Where is Windows Media Player in Windows 10? What is this?

Where is Windows Media Player in Windows 10? When it comes to enjoying different forms of digital media on Windows 10, Microsoft includes Groove Music, Movies & TV, and its Photos apps. These are elegant apps that work well, but if you’ve recently upgraded Windows 7 to Windows 10, you might be more comfortable using Windows Media Player (WMP) instead.

If you’re a fan of WMP, you’ll be happy to learn that it’s still in Windows 10. Here’s a look at how to find it and set it as the default app for your digital media.

Note: Microsoft removed DVD playback support back in Windows 8, so you won’t be able to use WMP for them. However, there are plenty of third-party utilities (hint: VLC) that will let you play DVDs. For more on that, read our article: How to Bring DVD Playback to Windows 10.

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Where is Windows Media Player in Windows 10?

Windows Media Player still exists in Windows 10 and accessing it is just a matter of finding it using the File Explorer utility on your computer. If you’ve upgraded your machine from an old Windows version to Windows 10, you might have noticed accessing the program isn’t as easy as it used to be.

Microsoft has made significant changes to Windows 10 and not being able to find your favorite Windows Media Player easily on your computer is likely the result of these changes. However, with our instructions below, you should be able to easily locate and open it on your computer.

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In case you don’t find the player where it’s supposed to be, you can always have it installed using one of the many utilities available on your computer. These will bring the media player back to your Windows 10 computer.

Where do I find Windows Media Player for Windows 10?

To get the Media Player version compatible with your system, head over to the official Microsoft page and get the tool.

As you’ll find out, the latest app version is Windows Media Player 12 and it was released along with Windows 7. Since then, the program’s interface or features haven’t changed.

How does Windows Media Player work?

Windows Media Player is more than just a basic media player. As such, it supports playback of audio, video, and pictures, and comes with a wide array of advanced playback settings.

The tool also supports local playback, or streaming playback with multicast streams, and progressive downloads. Visualizations can be added during playback, from the app’s library.

For those still interested, Windows Media Player can be used for CD burning and ripping in WMA or WMA 10 Pro formats.

The tool doesn’t include DVD playback, but you can add it separately using the Add features function. On the other hand, it allows the listening to Internet radio.

If you want to make Media Player the default tool for certain audio and video files, just type default in the Search bar and then go to Default Programs. From there, you will know what you have to do.

If you are interested in alternatives, we recommend CyberLink PowerDVD. It’s a modern software compatible with Windows 7 and later that will allow you to make the best of your multimedia experience on just about any device.

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The centralized dashboard helps you keep all your media files organized. Once you’ve got your library up to date, you can stream 8K, 4K, Ultra HD Blu-ray content, and more.

The exclusive TrueTheater audio and video enhancements will surely keep you glued to your device and wanting more of that rich audio and video content.

How to Make Windows Media Player Default on Windows 11/10?

Set Windows Media Player as Default on Windows 11

Step 1. Right-click on Start icon on Windows 11 and select Settings.

Step 2. Select Apps in the left sidebar and then choose Default apps.

Step 3. In the new window, type the file type in the search bar for which you want the default media player to play. Like, .mp4, .mpeg, .mkv, etc. Then, the media player will appear in the search result.
Note: If the file extension is not supported by Windows Media Player, Windows Media Player won’t show. You can convert your media file to Windows Media Player compatible first with a video converter.

Step 4. Select Windows Media Player that you want to set as the new default and then click on OK to apply.

Note: For types of videos like .mpeg, .mkv, .wmv, .avi, etc., you need to do the above steps again and again to make Windows Media Player default for playing of all of them on Windows 11 by default.

Make Windows Media Player Default in Windows 10

The default music player and video player on Windows 10 are Groove Music and Movies & TV respectively. To change the default player to Windows Media Player on Windows 10, you need to perform the following steps.

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Step 1. Click Start -> Settings.

Step 2. Click System -> Default apps.

Scroll down to Music player, click on the Groove Music entry, and then you can choose Windows Media Player.
Scroll down to Video player, click on the Movies & TV entry, and then you can choose Windows Media Player.

Then, Windows Media Player has been set as the default on Windows 10.

How to Solve Windows Media Player not Playing DVDs & Videos on Windows 11/10?

Although Windows Media Player isn’t axed from Windows 10/11, it lacks the native support for DVD playback (Microsoft removed the DVD playback capability since the release of Windows 8 including Windows 8.1 and Windows 8.1 Pro). Microsoft offers a Windows DVD Player as a remedy, but it charges $15. Luckily, this isn’t your only option. You can also pick a third-party free DVD player for Windows 10/11 or simply digitize your DVDs with a DVD ripper.

WinX DVD Ripper Platinum is worth a try. This program can help you convert DVDs to digital files as ISO, MP4, H.264, HEVC, AVI, WMV, MOV, FLV, MP3, and more media formats. Intel and NVIDIA powered hardware acceleration is supported to boost DVD ripping speed. With hardware acceleration on, a DVD can be finished processing within 5 minutes (depend on your computer configurations). And the original quality will be maintained.

How to rip DVD on Windows 11/10: Insert DVD into DVD drive and load the DVD into the ripper by clicking DVD Disc button -> choose a desired output profile -> begin ripping by hitting the RUN button.

Above is information about Where is Windows Media Player in Windows 10? What is this? that we have compiled. Hopefully, through the above content, you have a more detailed understanding of Windows Media Player in Windows 10. Thank you for reading our post.