Quod Libet is a free and open source audio library, tag editor and player for Linux, Windows and macOS. Written in Python with GTK+ and the Mutagen tagging library, it is built around the idea that you know how to organise your music better than the application does: instead of a fixed folder view you build paned views, saved searches and playlists from any tag, and the same editing interface rewrites tags across a whole selection of files. It stays responsive with libraries of tens of thousands of tracks.

Features

• Tag editing at scale — view and edit any tag in every supported file format, change many files in one go, tag files from their filenames or rename files from their tags, with filters for awkward characters and full Unicode support.
• Query-based browsing — paned, album-list and playlist views driven by plain searches or regular expressions over tags, so what you see is defined by metadata rather than by folder layout.
• Playback — GStreamer and xine-lib back ends with explicit JACK output, rich ReplayGain support (automatic track/album mode and clipping prevention), a configurable play queue, true shuffle that plays the whole list before repeating, and rating-weighted random playback.
• Library services — internet radio, podcast (“audio feed”) subscriptions, SoundCloud browsing and streaming, album art, saved ratings and play counts, bookmarks inside files, and playlists imported and exported as XSPF, M3U or PLS.
• More than 90 plugins — bundled extensions including an optional high-resolution waveform seek bar, and you can write your own in Python.
• Ex Falso — a companion tag editor that uses the same back end for people who are happy with their existing player but want proper tagging.

Requirements and installation

The current release is 4.7.1 (May 2025) and runs on Linux, Windows and macOS. It is packaged for Debian and Ubuntu, where a single apt install quodlibet is enough, and for most other distributions; the project also publishes Windows and macOS builds and a source tarball. The interface is translated through Weblate and ships light and dark themes that follow the GNOME desktop.

Alternatives

• Exaile — Python/GTK+ player with rule-based smart playlists
• Audacious — lightweight Winamp-style player
• Rhythmbox — GNOME’s long-standing library player