Paris-based developer VideoLAN on Tuesday announced the arrival of the insanely popular VLC Media Player for the Apple TV. The new app for the Apple device, VideoLAN says, follows the company’s ultimate goal i.e. “VLC plays everything and runs everywhere“.
The app for VLC went under development soon after the 4th generation Apple TV hit the market, the company says. A beta version of the app was rolled out for all developers in November last year. Today, the app finally went public and can be accessible via the App Store on the Apple TV. Just search for ‘VLC’ and you’ll get the desired result.
Just like on any other platform, VLC will support all formats possible without the need of any conversion or decryption. Also, the VLC Apple TV app will be able to play files accessible via Windows Shares, UPnP, FTP and Plex servers, along with those available on the local machine. It will automatically discover network storages and shares and will also be able to download subtitles and artwork.
You also get the regular VLC goodies like chapters navigation, multiple audio and subtitles tracks. Another unique feature VLC offers is the ability to set custom playback speed.
All this is fine, but the standout feature about the VLC Apple TV app is by far ‘casting’ which will allow you to send your video files directly for any browser or app to the Apple TV. You can also view videos by directly pasting URLs in the app for streaming. You can also access these videos later using the ‘Network Stream’ option.
Subtitles for the new player are also going to impress you. VideoLAN has, for the first time, integrated the app with OpenSubtitles.org, which will allow users to download missing subtitles during playback. We also get support for complex subtitles for Asian languages and right-to-left text for Arabic and Hebrew.
Web radio also comes integrated in the app with the community service hatchet.is to show artist imagery and biographies in addition to album artwork.
VideoLAN is also planning native integration with Cloud Services, like Dropbox, OneDrive and Box. These services, the company says, will enter the beta phase today. And to conclude, just like every other VLC player we’ve seen before, the Apple TV version is also completely free.
