REX-Player

REX Player v5.5.0 is here! 🎉

This release adds pinning folders and media to the top of your browser, manual bookmarks alongside chapters, Dynamic Ambient Mode, instant player controls, a faster Shorts feed, file dates in Media Info, and fixes for offline playback, navigation crashes, and update checks.

🔥 Pin Folders and Media

Pin any folder, video, or audio file and it stays at the top of the browser, right where you need it. Pinned items keep their own order, wear a pin badge on the thumbnail, and follow renames and deletions on their own (#466).

🔥 Dynamic Ambient Mode

Ambient mode now creates a live glow around your video that follows zoom, pan, and aspect ratio changes, with smooth transitions between scenes and battery-efficient rendering (#267, #268).

✨ New Features

• Pin Folders and Media: Pin folders, videos, and audio files from the selection-mode overflow menu so they always surface at the top of the browser. Pinned items keep their pin order regardless of your active sort, and pins follow renames, are dropped on delete, and are cleaned up when the file goes missing (#466).
• Separate Pins Per View: Optionally keep folder pins isolated to the view you pinned them in. Media pins are always shared across the tree, video list, and media library (#466).
• Manual Bookmarks: Create your own bookmarks (pins) on any video. They merge with embedded chapters into a single timeline in the Chapters sheet and show up on the seek bar like chapter boundaries. Tap one to jump there exactly, double-tap skip lands on them too, and the Chapters/Bookmarks button is always available, so you can add a first bookmark to a file with no chapters at all (#469).
• Instant Controls: Player controls now appear the moment you touch the screen instead of after the double-tap window, and hide just as immediately. If you prefer the old wait so a double-tap seek never flashes the controls, turn off Settings > Gestures > Instant controls.
• Subtitle Pinch to Scale: Drag subtitles up or down and pinch with two fingers to scale their size. Pinch-to-resize can be toggled in Settings and the More sheet (#398, #434). (by @pigmaos)
• Redesigned Network Tab: A Material 3 Expressive layout with a streamlined stream URL field and combined Paste/Play button. Tap recent links to play them or long-press to copy. Connections are grouped into cards with prominent Connect/Browse actions. Long-press a connection to connect, edit, enable auto-connect, or delete it.
• Alternate Audio Languages: Multi-language yt-dlp videos list alternative audio tracks under "Other audio languages". Pick a language and it is fetched on demand, while the original audio stays selected and nothing extra is downloaded ahead of time.
• Network File Sorting & Hidden Files: Sort remote files naturally by name, modification date, or size, with folders always first. Optionally hide dotfiles and supported SMB/WebDAV hidden and system files (#440). (by @asim-sde)
• Bottom Bar Playback Controls: Option to move the playback controls row to the bottom of the player (#417).
• File Dates in Media Info: Media Info now lists the file's dates (#465). (by @quirkyfiesta-glitch)
• Subtitle Font Import: Import multiple TTF and OTF font files with validation and duplicate detection. Importing a single font applies it to subtitles immediately (#402). (by @pigmaos)
• Long-Press Speed Memory Modes: Long-press the speed button to access multi-speed controls and choose whether adjusted speed is remembered globally or per video (#460). (by @quirkyfiesta-glitch)
• Show Play in Header: Hide the floating Play button and show a Play icon in the top bar across supported browser views.
• Borderless Button Indicator: When player button backgrounds are hidden, active Speed, Zoom, Flip, and A-B Loop buttons display a colored indicator beneath the icon.
• Independent Sort Orders: Each sorting opti

Checksums

REX Player v5.3.0 is here! 🎉 This release introduces the "You" tab to consolidate personal media, redesigned player control capsules, and automatic subtitle character encoding detection.

🔥 The new "You" tab

Consolidates personal media into a single tab to reduce bottom navigation clutter:

• Recents & Playlists: Features a horizontal shelf for Recently Played media alongside your playlists, letting you navigate both from one screen.
• Quick-Access Chips: If you disable the Shorts or Network tabs in settings, quick-access chips appear at the top of the You tab so you can still reach them.
• Profile Header: Adds a profile avatar and display name with a hidden customization easter egg for curious users to discover.

✨ New Features

• Grouped Player Controls: Replaces individual circular buttons with grouped control capsules that show active toggle states (e.g. repeat, shuffle), paired with matching pill-shaped volume, brightness, speed, and chapter indicators.
• Subtitle Encoding Detection: Automatically detects subtitle character encodings (with manual override support) and reloads subtitles immediately without restarting playback (#344, #394).
• Dynamic Auto-Playlists: Automatically generates "Recently Added" and "Most Played" playlists with contextual sorting and deletion options.

Also new:

• Ytdlp Stream Quality Selection: Select video resolution (up to 4K, 1080p, 720p, or audio-only) directly in the player for streams resolved via the REX Ytdlp companion add-on (requires updating the companion app).
• Navigation Tab Reordering: Reorder bottom navigation tabs in Appearance settings.
• Custom Playback Speed Presets: Customize the speed steps cycled when tapping the playback speed button (#331).
• Media Info Folder Paths: Displays the full parent folder path in the media info sheet with faster loading (#383).
• Playlist Cards: Updated playlist cards to a 16:9 layout matching media cards with custom thumbnail support.
• Settings Search: Indexed previously missing preferences and improved fuzzy search matching (#397, #408).
• Translations: Added Indonesian translation and updated Spanish (#403, #411) and Arabic strings.
• Toolchain Upgrade: Updated build toolchain to Kotlin 2.4.10, AGP 9.3.1, and Gradle 9.6.1.

🐛 Stability & Bug Fixes

• Folder Statistics: Separated video and audio calculations across folders to fix duration and size mismatches when audio files are present (#405, #412).
• Recently Played Deletion: Fixed the "Delete file from device" option leaving the physical file on storage when deleting from history (#410).
• Chapter Menu Delay: Removed the 300ms gesture delay on chapter buttons and eliminated scroll jitter when opening the chapter sheet (#381, #386).
• Player Exit Crash: Fixed a crash on playback exit caused by accessing destroyed MPV mutexes.
• Rapid Seeking Audio Dropouts: Fixed audio streams dropping out during rapid scrubbing or seeking.
• Startup Crash: Fixed a crash on launch caused by duplicate media item keys (#390).
• Shorts Playback & Navigation: Kept the screen awake during Shorts playback (#385) and fixed the back gesture returning to the wrong tab.
• WebShare QR Code: Fixed QR code generation and styling in the WebShare sheet.
• Explorer List Padding: Fixed excessive bottom padding in file browser lists (#380).

👥 Contributors

Thanks to external contributors @asim-sde (#381, #386, #397, #405, #408, #412), @FFSA47 (#403, #411), and @maqu630 for their contributions to this release!

Note for yt-dlp users: Quality selection requires the updated REX-Ytdlp add-on. You can download or update it from the REX-Ytdlp Releases page.

Checksums

REX Player v5.2.0 is here! 🎉 This release introduces yt-dlp stream playback via companion add-on, per-video aspect ratio persistence, disable autoplay mode, full Material 3 Expressive browser redesign, and fuzzy settings search.

🔥 Highlighting: Web Stream Playback via yt-dlp Add-On

Play streams from yt-dlp supported websites directly inside REX Player through a secure companion add-on:

• REX Ytdlp Companion Add-On: Install the companion add-on to resolve and stream media from thousands of yt-dlp supported websites seamlessly.
• Direct Stream Fallback: Play compatible URLs directly without the add-on installed, with flexible URL routing for maximum compatibility.
• Material 3 Expressive Loading Indicator: Buffer percentage overlay with smooth URL load transitions for network streams.

✨ New Features

• Per-Video Aspect Ratio Persistence: Set a default aspect ratio and optionally remember per-video overrides that survive app restarts (#338, #352). (Thanks @asim-sde!)
• Disable Autoplay on Open: Open media in a paused state to adjust subtitles, audio tracks, or volume before playback begins (#328). (Thanks @asim-sde!)
• Material 3 Expressive Browser Redesign: Comprehensive visual refresh of media cards, floating selection bar, breadcrumb navigation, top bar with flat bottom dock, and bottom navigation bar with M3 Expressive styling.
• Material 3 Expressive Player Sheets: Upgraded bottom sheets with responsive badges, Mini Player synchronization, and expressive design tokens throughout the player.
• Fuzzy Settings Search with Auto-Scroll Highlight: Instantly find any setting with fuzzy matching and automatic scroll-to-highlight navigation (#329).
• File Explorer Playlist Support: Open playlists directly from third-party file explorers with full track naming and ordering support (#334). (Thanks @asim-sde!)
• Robust SMB Streaming: Improved network drive streaming with better credential handling, custom port support, IPv6 compatibility, and automatic connection cleanup (#334). (Thanks @asim-sde!)
• History Management Controls: Options to auto-remove deleted files from history and exclude externally opened playback from history entries.
• Force Dark Mode for Glass Controls: Player automatically switches to dark theme when glass player controls are enabled.
• Show Next/Previous Buttons Setting: Configurable toggle to show or hide next/previous track buttons in the player layout.
• Shorts Mode Improvements: End-of-feed card indicator, fixed blocked shorts mode reload, and persistent watch position tracking.
• Turkish Translation: Added comprehensive Turkish localization (#373). (Thanks @KerimDemirkaynak!)
• Azerbaijani Translation: Added full Azerbaijani localization (#367). (Thanks @Jamal Ali!)
• Persian Translation: Added Persian localization. (Thanks @Saeedbz9!)
• Arabic Translation Updates: Updated Arabic translation strings.

⚡ Performance & Optimizations

• Modular Player Architecture: Redesigned player engine for faster startup and reduced memory usage.
• Chapter Menu Performance: Fixed lag when opening chapter menus with large chapter lists (#337). (Thanks @asim-sde!)
• Subtitle Loading Fix: Fixed app freezing when loading web subtitles.
• Streamlined Settings: Removed redundant preferences (thumbnail generation strategy, save position on quit, autoplay next video) and reorganized Player Layout into Playback & Controls section.

🐛 Stability & Bug Fixes

• Playback Resume Near End of Video: Fixed saved position being reset to 0 when exiting in the final portion of a video — position now preserved until actual EOF (#342).
• PiP Brightness & Playback: Released window brightness override when entering PiP and prevented accidental pause during PiP transitions (#376).
• Video Flip Fix: Fixed video flip toggle sometimes