The popular FFmpeg media library released new version 7.1 a few days ago. Here are the new features and Ubuntu PPA for Ubuntu 22.04 and Ubuntu 24.04 users.
The new release of FFmpeg library added official VVC decoder support. Versatile Video Coding (VVC in short), also known as H.266, has about 50% better compression rate for the same quality compared to HEVC (aka H.265). It supports resolutions ranging from very low up to 4K, 16K, and 360° videos, as well as YCbCr 4:4:4, 4:2:2 and 4:2:0 with 8–10 bits per component, HDR, variable and fractional frame rates from 0 to 120 Hz, and more.
FFmpeg added experimental VVC decoding support since the last 7.0 version. Now, the decoder goes official and it’s compatible with DVB test content. The release also supports for decoding VVC with Intel Quick Sync Video acceleration. As well, it supports encoding VVC using libvvenc library.
FFmpeg announced new major 7.0 release yesterday! Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04, Linux Mint 21.
The new version of this popular multi-media library came with name “Dijkstra”. It features native decoding support for VVC (aka H.266) through the libavcodec library, though it’s so far experimental.
The libavformat library can now read and write IAMF (Immersive Audio) files. And, a new -stream_group option is added into CLI tool to configure the IAMF structure.
As announced at the end of last year, the CLI (command-line) tool now is multi-threaded. Meaning, the transcoding process now runs in parallel that can be much faster than before.
FFmpeg multi-media library updated to version 6.1, code-name “Heaviside”, few days ago!
According to the FFmpeg release page, the new 6.1 release features new libaribcaption decoder, RivaTuner video decoder, Playdate video decoder and demuxer, vMix video decoder, OSQ demuxer and decoder, as well as Microsoft RLE video encoder and VAAPI AV1 encoder.
The release also includes some new filters, including arls filter, afireqsrc audio source filter, color_vulkan filter, bwdif_vulkan filter, nlmeans_vulkan filter, zoneplate video source filter, xfade_vulkan filter, apsnr and asisdr audio filters, bwdif_cuda filter.
Other changes include:
CRI USM demuxer
Raw AC-4 muxer and demuxer
Raw VVC bitstream parser, muxer and demuxer
Extend VAAPI support for libva-win32 on Windows
ffmpeg CLI new option: -readrate_initial_burst
command support in the setpts and asetpts filters
Vulkan decode hwaccel, supporting H264, HEVC and AV1
Essential Video Coding parser, muxer and demuxer
Essential Video Coding frame merge bsf
Bitstream filter for editing metadata in VVC streams
Bitstream filter for converting VVC from MP4 to Annex B
scale_vt filter for videotoolbox
transpose_vt filter for videotoolbox
support for the P_SKIP hinting to speed up libx264 encoding
Support HEVC,VP9,AV1 codec in enhanced flv format
Support HEVC,VP9,AV1 codec fourcclist in enhanced rtmp protocol
ffmpeg CLI ‘-top’ option deprecated in favor of the setfield filter
ffprobe XML output schema changed to account for multiple variable-fields elements within the same parent element
ffprobe -output_format option added as an alias of -of
Install FFmpeg 6.1 in Ubuntu 22.04
NOTE: FFmpeg is an important media library that many apps depend on it. Install newer FFmpeg in Ubuntu may cause dependency issues (or even break your system). Use it at your own risk!!
I’ve made the new release package into this unofficial PPA for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS only, with x86_64, and 32/64-bit Arm architectures support.
1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:
NOTE: Keep an eye in terminal output before answering yes to confirm! It MAY remove some other useful app packages, though it should be able to install them back later.
FFmpeg 4.4 “Rao” now can be installed in all current Ubuntu releases easily via an Ubuntu PPA.
FFmpeg is a free and open-source solution to record, convert and stream audio and video. The major 4.4 version was released almost a months ago with PGX decoder, AV1 encoding support SVT-AV1, AV1 decoder with hardware acceleration used only, AV1 VAAPI decoder, and so many other new features.
Thanks to Rob Savoury, an Ubuntu PPA is available contains the packages for all current Ubuntu releases.
1.) Add the PPA:
Firstly open terminal either from system app launcher or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard. When it opens, run the command below to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:savoury1/ffmpeg4
Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.
2.) (Optional) Add optional PPAs:
For newest versions of graphics and multimedia dependencies, you can also add the following PPAs by running commands one by one:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:savoury1/graphics
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:savoury1/multimedia
3.) Finally install / update FFmpeg:
As a widely used media library, it’s mostly installed on your system. So you can run command to upgrade it in terminal:
sudo apt full-upgrade
NOTE: using Software Updater is not recommended in the case. It may keep back FFmpeg since old libraries may be required for some apps, Pitivi in the case.
4.) Check FFmpeg version:
Once installed, run command to check software version:
ffmpeg -version
How to Restore Stock FFmpeg version:
You can purge the Ubuntu PPA which will also downgrade FFmpeg libraries to the stock version in Ubuntu. Also purging the FFmpeg PPA may also remove some apps for unknown reasons :(.
Got a video playing upside down? Here’s an easy way to rotate it via a single command in Ubuntu.
There are a few video players, e.g., SMPlayer, support for rotating by 90 degrees clockwise or counter-clockwise during video playback.
If you want to make it permanent by exporting video rotated, besides using a heavy video editing tool, e.g., Pitivi and Openshot, the single command in this tutorial may help.
An upside down video
1. Install FFmpeg:
Firstly install FFmpeg if you don’t have it. FFmpeg is a large suite of libraries and programs for handling multi-media files and streams.
It is very popular and most likely already installed on your system, if you have any audio, video, and other multimedia relevant applications installed.
To make sure, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command:
2. Command to rotate video:
Now you can run the single command to rotate a video:
Before this command, you may first navigate to the video folder either via cd command (e.g., cd ~/Videos), or in file browser go to the folder and right-click blank area and select “Open in Terminal”.
In the command, the number in “transpose=1” can also be:
0 – means rotate by 90 degrees counterclockwise and flip
1 – means rotate by 90 degrees clockwise
2 – means rotate by 90 degrees counterclockwise
3 – means rotate by 90 degrees clockwise and flip
(Thanks to Roman Sheydvasser) Add -c copy (or -codec copy) will copy all the frames instead of doing decode -> filter -> encode process. It will speed up the command quite a lot!
This command however will re-encode the video. Depends on the video size and your CPU, the process may take a few minutes.
Optional
The last command can take quite a few minutes since it needs to re-encode the video. As a workaround, user can use this command instead to do the rotation in the metadata.
NVIDIA NVDEC GPU-based decoding for H264 / MJPEG / HEVC / MPEG-1/2/4, VC1, VP8, and VP9 formats.
OpenCL overlay filter
VA-API MJPEG and VP8 decoding support
AV1 Support through libaom
AMD AMF H.264 and HEVC encoders
And many other new filters, and accelerated code path improvements.
How to Install FFmpeg 4.0 in Ubuntu:
FFmpeg 4.0.2 is available in Ubuntu Software via SNAP package (Runs in sandbox).
To upgrade from the Ubuntu build FFmpeg 3.x, the unofficial PPA contains the latest packages for Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 16.04, and Ubunu 14.04.
1. Open terminal either via Ctrl+Alt+T keyboard shortcut, or by searching for ‘terminal’ from software launcher. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:jonathonf/ffmpeg-4
Type user password (no asterisks feedback) when it prompts and hit Enter.
2. You can then upgrade FFmpeg libraries via Software Updater:
Or run commands in terminal:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ffmpeg
How to Restore:
For any reason, you can downgrade FFmpeg to the stock version in Ubuntu universe repositories by purging the PPA via command:
This tutorial is going to show you how to install the latest version of FFmpeg, so far it’s FFmpeg 2.1.2, in Ubuntu, Linux Mint and their derivatives via PPA.
FFmpeg is a complete, cross-platform solution to record, convert and stream audio and video. 2.1.2 was released on 2014-01-13. It is the latest stable FFmpeg release from the 2.1 release branch, which was cut from master on 2013-10-28. Amongst lots of other changes, it includes all changes from ffmpeg-mt, libav master of 2013-10-27, libav 9 as of 2013-10-27.
Sam Rog has been maintaining the most recent FFmpeg packages in his PPA for Ubuntu, Linux Mint and their derivatives. The PPA is trustable and so far it supports Ubuntu 14.04, Ubuntu 13.10, Ubuntu 13.04, Ubuntu 12.10.
To add the PPA, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it open, run below command:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:djcj/vlc-stable
Then you can check for updates via Synaptic Package Manager. Or just run below commands instead:
