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I installed Ubuntu 22.04 as a minimal desktop install, after a while I realised I could not play any media files due to lack of player. I assume, if I had chosen the option of a full install I would have gotten a working media player. It is too late now though, I have set up everything else just the way I like.

Looking at the store I see various media players, most with bad ratings and comments such as it doesn't work.

How do I install the default player (not sure what it would have been) that should have installed with a full installation? With all the codecs that I would need it to play .mkv and .mp4 files.

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The totem player seams to be the default video player installed by the gnome version of the desktop-base package.

So you have the following options:

  • Install the totem player directly 
    $ sudo apt install --yes totem
  • Install the entire desktop-base package 
    $ sudo apt install --yes desktop-base
  • Or install some other player e.g. vlc (which is properly the most commonly used player) or mplayer (console only), etc. 
    $ sudo apt-get install --yes vlc

If a missing codec is the problem, take a look at this post. The mkvtoolnix will help you identify the used codes per stream.

Simon Sudler
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