VLC media player crosses 7 billion downloads milestone
Free offline media player VLC by non-profit VideoLAN surpasses 7 billion downloads globally, 18 months after hitting 6 billion in January 2025.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
- VLC media player has surpassed 7 billion downloads across all platforms globally.
- The milestone comes roughly 18 months after hitting the 6 billion mark in January 2025.
- Developed by non-profit VideoLAN, the app recently expanded to Amazon's Vega OS for TVs.
- The team is currently working on platform support, codecs, and preparing for the VLC 4 release.
In an era dominated by expensive streaming subscriptions, the completely free and offline VLC media player, built by the non-profit organization VideoLAN, has officially crossed the 7 billion download milestone across all operating platforms.
Jean-Baptiste Kempf, president and lead developer of VLC, shared this updated figure via email. This major achievement arrives roughly 18 months after the software successfully breached the 6 billion download threshold back in January 2025.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
Kempf also noted that the company recently ported VLC over to Amazon's new Vega OS designed for televisions. The development team stated they are actively working on broadening support for all remaining platforms and codecs, while heavily preparing for the upcoming VLC 4 release, though development is taking time.
"VLC is preparing for the VLC 4 release, but it is taking time in development."
Jean-Baptiste Kempf
The steady rise of VLC in an ecosystem crowded with cloud-based streaming services highlights enduring consumer demand for reliable, offline, and versatile local media playback tools. VideoLAN's ability to maintain a non-profit model while successfully adapting to emerging hardware ecosystems like Amazon's Vega OS underscores the long-term resilience of community-driven open-source software projects.
During the previous year, VideoLAN had teased the integration of AI-powered translation and subtitles running on local models, though it remains unconfirmed whether those advanced features were ever officially rolled out to the public.
Source: TechCrunch
Found something wrong in this article? Report an issue with this article
Comments
Leave a Comment