A command-line media Swiss Army knife powered by FFmpeg. combine-av provides a simplified yet powerful interface for merging, batching, extracting, and joining media streams with advanced filtering and hardware acceleration support.
Install combine-av using our automated setup script. This installs the core application into ~/.combine-av and creates a symbolic link in ~/.local/bin.
curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/squishna/combine-av/main/install.sh | bash- Python: Version 3.6 or higher.
- FFmpeg: Must be installed and accessible in your system
PATH.- Linux:
sudo apt install ffmpegorsudo pacman -S ffmpeg - macOS:
brew install ffmpeg - Windows: Download from ffmpeg.org and add to PATH.
- Linux:
Merge a video and an audio track into a single file:
combine merge -v movie.mp4 -a track1.mp3 -o output.mp4Extract the audio from a video:
combine extract -i movie.mp4 --audioJoin multiple clips into one:
combine concat -i clip1.mp4 clip2.mp4 -o full_video.mp4Combines video and multiple audio streams into one container.
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-v, --video |
Required. Path to the input video file. |
-a, --audio |
Required. Path(s) to input audio track(s). Supports multiple tracks. |
-o, --output |
Required. Final output file path. |
-s, --subtitle |
Optional subtitle file (SRT, ASS, VTT). |
-f, --format |
Force an output container format (e.g., mkv, webm). |
-q, --quality |
fast (copies video streams) or high (re-encodes for quality). |
Automatically merge matching video and audio pairs in a directory.
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
-d, --dir |
Required. Directory containing source files. |
-o, --output-dir |
Required. Destination directory for merged results. |
-q, --quality |
Quality preset for all files in the batch. |
Losslessly joins multiple video files into a single continuous file.
combine concat -i clip1.mp4 clip2.mp4 clip3.mp4 -o final_movie.mp4Extracts specific streams from a media file.
--audio: Extracts the primary audio track as a high-quality MP3.--subs: Extracts the first subtitle track as an SRT file.
Provides detailed technical metadata about any media file.
combine info -i filename.mp4Accelerate re-encoding and filtering using your GPU.
--hwaccel nvenc: NVIDIA (requiresh264_nvenc).--hwaccel vaapi: Intel/AMD (requiresh264_vaapi).--hwaccel videotoolbox: Apple Silicon/Intel (requiresh264_videotoolbox).
Applying filters forces re-encoding of the video stream.
--scale {1080p, 720p, 480p, 360p}: Resizes the video frame while maintaining aspect ratio (adds padding if needed).--rotate {90, 180, 270}: Rotates the video clockwise by the specified degree.--crop <w:h:x:y>: Crops the video to the specified dimensions and offsets.--speed <float>: Changes the playback speed (e.g.,1.5for 150% speed).
--volume <float>: Multiplies the audio volume (e.g.,2.0to double volume).--audio-start <seconds>: Delays or trims the start of the audio tracks.
Update combine-av to the latest version directly from GitHub:
combine updateEnsure FFmpeg is in your system PATH. Test it by running ffmpeg -version in your terminal.
Your shell might not include ~/.local/bin in its PATH. Add the following line to your .bashrc or .zshrc:
export PATH="$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin"If a specific container (like .mp4) doesn't support an input codec, use --format mkv for maximum compatibility.
This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for the full text.
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