Dacx: Cross-Platform Music and Video Player

Fast, lightweight, open source media player for Windows, macOS, and Linux.

Built with Flutter + media_kit (libmpv).

Dacx is a desktop music and video player focused on speed and low overhead, with modern playback controls, media session integration, and broad format support.

⬇️ Download Dacx

Need assistance? Check out the Installation Documentation!

Windows	MacOS	Linux
MSI: x64	DMG: Universal	AppImage: x64
	ZIP: Universal	DEB: x64
		RPM: x64
		Flatpak: x64
		TAR.GZ: x64

Platforms

• Windows
• macOS
• Linux

Features

• Audio + video playback for MP3, FLAC, WAV, OGG, AAC, Opus, MP4, MKV, AVI, WebM, and more (anything libmpv handles).
• Playlist files (.m3u / .pls import + save queue as .m3u); HLS .m3u8 streams via mpv.
• Playback speed control (transport chip + [ / ] / \ shortcuts).
• External audio / subtitle track load from the more menu.
• 10-band equalizer with presets.
• Optional multi-audio-track mixing via lavfi-complex (Experimental Features; unstable).
• Optional seek thumbnails (Playback settings; uses extra memory).
• Window transparency / background blur on Windows and macOS (Appearance settings). Linux compositor blur remains experimental.
• Resume a file from its previous position when you reopen it; relaunch starts at the empty home screen.
• Compact mode and always-on-top window.
• System media-session integration: lock-screen / Now Playing / SMTC / MPRIS controls, artwork, rate, and scrubbing.
• File associations + custom document icon on Windows, macOS, and Linux.
• Built-in update checker: in-app self-update on Windows (MSI) and macOS (/Applications). On Linux, prefer the AppImage managed with AppManager for install + updates (no in-app Linux installer).
• Notarized & signed DMG/ZIP for macOS; Windows/Linux packages carry GPG detached signatures. Windows MSI is not Authenticode-signed by default (SmartScreen may warn); optional Authenticode is a release-machine concern (see SECURITY.md).

Support contract (v1 readiness)

• UI language: English only (lib/l10n).
• macOS: 15 (Sequoia) or newer.
• CPU arch: Windows/Linux ship x64 only (arm64 not a priority).
• Linux (recommended): AppImage + AppManager for desktop install and updates. deb/rpm/Flatpak/tar remain available; Flatpak is GitHub-sideload only (not Flathub).
• Experimental Features: Long-lived opt-in lane (off by default) for unfinished / in-progress ideas (multi-audio mix, Linux compositor blur, …). Features may graduate to stable settings (like Win/mac blur) or stay experimental indefinitely; not a blocker for 1.0.
• Windows portable ZIP: No longer shipped; use the MSI.

Development

Note

This project uses Flutter/Dart but also NodeJS. Its a little bit messy and not the best of practices I know, im just the most familiar and confident with js scripting and node so thats how the project is controlled. Sorry :P

# Install Node.js dependencies (build scripts)
npm install

# Install Flutter dependencies through FVM
fvm flutter pub get

# Run in development mode
npm run dev

# Run tests
npm run test:all

# Build for current platform
npm run build:win   # Windows
npm run build:mac   # macOS
npm run build:linux # Linux

Signing model

macOS releases are fully code-signed and notarized. Windows releases are fully code-signed using Azure Artifact Signing. Linux DEB/RPM/TAR.GZ artifacts are signed with a GPG detached signature (the project's release key). Ed25519 remains the primary self-update trust, and Authenticode signing provides OS-level trust verification (see SECURITY.md).

This means:

• scripts/flutter-build-macos.js requires APPLE_TEAM_ID in .env. Self-update pins against the team id. Set DACX_BUILD_DEV_NO_TEAM_ID=1 to skip for local dev:

  DACX_BUILD_DEV_NO_TEAM_ID=1 npm run build:mac

• scripts/flutter-build-windows.js accepts WINDOWS_SIGNING_CERT_THUMBPRINT (or DACX_WINDOWS_SIGNER_THUMBPRINT). In official release builds, the MSI is fully signed using Azure Artifact Signing and the thumbprint is baked in as a runtime pin. On release VMs, set the thumbprint and DACX_REQUIRE_WINDOWS_SIGNER=1 so npm run build:win fails if it is missing (see SECURITY.md). The Windows build also ships dacx-update-helper.exe next to dacx.exe for post-exit MSI install (no on-disk PowerShell watchdog scripts).
• scripts/flutter-build-linux is not affected by either.

macOS support

The macOS build targets macOS 15 (Sequoia) or newer. Older macOS versions are not supported.

License

GPLv3