Hello,

I have been working on a new media player for some time. It is a fully web based media player (PWA). It plays local files on your system and does not upload them anywhere.

- Can play video and audio files - Supports mp4, webm and some mkv files for video and supports most of the common formats for audio like mp3, flac, ogg, wav - Because it is a PWA, you can install it to your system using the install button on the browser URL box, or on mobile by adding the web page to your home screen - Once installed, it works fully offline - Uses GLSL fragment shaders via WebGL for audio visualizations and supports importing custom shaders (API explanation is in the settings if you want to create a custom audio visualization!) - Supports creating a basic playlist - Can show subtitles (via .srt files or embedded subtitles) - Can show lyrics (via .lrc files) - Picture-in-picture mode for videos - Different playback speeds - Settings for customization - Keyboard shortcuts - You can assign it as the default app on your OS for the media file types you want. Then you can just double click on a file to open it using EMP - Works with the media buttons on your headphones or keyboard - I tried to make it responsive, so it should work on different screen sizes, having said that, I mostly had desktop users in mind.

There are plethora of media players out there, I guess what makes this app a bit different is that it is fully web based, so it is cross-platform and you can simply go to https://essentialmediaplayer.com and start playing your local media files. Also if you have restricted access on a computer and not able to install desktop applications, this might be an alternative.

This app only supports the formats/codecs the browser supports. This is probably the biggest limitation but I chose this route to reduce implementation effort significantly. So this app is definitely not a VLC replacement.

Technologies used: Vue, TypeScript, Vite, Material Web

I would be happy if anybody has a Chromebook and can try this app and let me know if it works well, and whether it feels native or not.

This project started as a way to improve my web coding skills and also learn more about PWAs and to see if it is a viable option for creating native-like app experiences. Turns out PWAs are indeed very capable!

Especially the GLSL fragment shader based audio visualization (and creating an API for it) was not something on my mind when I started this project, but it felt natural when adding audio playing capabilities and it was fun to work on that part.

Looking forward to your feedbacks.

Show HN: Essential Media Player – A web-based (PWA) local media player