It is difficult to play HEVC videos on your devices without the right codecs. Therefore, if you want to play HEVC videos without a hassle, it's better to get an HEVC video player for your computer. In this article, we give you the top 8 players.
Have you ever tried to open a high-quality HEVC (H.265) video, only to see a blank screen, choppy playback, or no sound at all? This often happens because many default media players on Windows, macOS, and other platforms don’t have built-in support for the HEVC codec. While you could install extra codec packs, the easier option is to use a dedicated HEVC video player that can handle H.265 files smoothly across devices. In this article, we’ll share the best HEVC video players for different systems, so you can enjoy crisp, lag-free playback without compatibility hassles.
HEVC, short for High-Efficiency Video Coding, is a next-generation video compression standard and the successor to AVC (H.264). It delivers the same image quality at about half the file size, making it perfect for streaming, storing, and editing high-resolution videos.
Supporting resolutions up to 8K UHD, HEVC is widely used in 4K movies, high-definition recordings, and professional projects. However, due to its advanced compression technology, many media players require special codecs or updates to play HEVC videos smoothly.
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Before recommending our top picks, we evaluated each player using the following criteria:
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EaseUS RecExperts is a versatile video player and screen recorder. Compatible with almost all common video and audio formats, like MP4, MOV, MKV, etc., this free media player can help you open all media files with a few simple clicks. As for video playing, it lets you enjoy the movies in video quality from HD to even 4K, ensuring an excellent viewing experience. In addition, you can even slow down or speed up video playback from 0.5X to 2X while watching videos.
As we discussed before, it is also a professional screen recording tool that allows you to record screen and audio in different modes. Once the recording is done, you can export your recordings in various formats for later sharing. Now, just hit the below button to get this free video player!
What's the best HEVC video player? In the following, we will share some HEVC H.265 video players for Windows, Mac, and mobile devices.
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DivX Player is a free HEVC (H.265) video player that delivers smooth 4K playback for popular video formats. It supports videos from local storage, URL links, Google Drive, and Dropbox, making it easy to access and enjoy your media files.
The player also offers flexible playback controls, and you can slow down or speed up videos, manage subtitles, and adjust aspect ratios to suit your screen. For organization, it allows playlist creation and library management, so you can keep your videos neatly arranged.
For enhanced viewing, DivX Player lets you rotate, flip, resize videos, choose the screen size, add subtitles to MP4 files, and even cast videos up to 4K to your Smart TV, providing a versatile media experience.
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PotPlayer is a free HEVC (H.265) video player for Windows that delivers smooth playback of HEVC videos without requiring extra codecs. It supports high-quality playback up to 4K, ensuring crisp images and accurate colors even for highly compressed H.265 content.
PotPlayer is optimized for HEVC playback, providing minimal lag or stuttering even with large 4K files. It supports HDR and SDR content, and offers flexible playback controls such as speed adjustment, audio track switching, and subtitle management. In addition, PotPlayer can handle a wide range of video formats alongside HEVC, including MP4, MKV, AVI, and H.264, and takes advantage of hardware acceleration to ensure smooth performance on modern GPUs.
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VLC Media Player is a free, cross-platform player that supports HEVC (H.265) playback without extra codecs. It delivers smooth 4K video playback, handles HDR and SDR content, and offers flexible controls like speed adjustment, subtitle management, and audio track switching.
VLC also supports almost all popular video formats and uses hardware acceleration for efficient performance.
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5KPlayer is one of the best free HEVC video players you can rely on. The free multimedia player fully supports hundreds of audio-video codecs, especially the H.265/HEVC codec.
It is worth mentioning that this free HEVC media player can play HD and 4K HEVC 8-bit, 10-bit, and even 12-bit videos from GoPro, Drone (DJI), iPhone, action camera, Canon, JVC DSLR cameras with whatever HEVC sub codecs, be it Apple native hvc1 or non-Apple hev1. No external video codec pack or filter is needed. Moreover, it allows streaming 4K and 8K videos in formats like MP4, MKV, MOV, AIV... Windows PC and Apple TV are both supported. As for a free media player, I think it is worth trying!
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MPV is also a free and open-source video player compatible with Windows and Mac computers. It is lightweight, simple, easy to use, and supports a wide range of video formats. With this tool. You can play high-efficiency coding HEVC videos without the help of extra codecs. Moreover, the HEVC H.265 player is also very customizable, which is great. For instance, you can change the video output, the audio output, and the subtitle settings. You can also create custom shortcuts and hotkeys to make it easier to control the player.
Based on my situation, the only downside is that the player doesn't have much documentation. However, the community is very helpful, and there are many resources available online. Overall, I would highly recommend MPV player to anyone looking for a great media player.
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MPC-HC is another open-source and 100% free HEVC media player for PCs. This lightweight media player supports all common video and audio file formats available for playback, and you can watch movies on any SSE2 CPU, even on a low-end PC.
However, this freeware has some disadvantages, such as freezes, sluggish 4K playback, and choppy & out of sync errors while playing the HEVC codec videos on your PC. Considering it's completely free, I think it is a qualified 1080P HEVC video viewer for general users.
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When it comes to the HEVC video player app, you might find fewer apps that allow you to view the HEVC or H.265 video files on your mobile devices. Luckily, we found an excellent HEVC video player app for Android users, and that's Hevc Player & Converter. As its name implies, you will know that this app can help you play H.265 / HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) videos easily. Moreover, if your video file is in another format, you can even use this free tool to convert it into HEVC.
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It is an online HEVC video player that you can use directly in your Google Chrome. This is a standalone video player using libde265 to playback H.265/HEVC content. It currently supports Matroska and other video containers with common audio codecs and subtitles (SSA/ASS format). However, if your computer is too slow for decoding, some problems like frame dropping will occur. At that time, the player will display a short notice. Considering there are few online H.265 media players, this tool is a nice choice if you don't want to install any desktop programs.
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All the tools in this article can be used to play HEVC videos. Among them, we recommend EaseUS RecExperts. This is because if you can download a specific video for some reason, you can record it on your device with this software.
The answer is yes. Since version 3.0, VLC supports HEVC hardware decoding on Windows, Android, macOS, and iOS. You may try this player if you want.
Go to the official website of Convertio, and follow the steps below to convert HEVC to MP4 online.
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