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VLC media player vs Baka MPlayer: catalog facts
VLC media player	Baka MPlayer
Free Free software from a non-profit; there is no paid tier and no advertising in the player.	Free Free and open source under the GPL 2.0 licence.
Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS	Windows, Linux
Plays an unusually wide list of codecs and containers out of the box, including MPEG-1/2, H.264, H.265, VP8/VP9… No spyware, no advertising and no user tracking, stated on the project feature page	Uses libmpv for wide format support Simple, uncluttered interface
The stable desktop line is still 3.0.23; the 4.0 interface rewrite has not shipped The interface is functional rather than modern, and advanced options are buried in preference dialogs	No releases published on the GitHub repository Building from source requires Qt 5 and libmpv development packages
Downloadable app	Downloadable app
Open source	Open source
License: GPL-2.0	License: GPL-2.0
No account needed	No account needed
Works offline	Works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked September 20, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 2, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.