All you Should Know about Windows Media Player

2023-01-10 | Yvonne

Tip: Windows Media Player works on Windows devices. Find your computer's Player version in this table. Windows Media Components for QuickTime can play Windows Media files on Macs.

Windows Media Player works on Windows devices. Find your computer's Player version in this article. Windows Media Components for QuickTime can play Windows Media files on Macs.

WMP is Microsoft's first media player and library program. It plays audio, video, and graphics on Windows PCs, Pocket PCs, and Windows Mobile devices. Windows Media Player for classic Mac OS, Mac OS X, and Solaris was discontinued. In Windows 8, Groove Music replaced Windows Media Player. Windows 11 introduced the Media Player, replacing Groove Music.

The media player can rip audio files from and copy them to compact CDs, manufacture recordable discs in Audio CD format or as data discs with playlists, such as an MP3 CD, synchronize content with an MP3 player or other mobile devices, and enable users buy or rent music from several online music stores.

Windows XP, Vista, and Server 2008 had Windows Media Player 11. WMV, WMA, and ASF are the default formats. Windows Playlist uses XML (WPL). Windows Media DRM can be used by the player.

Before Windows 11, Windows Media Player 12 was the latest. Windows 7 and it debuted on October 22, 2009. It hasn't been updated for Windows 8, 8.1, 10, or 11. Groove Music and Microsoft Movies & TV play most media on Windows 8 and later. Windows Media Player is still included in October 2021. Windows RT lacks Windows Media Player.

Microsoft replaced Groove Music with Media Player on November 16, 2021. Windows 11 users can use the old Windows Media Player.

Features ofWindows Media Player

Library and playback functions

Windows Media Player plays audio, video, and photos. It has quick forward, backward, file markers (if any), and variable playback speed (WMP 9 Series included seek and temporal compression/expansion). It can be played locally, streamed multicast, and downloaded in stages. Skip playlist elements during playing without eliminating them. The player is keyboard-controlled.

In version 7, Windows Media Player included a media library that enables you catalog, search for, and browse media metadata. Media can be sorted by album, artist, genre, date, etc. The menu-based Quick Access Panel in Windows Media Player 9 Series lets you browse your entire collection. Version 10 included the micro mode Quick Access Panel.

Version 11 eliminated it. WMP 9 Series ratings include auto ratings. Windows Media Player 10 lets you add photos, TV episodes, and more to the library. WMP 9–11 had a full-featured Advanced Tag Editor. Windows Media Player 12 removed it. Since WMP 9 Series, Auto Playlists alter based on your requirements. Auto Playlists always update when opened. In WMP 9 Series and later, Auto Ratings rates tracks based on play frequency. Windows Media Player 9 Series has pre-filled auto-playlists. Only Windows XP and later allow Auto Playlist creation.

Windows Media Player 11 replaced the Quick Access Panel with a left-hand Explorer-style navigation pane. Each library's media or metadata categories can be altered in this pane, while the library's contents are shown on the right as thumbnails with album art or other art that identifies the item. Add album art to Library placeholders (though the program re-renders all album art imported this way into 1x1 pixel ratio, 200x200 resolution jpegs).

Music, Pictures, Videos, and Recorded TV can each be set to Tiles, Icons, Details, or Extended Tiles from the menu bar. Entry thumbnails are shown. Version 11 lets you search and see results as you type without hitting Enter. More characters improve search results. Stacking shows how many albums are in a category or folder. More albums in this category make the pile bigger. The List pane lets users choose whether to be asked to remove skipped songs from a playlist when saving or playing it.

Visualizations

Windows Media Player plays music with pictures. Alchemy, Bars and Waves, and Battery have been utilized since versions 9, 7, and 8. If you updated from Windows Media Player 7 or 8, "Musical Colors" remains. Versions 11 and up remove the "Ambience," "Particle," "Plenoptic," and "Spikes" visuals. Version 12 later eliminated the "Battery" image.

The graphics were removed since full-screen controls don't work (either the visualization gets shifted to the left while there is a thick black bar to the right side of the screen, that there are no full screen controls, or that the visualization have DXE Problems). "BlazingColors," "ColorCubes," "Softie the Snowman," and "Yule Log" were previously downloaded visuals. Microsoft has removed most downloads, however WMP Goodies still has them.

Formats

WAV, MP3, and Windows Media codecs are incorporated into the player. Windows XP and WMP 9 Series include the Windows Media Audio Professional codec. It supports 24-bit 192 kHz multichannel audio. Windows Media Player 11 includes the Windows Media Format 11 runtime, which supports low bitrates (less than 128 kbit/s for WMA Pro), rips music to WMA Pro 10, and updates WMA to version 9.2.

Media Foundation codecs and DirectShow filters can support any media codec and container format (Media Foundation codecs only in Windows Vista and later). "The input media file is invalid" while playing an MP3 file with compressed ID3 headers (tags). Version 6.1 supported MP3s, and version 7 supported audio CDs.

Windows Media Player 8 for Windows XP plays DVDs without decoders. With compatible decoders, the player can play DVDs and Blu-rays with menus, titles, chapters, parental controls, and audio track language selection. Starting with Windows Media Player 11, MPEG-2 and Dolby Digital (AC-3) decoders were built into Windows Vista (only the Home Premium and Ultimate versions) and Windows 7 (Home Premium, Ultimate, or Enterprise editions) to play DVDs without further software. Due to licensing costs, Windows 8 and Windows 10 removed the decoders.

Windows Media Player 12 supports H.264, MPEG-4 Part 2, ALAC, AAC, 3GP, MP4, and MOV.

Windows Media Player 12 plays AVCHD files (.M2TS and .mts).

Windows Media Player 12 version 1507 supports FLAC, HEVC, SubRip subtitle, and Matroska container formats.

Windows 10 versions 1809 and later can play VP9 video in a WebM container, even if Microsoft Movies & TV is the default player.

Burning, ripping, and playing discs

Windows Media Player 7 can create music CDs, while Windows Media Player 9 Series can burn data CDs on Windows XP and later. Data CDs can use any player-supported media format. Data CDs can be burned with playlists and WMA media. Burn music CDs with volume leveling in WMP 9 Series.

Audio CDs can be ripped as WMA or WMA 10 Pro (WMP 11 and after) at 48, 64, 96, 128, 160, and 192 kbit/s, WMA lossless (470 to 940 kbit/s) (9 Series on XP and later), WMA variable bitrate (40 to 75 kbit/s up to 240-355 kbit/s), or MP3 at 128, 192, 256, and 320 kbit/s (WAV ripping in WMP 11 and later). If you have compatible audio hardware, WMP 9 Series can play 20-bit HDCDs. Error correction and Windows Media DRM protect ripped audio.

Ripping to MP3 requires Windows Media Player 8 for Windows XP and later with a suitable MP3 encoder. Windows Media Player 10 included Fraunhofer MP3 Professional. When a CD is inserted, the online Windows Media database automatically downloads the album name, artist, and track list. Version 11 lets you rip CDs to WAV and WMA 10 Pro. Version 12 adds FLAC and ALAC formats to Windows 10 in 2015. Version 11 displays the disc's burnt space on a visual bar. If a burn list won't fit on one disc, it adds disc spanning.

Portable sync

Since version 7, Windows Media Player can connect, share, and sync with handheld devices and gaming consoles. Media can be transformed automatically when synchronizing. Windows Media Player automatically deletes playlists from devices. Windows Media Player 9 Series and later can setup devices. Version 10 and later support Media Transfer Protocol and Auto Sync.

Auto Sync allows customers choose the most recently added or highest-rated tracks to automatically sync with their portable device. It also automatically sets the portable device's clock and talks to it to gather the user's preferences. Windows Media Player 10 added UMDF-based Windows Portable Devices API.

Version 11 improves PlaysForSure-compatible portable player sync. "Reverse-synchronization" in WMP 11 enables you copy media from a portable device to the PC. Shuffle Sync can rearrange portable device content. Multi PC Sync and Guest Sync can be used to sync various content from numerous PCs to the portable device. Portable device content is searchable in the library's navigation window.

Windows Media Player's "Sync" feature lets you automatically "down-convert" (transcode) high-bit-rate song files. Down-conversion is active by default. This helps give low-bit-rate data to portable devices and save space on portable devices with limited capacity. Devices with enough storage and fast bit rates can skip down conversion.

The Quality options in the Windows Media Player settings for Sync for a portable device determine the bit-rate of files copied to it in versions 11 (2006) and 12 (2009). If you leave Quality on Automatic, the portable device will usually copy 192kbs files. Set everything manually. The Sync function's down-conversion function's best manual bit rate is 192kbs. Lower the bit rate.

High-bit-rate portable devices should not be down-converted. This yields device-optimal files. Windows Media Player Version 11's Quality tab in the Advanced Options section of the device's Sync settings lets you disable down-conversion. In Windows Media Player 12, you may disable down-conversion on the Quality tab of the device's Properties in the Sync Options menu under Select Settings.

When set up this way, Windows Media Player's "Sync" function can sync unmodified high-bit-rate song files to portable devices that can play them (i.e. those capable of using file formats such as WMA Lossless, mp3-360kbs, etc.). Some PC users have created big song collections with high-bit-rate WMA Lossless (WMA-LL) protocol or other song file formats.

Windows Media Player supports WMA-LL for CD ripping. Depending on how good the CD source file was, ripped WMA-LL files are normally between 600kbs and 1200kbs, 3 to 6 times higher than 192kbs. The sound quality is greater than the default rate despite the larger file size.

Versions 11 and 12 decreased file bit rates since portable devices have limited storage and capabilities. Sync down-conversion was always on. This ensured that the files could be played and were tiny enough to contain a lot of songs on the portable device.

Around 2012, portable devices were released that could play Windows Media Player-made high bit-rate WMA-LL files and others and hold enough to play a huge collection. This made it easier and more enticing to utilize Windows Media Player to sync PC-only high-bit-rate music libraries to these new portable devices.

Playback enhancements

Windows Media Player enables you adjust brightness, contrast, saturation, hue, and pixel aspect ratio for all supported video formats. A pre-set 10-band graphic equalizer and SRS WOW audio post-processing are also included. Windows Media Player supports audio and video DSP plug-ins.

These plug-ins process sent audio or video. Video Smoothing (only for Windows XP and later) interpolates extra frames to increase frame rate in WMP 9 Series. This smooths low-framerate videos. The player supports closed captioning and subtitles for local media, VOD, and live streaming. Windows Media captions can embed closed caption data in SAMI files.

Video overlays and VMR surfaces are possible if the video card can handle them. "Employ high quality mode" in Powerful Performance options lets Windows XP use the more advanced YUV mixing method instead of VMR7. Deinterlacing, scaling, and better colors are possible.

TV output deinterlacing is incorporated into WMP 9 Series. DXVA speeds playback in version 9. Version 11 improved DirectX-accelerated WMV decoding (DXVA decoding). It used static lyrics and "Synchronized Lyrics," which time-stamped lyrics to appear at specific periods. Version 12 removed the Advanced Tag Editor, which allowed access to Synchronized Lyrics.

Since Windows Media Player 9 Series, the player supports crossfading, audio dynamic range (Quiet Mode) for WMA Pro and WMA Lossless, and auto volume leveling for MP3 and Windows Media media with volume level/gain information. The player offers many privacy and security settings.