Download M3u8 Mac
Oct 10, 2020 Free download the professional M3U8 to MP4 Converter and Downloader - Allavsoft (for Windows, for Mac), install and then launch it, the following interface will pop up. Step 1 Import M3U8 URL Find any M3U8 video that you want to download, copy its M3U8 URL and paste it to Allavsoft.
Sometimes when you get a file with .m3u8 file extension or an M3U8 stream link, you may be confused and don't know how to play it on your computer. Don't worry. In this post, we will take you close to the M3U8 format and let you understand this file type better. Besides, you can also know 5 best M3U8 video players to help you open this special file type.
Part 1. What is M3U8
M3U8, or M3U8 playlist, is a plain text-based playlist format that contains multimedia playlists. This file extension uses UTF-8 character encoding and describes the locations of media files to most media players. Normally, it can give you references to online media files/folders through absolute paths, relative paths, and URLs. You can also employ this file type to build a playlist for the videos and music on your computer.
Step 1 Open a M3U8 file. Install the best M3U8 video player on your PC and open it. There is another version for Mac. There are two ways to open a M3U8 file. Click the Open File button, find and select the file on the popup dialog, and click Open. Alternatively, go to the File menu on the top ribbon and open your file. Step 2 Control playback. Top 3 M3U Playlist File Player Free Download to Play M3U Files. No.1 5KPlayer – Free IPTV/HLS Streaming/M3U8/M3U Player for Mac/Windows (10) As the best free 4K video player, 5KPlayer is also a qualified M3U playlist player to help you play M3U files and.m3u IPTV playlist on computer as easy as ABC. Before becoming an M3U player, 5KPlayer. M3u8 Software - Free Download M3u8 - Top 4 Download - Top4Download.com offers free. software downloads for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android computers and mobile devices. Visit for free, full. M3u8 Player free download - MP4 Player, VLC Media Player, XXX Video Player - HD X Player, and many more programs.
And M3U8 is based on HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), an HTTP-based media streaming communications protocol implemented by Apple. So, if you want to play M3U8 files, you will need a media player that supports HLS streaming and M3U8 technology.
Part 2. How to Play M3U8 Videos Online
If you only want to open an M3U8 stream link, you don't need to install any software on your computer. You can simply paste the URL address of the video into an online M3U8 Player and enjoy the video without any hassle.
Here is a list of the most popular M3U8 players we have found on the Internet. Basically, you can run them on any web browsers, including Google Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, and Microsoft Edge.
1. m3u8player.net
This M3U8 streaming player is free to use. With an intuitive interface, you can play M3U8 stream links and test HLS streaming examples online effortlessly. Just copy and paste the URL to the box and click on the Play button. It supports HD videos playback and provides several bit rates for you to choose from while playing videos.
2. HLSPlayer.net
With no installation required, this online player enables you to access M3U8/HLS streams for free. Besides M3U8 files, you are allowed to play online streaming videos in other formats, such as RTMP and MP4.
As you can see in the picture below, you can even play the video with the Picture in picture mode. So that you can watch the video and doing your business at the same time.
3. Castr Live Streaming Player
Castr, an HTML5 based player, can help you test HLS streams instantly and stream live videos in high quality. It offers a bunch of live streaming features like stream rewinding, cloud recording, and more. But unlike other M3U8 players we have introduced, Castr player is not free to use. You can only enjoy a 7-day free trial after signing up.
Part 3. How to Open an M3U8 File/Link on Windows & Mac
Even though these online M3U8 players are convenient to operate, they cannot work if you want to play a local M3U8 file. You can only use them when you have a URL directing the M3U8 file that is also online.
Therefore, to play local M3U8 files on your Windows PC or Mac, you should use desktop software that supports M3U8 format, like VLC, iTunes, Windows Media Player, etc.
1. VLC Media Player
As a free and open-source program, VLC media player is one of the most common media players in the world. Perhaps you have already installed it on your computer. If you don't know how to open M3U8 videos with VLC, please follow the steps below.
Launch VLC media player on your computer. Then if you want to play .m3u8 file, click on the Media list and choose Open File…
Select the M3U8 playlist file you want to open. But please make sure this playlist file and the video(s) it refers to are in the same folder. Click the Open button. Then you can sit back and enjoy the video.
You can also use VLC to play M3U8 stream links. Find Media and select Open Network Stream…
Paste the network URL in the box and click Play.
2. iTunes
As we have mentioned, you can also consider iTunes as an M3U8 player. And it is unnecessary to make the M3U8 file and the video it refers to stay in the same folder. To open the file, you can simply double-click it. And iTunes will display the file automatically.
Bonus: Best Media Player to Play High-quality Video
If you want to play Blu-ray/DVD movies, you can give Blu-ray Master Free Blu-ray Player a try. With this software, you watch videos in popular formats including MP4, AVI, WMV, MTS, TS, FLV, MTS, M2TS, WKV, TRP, MXF, MPEG, etc. with original quality.
- 1. Play many video formats and Blu-ray/DVD movies without quality loss.
- 2. Optional audio/subtitle tracks and adjustable video effects.
- 3. Provide full, half, normal, and many other playback modes.
- 4. Take snapshots of your favorite scene while playing the video.
- 5. Offer a user-friendly interface that is easy to operate.
Part 4. FAQs of M3U8 Video Player
1. What is HLS?
As we said, HLS (HTTP Live Streaming) is an HTTP-based media streaming communications protocol. Apple implemented this protocol to serve its iOS and macOS devices. Generally, it uses MPEG-2 transport stream technology and has the capability to cross any firewall or proxy server.
2. How to create an M3U8 file?
You can use VLC media player to create M3U8 files. The operations are quite easy – just go to Media >Save Playlist to File... after opening the file(s) you want to add. Then select M3U8 as the output format.
3. Can we convert M3U8 to MP4?
Technically, you can't. Because the M3U8 file is a plain text file. But you can use Video Converter Ultimate to convert the video/audio files, which the M3U8 file refers to, to MP4 or any other media formats you like.
Conclusion
In this post, you have learned a lot of information about M3U8 and M3U8 Player. Hope you have found the perfect player that suits you best. Online M3U8 players are easier to use as there is no installation. But they cannot open local M3U8 files. Compared with them, VLC has more functions.
If this post has answered your questions, you can give a five-star review and share it with your friends.
A file with the M3U8 file extension is a UTF-8 Encoded Audio Playlist file. They are plain text files that can be used by both audio and video players to describe where media files are located. VLC, Apple's iTunes, Windows Media Player, and Songbird are just a few examples of programs that can open and use M3U8 files. If you're looking to convert M3U8 to MP4, or to MP3, or to any other media format, you first need to understand that an M3U8 file is a plain text file - nothing more and nothing less. This means it just contains text, nothing that can actually 'play' like how an MP4 or MP3 file can play in a media player.
How to Convert an M3U8 file to an MP4 with VLC for Free
In fact, there is no such a M3U8 converter on the market. Then what if you want to convert an M3U8 file to an MP4 file? Fortunately, there are still some media players that act as M3U8 file converter to extract MP4 files from M38U files. Here I will take VLC Media Player as an example to tell you how to change ,m3u8 file to .mp4 file step by step.
Step 1: Download and install the VLC for Windows or Mac version from the official site that suit your computer OS.
Step 2: Run VLC, and then click on 'Media' and select 'Convert / Save', after that a 'Open Media' window will pop up and click the 'file' tab and then click 'add' button to load the file you want to convert.
Step 3: Click on the 'Convert/Save' button when you are done. Finally select the destination folder, give a desired file name and select the desired video profile. The default output is an MP4 file with H.264 codec.
Step 4: Once all settings are done, you can press the 'start' button to begin the m3u8 to mp4 conversion.
Download M3u8 Mac Free
Part 2. Top 3 VLC Alternatives to Convert M3U8 to MP4
Besides VLC, there are other solutions that can help you convert M3U8 to MP4. And below are the other 3 ways to get the job done.
● How to Convert M3U8 to MP4 with EaseFab Video Converter
Although VLC is shipped with all the necessary codecs, you still may have some troubles while converting videos like unsupported video codec, slow conversion process, etc. One of the solution is to try installing a codec pack; alternatively you can turn to an easier-to-use yet professional video encoder and decoder tool - EaseFab Video Converter (available for Windows and Mac users). This M3U8 to MP4 converter helps you to both download the M3U8 playlist from the URL and then fast convert it to MP4 (H.264/H.265) afterward in a hassle freeway while keeping the original quality.
As a powerful M3U8 downloader and converter, it can help you transcode M3U8 files to MP4 files with H.264 codec, or change the codec to HEVC at the lowest possible bit rate without loss in visual quality. As a result, the output file size will be greatly reduced to save storage, and the conversion will be turbo fast basically due to the industry-leading hardware and software accelerations utilized synchronously. You can also edit enhance & personalize and merge your video files. What's more, the program can also help you adding external subtitles during the M3U8 to MP4 conversion.
How to convert M3U8 to MP4 Quickly using EaseFab
Step 1. Download and load the M3U8 file
Install and launch EaseFab Video Converter. Drag and drop the M3U8 file to the program. A M3U8 file loading window will pop up, it will then automatically grab the copied URL of your M3U8 file and starts downloading it.
Note: The video loading (or downloading) time from the M3U8 file depends on the video length and the broadband speed.
Step 2. Select MP4 as the output file
After loading, click Profile and select MP4 or HEVC MP4 from Common Video category as the output format. If you want to convert M3U8 to MP4 for iPhone, iPad, Samsung Galaxy, Google Nexus, etc., you can browse to find any video preset as the output format.
For advanced functions
1. Click the Edit button to open the Video Editor window to achieve editing M3U8 file like trim, crop, image, watermark, effect, subtitles and rotate and etc in the corresponding editing pane.
2. Click the Settings button to open the Settings window to adjust the output video codec, resolution, bitrates, frame rate, aspect ratio, audio codec, channel, volume and etc in the advanced tab.
Step 3. Begin conversion
When you click the Convert button, the process of converting M3U8 to MP4 will begin in earnest and it will be very fast.
● How to Convert M3U8 to MP4 with FFmpeg
FFmpeg is an open-source multimedia framework compatible with Windows, Linux, macOS, and iOS and Android in mobile devices. It empowers you to download record, stream, edit and convert video/audio files in an efficient way. With an advanced codec library libavcodec, FFmpeg is capable of converting M3U8 files without quality loss.
However, it has no straightforward interface like other common media converter. So be prepared like a tech-savvy to use command lines to convert M3U8 files.
Step 1. Download and install FFmpeg on your PC.
Go to www.ffmpeg.org to download a program package in terms of the operating system. Then create a folder for this program as well as its unpacked files. Finally set the Environmental Variables to C:FFmpegbin.
Step 2. Copy the link of the M3U8 file.
Open the live video through a browser like Google Chrome or Firefox. Right-click on the live video (or hit F12 key on the keyboard), and go to Inspect >Network. Find your M3U8 file, and copy the link with a suffix of '.m3u8'. Then type the command line 'ffmpeg -i http://.../playlist.m3u8 -c copy -bsf:a aac_adtstoasc output.mp4 ' on a Text Document, and replace http://.../playlist.m3u8 by the link you just copy online.
Step 3. Open Command Prompt.
Search 'Command Prompt' in the box of Search Windows and open it. Paste the command line to it, then press Enter.
Step 4. Change the M3U8 file to MP4.
Once the process completes, you can find the MP4 video according to the path before the command line, C:ffmpeg>bin, for example.
● How to Convert M3U8 to MP4 Online
As for online M3U8 to MP4 converters, anyconv.com and video.online-convert.com gain massive popularity among users. Both of them are simple converters with a 3-step workflow:
Import the M3U8 file > Start converting > Download the converted MP4 file.
Compared to AnyConv, Video Online Converter has more customizable options such as resolution, file size, bitrate, etc. And you can import M3U8 by uploading from local storage and pasting a URL. In a nutshell, AnyConv for simple conversion of local M3U8 files, while Video Online Converter for advanced conversion of both online and local M3U8.
Final Words：
M3U8 files are not general videos and they comprise of media list and location and are stored in plain text format. That's why you might be troubled with an M3U8 cannot load error or failed to open M3U8 files in a player. In such occassions, you can convert M3U8 to MP4, which is one of the best video formats compatible with all applications.
Download M3u8 Video Mac
VLC is a great choice for encoding M3U8 file to MP4. Besides VLC, you can also use FFmpeg or online converters to get the job done. But if you're looking for an efficient, easy and fast way to to get the job done, EaseFab Video Converter will be your best choice.