me spend more time watching
a vid than getting it started.

shdwstar reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 29, 2008

This program rocks.
I wrote up a more detailed review for it at http://mzk.gofreeserve.c...es.php?lng=en&pg=74

Sephiroth... reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 7, 2008

To too-stupid-4u:
You don't know what you talking, this apps is great, you smoke something or what?.
This software is superb, with all the codecs in the same executable, really great.

too-smart-4u reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 6, 2008

mediocre at best like all the previous failures they released.

Tockman reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 6, 2008

Just the best one. Period.

duntuk reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 4, 2008

get the x64 version here:
http://sourceforge.net/p...1&package_id=245172

legion reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 4, 2008

Great media player, small, fast and easy tu use. My default player for rm, mpg, dvd, qt and flash files.

alexins reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 3, 2008

Latest build Media Player Classic - Home Cinema (unstable versions, x86 x64) can always find here: http://www.xvidvideo.ru

some guy reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 3, 2008

low foot print been using this for a long time.
great on low end machine I would use nothing else for my video play back

spacemarine reviewed v1.1.604.0 on Jul 3, 2008

The best media player, now with
HUGE improvements over the previous
version.
Not the most beautiful, flashy interface,
but the best feature set under the hood!

Now includes DXVA video acceleration support, integrated codecs (based on FFMPEG) for almost all media formats including H.264. No more need for the crappy DivX codec adware.
Great for Vista in general, as it supports EVR
(Vista's enhanced video renderer). Nice for Vista Business users, as an MPEG-2 codec is included (now also in the64 bit version).

Bottom line:
This IS arguably the best media player out there.

Chocobito reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Mar 10, 2008

Its great this soft, this have almost any I want in a player (maybe skin?). Five Star ;)

ABSENT reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Mar 8, 2008

Updated 5 March 2008:

Changelog for Win32: http://sourceforge.net/p...1&release_id=582297

Downloads: http://sourceforge.net/p...les.php?group_id=170561

eek-1 reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 16, 2007

AFAIK, the only added feature in MPC Home Cinema is support for remote control device. Therefore it's slightly more useful than the vanilla one on media center PC.

Yakumo reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 16, 2007

tbresson read the reviews under your own link, that MPC beta you mention is NOT from gabest.

tbresson reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 16, 2007

I agree with Prospero424 that there should be more emphasis on the difference between the home cinema edition and the regular one.

As for the developers not developing the MPC anymore as hell0 stated; how do you explain the recent beta ?

See: http://fileforum.betanew...ows_2000XP/1045531002/1

Besides all this, mpc is in my oppinion one of the best players and I use it religiously :)

Prospero424 reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 15, 2007

Cool project.

But the description is a bit lacking. It needs a better explanation of exactly how this is different from the vanilla MPC.

some guy reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 15, 2007

My favorite non resource hog player, one thing i wish it did have is snapshot.

hell0 reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 15, 2007

IT CAN'T BE! MPC is no longer being developed! I have it on good authority from fans of other media players. So what is this?

My favorite player, by far. Thank nature SOMEONE is making a usable player without skins.

But... Light version? You're kidding, right?

CharlieGimbert reviewed v1.0.11.0 on Oct 15, 2007

Hard to say anything yet, lets hope we still get light version too.