What is Windows Media Player? (2024)

The Microsoft Windows Media Player, also known as WMP and Wmplayer, is Microsoft's fully functional media player that is included for free with any copy of Windows. It allows users to view photos, play music from a CD (Compact Disc) or music file, and watch video media. Additionally, Windows Media Player allows users to rip audio CDs and organize their music collections. It should be noted, however, that Windows Media Player will not play DVDs due to Copyright restrictions.

Supported file formats

The Windows Media Player can play almost every computer media (sound and video) file format. Audio formats examples include MP3, WMV (Windows Media Video), WMA, CDA (Compact Audio Disc), WAV, and other formats. For video, AVI (Audio Video Interleave) and MPEG-4 are supported, with other file formats also supported. Other video formats are supported once the associated video codecs are installed. Microsoft also released a mobile version called Windows Media Player 10 Mobile. It supported MP3, ASF, WMA (Windows Media Audio), and WMV media formats.

Windows Media Player history

The first version of the Windows Media Player came about in 1991; it was intended to be used with Windows 3.0. At that time, it was called Media Player. It is included with every version of Windows since Windows 98 SE. The current release, bundled with Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10, is version 12. Since the release of version 7, support for burning and ripping audio CDs has also been included.

How do I open Windows Media Player?

From Windows

Press the Windows key, type WMP, and press Enter.

From MS-DOS and the Windows command line

If you enter something similar to the example text below into the command line, Windows Media Player opens and starts playing a song. This command can also be placed in a batch file to start a media file.

start wmplayer "i:\mp3\example.mp3"

How do I play a music CD in Windows Media Player?

To play a music CD in Windows Media Player, follow the steps below.

1. Open Windows Media Player.
2. Open the CD drive in the computer and place the music CD in the disc tray, then close the disc tray.
3. If the CD does not start to play automatically, look for the music CD in the left navigation pane of Windows Media Player. The music CD should be listed by the album title.
4. Click the music CD, then select the music track you want to play.
5. Click the play button to start playing the music CD.

How do I remove Windows Media Player?

The Windows Media Player can be added and removed through the Media Features section of Windows Features.

Audio, Media Player, Playback, Software terms, TLA, Video, Windows Accessories