35

Is there a way to make the VLC playback window completely borderless (no title bar, no other borders)?

Ideally, I would like the playback window to be completely borderless and then a separate window that has the controls (play, pause, timeline control, etc).

UPDATES:
I cannot use full screen mode, I would like playback window to be sized the same as the video, which is usually about 300x300 px. Also, I need to be able to position the window anywhere on the desktop.

I'm using the Windows version of VLC.

1
  • In my case, none of the solutions worked when I tested with VLC on Linux (Lubuntu), there is always a window border. The only way I was able to play videos without borders is using the picture-in-picture mode of a web browser like Firefox or Chromium.
    – baptx
    Mar 29, 2020 at 12:25

7 Answers 7

20

This would do it :

vlc --no-video-deco --no-embedded-video

Video will stay on top-left on Windows. Add this for aligning:

--video-x=X --video-y=Y

e.g.

--video-x=120 --video-y=300

For command lines : VLC command-line help

18

Open VLC preferences, goto Video Options --> disable the checkbox 'Window Decorations' Next go to the "Interface options" --> disable the "embed video in interface".

This will play the video in a borderless window (works on Windows as well) the only thing I haven't figured out is how to set the size of that window).

Update: You can force the width and height of the playback window by adding "width=640 height=480" to the shortcut properties in windows (or the command line on other systems for example).

4
  • For me, this is what the OP is asking for, the easiest to implement, and is 100% compatible with the latest version of VLC on all platforms.
    – Benjamin R
    Dec 23, 2015 at 0:20
  • 1
    Why is there no keyboard shortcut for this? And the fact that there isn't even any playback controls on hover is quite stupid.
    – Wesley
    Apr 22, 2017 at 16:03
  • 7
    The desired shortcut is CTRL+H
    – Jonathan
    Nov 4, 2017 at 22:25
  • 1
    This requires a restart (on Windows). Moreover, it detaches the video from the window and fixes it to the top left corner of the screen. This cannot be moved or resized (although, the Zoom control works). Not an ideal solution.
    – ADTC
    May 6, 2021 at 8:43
7

"View" menu > "Minimal View".

That hides all the buttons and menus, but leaves the window border and windows minimize/maximize/close buttons.

May I ask what you're trying to accomplish with this?

3
  • 1
    I really need to have the window completely without borders or other decorations. I'm capturing part of the screen to send to another device, and due to limitations with how that device can capture the screen, I need to be able to position my video window exactly. For example, if I position the video window at x=1600, y=0, I need the video to start exactly there, not have the window border get in the way... otherwise it will be captured and sent to the external device.
    – Rob Thomas
    Oct 20, 2010 at 21:49
  • 1
    You could convert the source video to the resolution you need, instead of trying to resize the window.
    – Force Flow
    Oct 21, 2010 at 6:02
  • Rob, you may consider streaming the digital content, as with your desired approach the process walks through all (OSI-) layers, requires more resources and is more likely to lag or fail. VLC is extremely powerful and offers streaming with its default tools with many protocols and decodings.
    – Jonathan
    Nov 4, 2017 at 22:29
5

use this to play your borderless video @ 100:100 of screen with size = 500x400

vlc -I dummy --width=500 --height=400 --video-x=100 --video-y=100 --no-video-deco --no-embedded-video test.avi
3

Window borders and title bar are drawn by your window manager. Maybe you could use a tiling window manager like awesome which doesn't draw any borders.

I was able to run borderless vlc window containing only the movie played with command:

alltray --borderless vlc --qt-minimal-view movie.avi

This was tested under Ubuntu 10.10. You will need to install alltray which isn't available by default:

sudo apt-get install alltray
1
  • Sorry, I should have been more specific, i cannot use full-screen mode.
    – Rob Thomas
    Oct 20, 2010 at 20:49
0

maybe you can try using

vlc -I dummy <video.avi>
-1

double left click in the video window for full screen for windows or linux

1
  • Sorry, I should have been more specific, i cannot use full-screen mode.
    – Rob Thomas
    Oct 20, 2010 at 20:50

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