| -api-id | -api-type |
|---|---|
T:Windows.UI.Xaml.Controls.MediaElement |
winrt class |
Represents an object that renders audio and video to the display. See Remarks.
<MediaElement .../>Important
In Windows 10, build 1607 and on we recommend that you use MediaPlayerElement in place of MediaElement. MediaPlayerElement has the same functionality as MediaElement, while also enabling more advanced media playback scenarios. Additionally, all future improvements in media playback will happen in MediaPlayerElement.
Tip
For more info, design guidance, and code examples, see Media playback.
Use a MediaElement control to play audio and video files in your app. Built– in media transport controls let users interact with their media by providing a default playback experience comprised of various buttons including play, pause, closed captions, and others. See MediaTransportControls for more info.
For info about the media formats that MediaElement supports, see Supported codecs.
For info about performance related to MediaElement, see Optimize animations and media.
Set the Source property of the MediaElement object to point to an audio or video file. The property can be set to the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) of a file that is included with the app or the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) of a file on the network. You can use the SetSource method to set the source to a file retrieved from the local system by using a FileOpenPicker object.
By default, the media that is defined by the Source property plays immediately after the MediaElement object has loaded. To suppress the media from starting automatically, set the AutoPlay property to false.
Live media streams report a NaturalDuration of Int64.MaxValue.
Here's how to create a MediaElement in XAML with the Source set to the path of a video file that is included in the app and the AutoPlay property explicitly set to false.
<MediaElement Source="Media/video1.mp4" AutoPlay="false"/>Here's how to create the MediaElement in code.
MediaElement mediaElement1 = new MediaElement();
mediaElement1.Source = new Uri("ms-appx:///Media/video1.mp4");
mediaElement1.AutoPlay = false;
// Add the MediaElement to the page.
rootGrid.Children.Add(mediaElement1);You can respond to common media events such as the MediaOpened, MediaEnded, MediaFailed, and CurrentStateChanged events. It is good practice to always handle the MediaFailed event.
Set the AreTransportControlsEnabled property to programmatically enable and disable the built in transport controls for the MediaElement. The built in transport controls provide UI for playing, stopping, pausing, and seeking the media, as well as UI for volume, mute, full window, track selection, and remaining time.
You can create your own media transport controls by setting AreTransportControlsEnabled to false, and using the Play, Pause, and Stop methods. MediaElement also exposes a rich set of properties you can control like Position, Volume, IsMuted, IsLooping, PlaybackRate, and Balance.
Tip
For better performance, avoid data binding to the Position property to reflect frequent position updates (for example with a progress bar). Instead, use the DispatcherTimer to query the Position property.
For more info and examples, see Create custom transport controls.
To open files on the local system or from Microsoft OneDrive, you can use the FileOpenPicker to get the file and SetSource to set the media source, or you can programmatically access the user media folders.
If your app needs access without user interaction to the Music or Video folders, for example if you are enumerating all the music or video files in the user's collection and displaying them in your app, then you need to declare the Music Library and Video Library capabilities. For more info, see Files and folders in the Music, Pictures, and Videos libraries.
The FileOpenPicker does not require special Capabilities to access files on the local file system, such as the user's Music or Video folders, since the user has complete control over which file is being accessed. From a security and privacy standpoint, it is best to minimize the number of capabilities your app uses.
-
- Call FileOpenPicker to let the user pick a media file.
Use the FileOpenPicker class to select a media file. Set the FileTypeFilter to specify which file types the FileOpenPicker will display. Call PickSingleFileAsync to launch the file picker and get the file.
- Call SetSource to set the chosen media file as the MediaElement.Source.
To set the Source of the MediaElement to the StorageFile returned from the FileOpenPicker, you need to open a stream. Call the OpenAsync method on the StorageFile returns a stream that you can pass into the MediaElement.SetSource method. Then call Play on the MediaElement to start the media. This example shows how to use the FileOpenPicker to choose a file and set the file as the Source of a MediaElement.
<MediaElement x:Name="mediaPlayer"/>
...
<Button Content="Choose file" Click="Button_Click"/>
private async void Button_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
await SetLocalMedia();
}
async private System.Threading.Tasks.Task SetLocalMedia()
{
var openPicker = new Windows.Storage.Pickers.FileOpenPicker();
openPicker.FileTypeFilter.Add(".wmv");
openPicker.FileTypeFilter.Add(".mp4");
openPicker.FileTypeFilter.Add(".wma");
openPicker.FileTypeFilter.Add(".mp3");
var file = await openPicker.PickSingleFileAsync();
// mediaPlayer is a MediaElement defined in XAML
if (file != null)
{
var stream = await file.OpenAsync(Windows.Storage.FileAccessMode.Read);
mediaPlayer.SetSource(stream, file.ContentType);
mediaPlayer.Play();
}
}Use the AudioStreamIndex property and the GetAudioStreamLanguage method to change the audio to a different language track on a video. Videos can also contain multiple audio tracks in the same language, such as director commentaries on films. This example specifically shows how to switch between different languages, but you can modify this code to switch between any audio tracks.
- Get the audio tracks.
To search for a track in a specific language, start by iterating through each audio track on the video. Use AudioStreamCount as the max value for a for loop.
- Get the language of the audio track.
Use the GetAudioStreamLanguage method to get the language of the track. The language of the track is identified by a language code, such as "en" for English or "ja" for Japanese.
- Set the active audio track.
When you find the track with the desired language, set the AudioStreamIndex to the index of the track. Setting AudioStreamIndex to null selects the default audio track which is defined by the content. Here's some code that attempts to set the audio track to the specified language. It iterates through the audio tracks on a MediaElement object and uses GetAudioStreamLanguage to get the language of each track. If the desired language track exists, the AudioStreamIndex is set to the index of that track.
/// <summary>
/// Attemps to set the audio track of a video to a specific language
/// </summary>
/// <param name="lcid">The id of the language. For example, "en" or "ja"</param>
/// <returns>true if the track was set; otherwise, false.</returns>
private bool SetAudioLanguage(string lcid, MediaElement media)
{
bool wasLanguageSet = false;
for (int index = 0; index < media.AudioStreamCount; index++)
{
if (media.GetAudioStreamLanguage(index) == lcid)
{
media.AudioStreamIndex = index;
wasLanguageSet = true;
}
}
return wasLanguageSet;
}Use the IsFullWindow property to enable and disable full window rendering. When in full-window mode, input events received on the MediaElement will still route through to the visual tree in the background. For example, if the MediaElement is in a ListBox, turning the scroll wheel could cause the ListBox to scroll in the background. This can cause unexpected behavior. If input events should not be routed when in full-window mode, the MediaElement should handle the events.
Note
We recommend that you not use MediaElement in a Popup control. If a MediaElement hosted in a Popup is switched to full-window mode, the Popup is rendered on top of the MediaElement. If you must use a MediaElement in a Popup, you should collapse the Popup when the MediaElement enters full-window mode, and restore the Popup when the MediaElement exits full-window mode. Use DependencyProperty.RegisterPropertyChangedCallback to be notified when the MediaElement.IsFullWindow property changes. For an example, see the Examples section.
To prevent the display from being deactivated when user action is no longer detected, such as when an app is playing video, you can call DisplayRequest.RequestActive. To conserve power and battery life, you should call DisplayRequest.RequestRelease to release the display request as soon as it is no longer required.
Here are some situations when you should release the display request:
- Video playback is paused, for example by user action, buffering, or adjustment due to limited bandwidth.
- Playback stops. For example, the video is done playing or the presentation is over.
- A playback error has occurred. For example, network connectivity issues or a corrupted file. Here, you use the CurrentStateChanged event to detect these situations. Then, use the IsAudioOnly property to determine whether an audio or video file is playing, and keep the screen active only if video is playing.
<MediaElement Source="Media/video1.mp4"
CurrentStateChanged="MediaElement_CurrentStateChanged"/>// Create this variable at a global scope. Set it to null.
private DisplayRequest appDisplayRequest = null;
private void MediaElement_CurrentStateChanged(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
MediaElement mediaElement = sender as MediaElement;
if (mediaElement != null && mediaElement.IsAudioOnly == false)
{
if (mediaElement.CurrentState == Windows.UI.Xaml.Media.MediaElementState.Playing)
{
if (appDisplayRequest == null)
{
// This call creates an instance of the DisplayRequest object.
appDisplayRequest = new DisplayRequest();
appDisplayRequest.RequestActive();
}
}
else // CurrentState is Buffering, Closed, Opening, Paused, or Stopped.
{
if (appDisplayRequest != null)
{
// Deactivate the display request and set the var to null.
appDisplayRequest.RequestRelease();
appDisplayRequest = null;
}
}
}
}You can use the PosterSource property to provide your MediaElement with a visual representation before the media is loaded. A PosterSource is an image, such as a screen shot or movie poster, that is displayed in place of the media. The PosterSource is displayed in the following situations:
- When a valid source is not set. For example, Source is not set, Source was set to Null, or the source is invalid (as is the case when a MediaFailed event fires).
- While media is loading. For example, a valid source is set, but the MediaOpened event has not fired yet.
- When media is streaming to another device.
- When the media is audio only.
On Windows Phone, you can only have one MediaElement at a time.
To let audio continue to play when your app is in the background, set the AudioCategory property to BackgroundCapableMedia. This also requires declaring the "Audio" background task capability in the app manifest. These values are deprecated in Windows 10.
Prior to Windows 8.1, the IsFullWindow property in not available. To enable full window video playback you must set the Width and Height of the MediaElement to the Window.Bounds of the current window. Specifically, use Window.Current.Bounds.Width and Window.Current.Bounds.Height. Full window playback will not take advantage of system optimizations if you set the dimensions of a parent element, such as a grid, or a containing element instead of the MediaElement.
Prior to Windows 8.1, the Opacity property is not supported on MediaElement.
Prior to Windows 8.1, the AreTransportControlsEnabled property and built-in transport controls are not available. You must provide your own transport controls. For more info and examples, see Create custom transport controls and scenario 4 of the XAML media playback sample.
Windows Phone 8.x app must use PickSingleFileAndContinue to open local media files.
This code creates a MediaElement with the AutoPlay property explicitly set to true and the Source set to the path of a video file that is included in the app.
[!code-xamlMediaPlayer_SimpleXamlMediaElement]
[!code-xamlBasicMediaElementControls]
<Grid>
<Button Content="Show Popup" Click="ShowPopupClicked"/>
<Popup x:Name="mediaPlayerPopup">
<StackPanel Height="1400" Width="1400" Background="Blue">
<MediaElement x:Name="mediaPlayer"
AreTransportControlsEnabled="True"
Source="Media/Intro.wmv"/>
<TextBlock Text="Simple Popup"/>
<Button Content="Close" Click="ClosePopupClicked"/>
</StackPanel>
</Popup>
</Grid>long token;
protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e)
{
token = mediaPlayer.RegisterPropertyChangedCallback(MediaElement.IsFullWindowProperty, OnMEFullWindowChanged);
base.OnNavigatedTo(e);
}
protected override void OnNavigatedFrom(NavigationEventArgs e)
{
mediaPlayer.UnregisterPropertyChangedCallback(MediaElement.IsFullWindowProperty, token);
}
private void OnMEFullWindowChanged(DependencyObject sender, DependencyProperty dp)
{
MediaElement me = (MediaElement)sender;
if (me != null && dp == MediaElement.IsFullWindowProperty)
{
if (me.IsFullWindow == true)
{
mediaPlayerPopup.Visibility = Visibility.Collapsed;
}
else
{
mediaPlayerPopup.Visibility = Visibility.Visible;
}
}
}
private void ClosePopupClicked(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
// If the Popup is open, then close it.
if (mediaPlayerPopup.IsOpen) { mediaPlayerPopup.IsOpen = false; }
}
// Handles the Click event on the Button on the page and opens the Popup.
private void ShowPopupClicked(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
// Open the Popup if it isn't open already.
if (!mediaPlayerPopup.IsOpen) { mediaPlayerPopup.IsOpen = true; }
}Control, MediaElement control guide, Create custom transport controls, Media transport controls sample, Video playback sample, Real-time communication sample (Windows 10), Real-time communication sample (Windows 10), Version adaptive code sample