Keyboard Controls

Default key bindings for controlling mpv playback

mpv has a fully configurable, command-driven control layer. The default bindings listed here are hardcoded into the mpv binary. You can add or override them in ~/.config/mpv/input.conf.

The listings below are not exhaustive. The authoritative source is etc/input.conf in the mpv source tree. You can also view active bindings interactively with the ? key (see Viewing bindings).

Seeking

Key	Action
Right	Seek forward 5 seconds (keyframe-limited)
Left	Seek backward 5 seconds (keyframe-limited)
Up	Seek forward 1 minute (keyframe-limited)
Down	Seek backward 1 minute (keyframe-limited)
Shift+Right	Seek forward exactly 1 second
Shift+Left	Seek backward exactly 1 second
Shift+Up	Seek forward exactly 5 seconds
Shift+Down	Seek backward exactly 5 seconds
Ctrl+Right	Seek to the next subtitle
Ctrl+Left	Seek to the previous subtitle
Ctrl+Shift+Right	Adjust subtitle delay so the next subtitle shows now
Ctrl+Shift+Left	Adjust subtitle delay so the previous subtitle shows now
Home	Seek to the beginning of the file
Page Up	Seek to the beginning of the next chapter
Page Down	Seek to the beginning of the previous chapter
Shift+Page Up	Seek forward 10 minutes
Shift+Page Down	Seek backward 10 minutes
Shift+Backspace	Undo the last seek (only within the same playlist entry)
Shift+Ctrl+Backspace	Mark current position for Shift+Backspace to return to

Playback control

Key	Action
p / Space	Toggle pause / unpause
.	Step forward one frame, then pause
,	Step backward one frame, then pause
q / Ctrl+w	Stop playback and quit
Q	Quit and save current position for later resumption
Ctrl+c	Quit with exit code 4
ESC	Exit fullscreen; no other effect in windowed mode

Playback speed

Key	Action
[	Decrease playback speed by 10%
]	Increase playback speed by 10%
{	Halve playback speed
}	Double playback speed
Backspace	Reset playback speed to 1×

Volume and audio

Key	Action
9 / /	Decrease volume
0 / *	Increase volume
m	Toggle mute
#	Cycle through available audio tracks
Ctrl++	Increase audio delay (A/V sync) by 0.1 s
Ctrl+-	Decrease audio delay (A/V sync) by 0.1 s

Video

Key	Action
f	Toggle fullscreen
ESC	Leave fullscreen
T	Toggle always-on-top
_	Cycle through available video tracks
A	Cycle aspect ratio override
w / W	Decrease/increase pan-and-scan range
b	Toggle debanding filter
d	Cycle deinterlacing filter
E	Cycle through available editions
Ctrl+h	Toggle hardware video decoding
Alt+Left/Right/Up/Down	Pan the video
Alt++ / Alt+-	Zoom in/out
Alt+Backspace	Reset pan and zoom
Alt+0	Resize window to half its original size
Alt+1	Resize window to its original size
Alt+2	Resize window to double its original size

Color adjustments

These keys are only effective when the video output supports the corresponding adjustment:

Key	Action
1 / 2	Adjust contrast
3 / 4	Adjust brightness
5 / 6	Adjust gamma
7 / 8	Adjust saturation

Subtitles

Key	Action
j	Cycle forward through subtitle tracks
J	Cycle backward through subtitle tracks
v	Toggle subtitle visibility
Alt+v	Toggle secondary subtitle visibility
z / Z	Shift subtitle timing −/+ 0.1 seconds
r / R	Move subtitles up/down
G / F	Increase/decrease subtitle font size by 10%
u	Toggle subtitle style override (apply --sub-ass-* overrides vs. override fully)
V	Cycle which video data is used for ASS rendering

Screenshots

Key	Action
s	Screenshot at original resolution, with subtitles
S	Screenshot at original resolution, without subtitles
Ctrl+s	Screenshot of the window as displayed (with OSD and scaling)
Alt+s	Screenshot every frame (press again to stop)

Playlist navigation

Key	Action
>	Go to the next playlist entry
<	Go to the previous playlist entry
Enter	Go to the next playlist entry
Shift+Home	Jump to the first playlist entry
Shift+End	Jump to the last playlist entry
l	Set or clear A-B loop points
L	Toggle infinite looping of the current file
F8	Show the playlist and current position

OSD and info

Key	Action
o / P	Show progress bar, elapsed time, and total duration
O	Toggle OSD between normal and always-on playback time
i	Show playback statistics overlay
I	Toggle statistics overlay
?	Toggle key bindings overlay
`	Open the console
F9	Show the list of audio, video, and subtitle tracks
DEL	Cycle OSC visibility: never / auto / always

Interactive track and playlist selection (g- prefix)

These bindings open an interactive menu in the console for selecting from a list:

Key	Action
g-p	Select a playlist entry
g-s	Select a subtitle track
g-S	Select a secondary subtitle track
g-a	Select an audio track
g-v	Select a video track
g-t	Select a track of any type
g-c	Select a chapter
g-e	Select an MKV edition or DVD/Blu-ray title
g-l	Select a subtitle line to seek to (requires ffmpeg in PATH)
g-d	Select an audio device
g-h	Select a file from the watch history (requires --save-watch-history)
g-w	Select a file from watch-later config files to resume
g-b	Select a defined input binding
g-r	Show all property values
g-m / Ctrl+p	Open the miscellaneous menu

Navigate the menu with Down/Ctrl+n (down), Up/Ctrl+p (up), Page Down/Ctrl+f (page down), Page Up/Ctrl+b (page up). Selecting the active track in a track menu disables it.

Multimedia keys

Key	Action
Pause	Pause
Stop	Stop and quit
Previous / Next	Seek backward/forward 1 minute
Volume Up / Volume Down	Adjust volume
Mute	Toggle mute

Context menu

Key	Action
MENU / Shift+F10	Open the context menu

Mouse controls

Action	Effect
Left double-click	Toggle fullscreen
Right click	Toggle pause
Scroll wheel up/down	Adjust volume
Scroll wheel left/right	Seek backward/forward 10 seconds
Ctrl+scroll wheel up/down	Zoom in/out, keeping the hovered position fixed
Forward/Back buttons	Next/previous playlist entry
Ctrl+left click and drag	Pan the video, keeping the clicked point under the cursor

Viewing bindings

Press ? during playback to toggle an overlay showing all currently active key bindings. This is provided by the built-in stats script.

You can also run mpv in binding test mode to inspect what any key does:

mpv --input-test --force-window --idle

Press any key in the window and mpv prints the binding details to the terminal.

Custom bindings in input.conf

Create or edit ~/.config/mpv/input.conf to add or override bindings. Each line has the form:

KEY COMMAND [# comment]

~/.config/mpv/input.conf

# Increase/decrease volume with +/-
+  add volume  5
-  add volume -5

# Jump forward/backward 90 seconds with Ctrl+arrow
Ctrl+RIGHT seek  90
Ctrl+LEFT  seek -90

# Toggle hardware decoding
h cycle-values hwdec no auto

# Bind SHARP (#) to toggle mute (SHARP is the literal key name for #)
SHARP cycle mute

# Ignore the g key so the g-* bindings still work without triggering anything
g ignore

Use ignore to fully unbind a key: ctrl+a ignore. Disable all default bindings with --no-input-default-bindings and define everything yourself.

Key modifier names are Shift, Ctrl, Alt, and Meta. Combine them with +, for example Ctrl+Alt+x.