News, Tutorials, Howtos for Ubuntu Linux
This is a step by step guide shows how to manually compile & install FFmpeg 8.0 from source with NVIDIA GPU acceleration support through cuda-nvcc and enable-libnpp in Ubuntu 24.04 & 22.04.
FFmpeg 8.0 so far is the latest version of this popular multi-media library, that features APV and ProRes RAW decoders, hardware accelerated VP9 and VVC encoding, and new Vulkan compute-based codecs support for FFv1 (encoding and decoding).
FFmpeg, the popular free open-source multimedia library, released new major 8.0 version almost a year since the last 7.1.
The new FFmpeg 8.0, codename “Huffman”, added native decoding support for Samsung’s Advanced Professional Video (APV) codec, Apple’s ProRes RAW, Sanyo LD-ADPCM, RealVideo 6.0, G.728, and ADPCM IMA Xbox.
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FFmpeg, the popular free open-source multi-media library, is going to release the new major 8.0 version in next few weeks in August.
Michael Niedermayer, the project lead announced in last week:
I intend to create the release/8.0 branch in the next 1-2 weeks after that i intend to make teh 8.0 release in the following 1-2 weeks.
FFmpeg, the popular free open-source multimedia library, released new 7.1.1 version few days ago. Here are the changelog and Ubuntu PPA for Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04, and Ubuntu 24.10.
FFmpeg is a maintenance released with more then 2 hundreds of changes, which are primarily bug-fixes and improvements.
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 media library is now at version 8.0! Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04, Ubuntu 25.04, Linux Mint 21/22 from PPA.
The new FFmpeg 8.0 version of this popular multi-media library came with name “Huffman”. It features native decoders for Samsung’s Advanced Professional Video (APV) codec, Apple’s ProRes RAW, Sanyo LD-ADPCM, RealVideo 6.0, G.728, and ADPCM IMA Xbox.
It also added encoding support for APV (via libopenapv wrapper), libx265 alpha layer, and animated JPEG XL images (through libjxl), as well as Vulkan compute-based codecs support for FFv1 (encoding and decoding) and ProRes RAW (decode only).
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:
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:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/ffmpeg6
Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.
2. For Linux Mint 21, you need to manually refresh package cache after adding PPA. To do so, run command:
sudo apt update
3. Finally, run the command below to either install or upgrade to FFmpeg 6.1:
sudo apt install ffmpeg
In case of in-complete installation, it’s HIGHLY recommend to run sudo apt upgrade to update all the packages to the latest versions.
4. After installation, run the command below in terminal to verify:
ffmpeg --version
In case you want to downgrade the FFmpeg library to the stock version available in system repository. Open terminal and run command:
sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/ffmpeg6
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
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 :(.
Firstly install ppa-purge tool via command:
sudo apt install ppa-purge
Then purge the PPAs one by one:
sudo ppa-purge ppa:savoury1/graphics
sudo ppa-purge ppa:savoury1/multimedia
sudo ppa-purge ppa:savoury1/ffmpeg4
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
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:
Now you can run the single command to rotate a video:
ffmpeg -i input-video.mp4 -vf "transpose=1" -acodec copy output-video.mp4
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:
(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!
In my case, the command is:
ffmpeg -i ~/Videos/aisha.mp4 -vf "transpose=1" -acodec copy ~/Videos/aisha-rotated.mp4
This command however will re-encode the video. Depends on the video size and your CPU, the process may take a few minutes.
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.
ffmpeg -i input-video.mp4 -map_metadata 0 -metadata:s:v rotate="90" -codec copy output-video.mp4
The command is fast and will work for video players (such as VLC and MPV) that support can handle rotation metadata.
FFmpeg 4.0 “Wu” was released months ago as a new major release. Here’s how to install it in Ubuntu 14.04, Ubuntu 16.04, and/or Ubuntu 18.04.
FFmpeg 4.0 release highlights:
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
For any reason, you can downgrade FFmpeg to the stock version in Ubuntu universe repositories by purging the PPA via command:
sudo apt-get install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:jonathonf/ffmpeg-4
