VLC Black Screen? A Guide to Fixing “VLC Not Playing Videos”

Why Does the “VLC Not Playing Videos” Issue Happen?

There are many possible reasons that can trigger this VLC black screen. First of all, when your MP4 won’t play on VLC, your video file could be missing, corrupted, or damaged, or some issues happen with the VLC media player or its coding scheme.

Besides, if you have just downloaded this program on your device, it can have a missing component. Or the location where the video has been stored could be corrupted.

At last, A system component or setting could be blocking your video from getting played in the usual way, which can lead to the “VLC not playing MP4” issue.

Then, let’s resolve these culprits one by one to get VLC turned into a normal state.

How to Fix the “VLC Not Playing Videos” Issue?

Method 1: Turn off Hardware Acceleration on VLC

You can try to change some settings to fix the “VLC media player not playing videos” issue.

Step 1: Open VLC and click on Tools, then Preferences.

Step 2: Go to the Input / Codes tab.

Step 3: Click on the drop-down arrow next to Hardware-accelerated decoding under the Codecs section.

Step 4: Choose Disable from the drop-down menu and click Save.

Restart the VLC media player and check if the issue has been fixed.

Method 2: Choose DirectX (DirectDraw) as the Default Video Output Mode

Sometimes its default output mode can fail to play certain types of videos so you need to make some changes to it.

Step 1: Do as step 1 in method 1 to open Preferences.

Step 2: Go to the Video tab and click on the drop-down icon next to Output and choose DirectX (DirectDraw) Video Output Mode from the context menu.

Step 3: Check the box before Accelerated video output (Overlay) and Use hardware YUV -> RGB conversions.

Step 4: Choose Save to save your changes.

Method 3: Reset the VLC Preferences

If your preference file has been missing, corrupted, or damaged, MP4 won’t play on VLC. In this way, you can reset the VLC preferences.

Step 1: Still, go to Preferences and click on Reset Preferences at the bottom of the screen.

Step 2: Click OK to confirm your choice.

Relaunch the VLC media player and check if you can play video or not.

Method 4: Update Your VLC

An outdated version of VLC can trigger some incompatible issues.

Step 1: Open VLC and choose Help at the top bar.

Step 2: Choose Check for Updates from the context menu.

Then you follow the instruction to update your VLC and try your VLC again to see if the issue is fixed.

Method 5: Reinstall VLC Media Player

If all the above methods have been proven of no use, you can reinstall your VLC.

Step 1: Go to Settings in Start and then the Apps & features page.

Step 2: Scroll down the right side of the page to find the programs that you would like to uninstall and right-click on them.

Step 3: Choose Uninstall and then click Uninstall again to confirm your choice.

Step 4: Visit VLC’s official website and download the latest application version.

If you need other ways to uninstall programs, you can refer to this article: How to Uninstall Programs on Windows 10? Here Are Methods.

Bottom Line:

This article has made the “VLC not playing videos” Issue clear and enumerate a series of solutions for you. You can follow them and find the most suitable one for yourself.