Alternatives to Dragon Player
A simple KDE video player that plays video files and streams with minimal controls. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
Dragon Player
A simple KDE video player that plays video files and streams with minimal controls.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as Dragon Player.
Haruna
An open-source KDE video player built on libmpv with automatic playlists and configurable shortcuts.
Haruna is also a KDE video player but built on libmpv, adding automatic folder playlists, seek bar previews, configurable shortcuts and online video through yt-dlp.
VLC media player
A free player that opens almost any video or audio file, disc or stream without installing a codec pack.
VLC media player runs on Linux, Windows, macOS, Android and iOS with a very wide codec list, but its interface buries advanced options in preference dialogs.
SMPlayer
A front end for mpv and MPlayer that remembers where you stopped in every file you have ever opened.
SMPlayer uses mpv and MPlayer on Windows, macOS and Linux, remembers playback position per file and downloads subtitles, offering far more features in a dated Qt interface.
mpv
A minimal, scriptable media player with high quality video output and no real interface to get in the way.
mpv adds scripting, hardware decoding and advanced video output across Windows, macOS and Linux, but relies on an on-screen controller and hand-edited configuration files.
Celluloid
A simple GTK front end for the mpv video player on Linux.
Celluloid is a simple GTK front end for mpv on Linux with drag and drop playlists and Wayland support, using mpv configuration for advanced tuning.
Clapper
A GNOME media player built on GStreamer and GTK4, designed for simplicity and ease of use.
Clapper is a GTK4 GStreamer-based player designed for GNOME, with simple controls, and its format support depends on installed GStreamer plugins.
Showtime
GNOME's video player, with simple playback controls, subtitles, multiple audio tracks and screenshots.
Showtime is GNOME's GPL-3.0 video player with fading controls, subtitle and audio track selection, speed control and screenshots, built to match GNOME rather than KDE.
Parole
A lightweight GStreamer-based media player written to fit the Xfce desktop.
Parole is a lightweight GStreamer-based player for Xfce that plays files, DVDs, CDs and live streams and can be extended through plugins.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
Elisa
A KDE music player for browsing and playing a local music library and listening to online radio.
JuK
A KDE jukebox-style music player focused on managing a collection, playlists and tags.
MPC-QT
A reimplementation of Media Player Classic built with Qt and libmpv.
Hypnotix
An IPTV streaming application from Linux Mint for live TV, movies and series.
Syncplay
Keep video playback synchronized across a group.
