Clario Applications CM Video Player

For Mac · Apple silicon

CM Video Player

Frame-accurate playback. True timecode. Plays everything.

A fast, focused Mac player for people who work in frames, not seconds — editors, colorists, post, broadcast and QC.

Download — [REPLACE: price] See what it does

Requires macOS 13 (Ventura) or later · Apple silicon Mac

CM Video Player playing a clip, with SMPTE timecode in the player bar

01 Why it's different

The three things it does better.

Timecode that tells the truth

A real SMPTE readout — HH:MM:SS:FF — not an approximation. It reads the timecode embedded in your file, so a clip that starts at 01:00:00:00 reads 01:00:00:00. Drop-frame footage is handled correctly (29.97 / 59.94). One click copies the current timecode to your clipboard.

Built for frame work

Step a single frame with the arrow keys. J-K-L shuttle like your NLE — tap to ramp through 1×, 2×, 4×, 8×, 16×, forward or reverse. Scrubbing stays smooth across the whole file, and Fine mode slows the playhead when you need to land on one exact frame.

It plays what you throw at it

H.264, HEVC, ProRes, VP9, AV1, MPEG-2, VC-1 — in MP4, MOV, MKV, MXF, MPEG-TS and more. Hardware-accelerated with Apple's VideoToolbox, so it stays light on your Mac and easy on your battery.

02 Timecode

Timecode, done properly.

SMPTE HH:MM:SS:FF, frame-accurate
Reads the embedded start timecode from the file
Drop-frame aware (29.97 / 59.94 shown with a semicolon)
Copy timecode to the clipboard with one click
Hidden in fullscreen, so nothing sits over your picture

Close-up of the player bar showing transport controls, seek bar, Fine precision switch and SMPTE timecode readout — The player bar — transport, seek bar, Fine switch, frame export, copy timecode, and the SMPTE readout.

03 Frame by frame

Move frame by frame.

← → — step exactly one frame back or forward
J K L — reverse shuttle, stop, forward shuttle (1×→16×)
Space — play / pause

04 Scrubbing

Scrubbing that keeps up.

Smooth across the entire file — no lag, no snapping between keyframes
Fine mode for precision: the playhead moves slowly so you can land on the frame
Two-finger swipe over the playhead for fine scrubbing — the pointer locks to the handle

Precision scrubbing enabled, shown by the orange seek bar

05 Get Info

Know exactly what you're looking at.

⌘I opens a full readout: container, duration and bitrate; video codec and profile, resolution, pixel format, frame rate, bit depth, colour space/primaries/transfer/range, scan type and embedded timecode; audio codec, sample rate, bit depth, channels, layout and bitrate; plus which hardware decoder is in use. Selectable, so you can copy any of it.

The Get Info panel listing container, video and audio details including codec, resolution, frame rate, bit depth and timecode

06 The window

A window that fits the picture.

Opens sized to the video's exact aspect ratio — no black bars
Locks that ratio when you resize
Size presets: ⌘1 actual size (100%), ⌘2 50%, ⌘3 25%, ⌘4 12.5%, ⌘5 200%

Screenshot coming cmvp-aspect.png — The window automatically sized to the video's exact aspect ratio, with no black bars

07 Fullscreen

Distraction-free fullscreen.

F or double-click to go fullscreen; Escape to leave
A true blackout: the menu bar and Dock stay hidden — nothing appears when your pointer drifts to an edge
Move the mouse and the playhead appears at the bottom for two seconds, then gets out of the way

08 Performance

Light on your Mac.

VideoToolbox hardware decoding
Draws only when there's a new frame — nothing burns while paused
Keeps the display awake while a video is playing, and lets your Mac sleep normally when it isn't

09 Keyboard

Every shortcut, where you expect it.

Key	Action
`Space`	Play / pause
`←` `→`	Step one frame back / forward
`J` `K` `L`	Shuttle reverse / stop / forward (tap to ramp 1×–16×)
`F` or double-click	Fullscreen
`Escape`	Leave fullscreen
`↑` `↓`	Volume
`⌘1` `⌘2` `⌘3` `⌘4` `⌘5`	100% / 50% / 25% / 12.5% / 200%
`⌘I`	Get Info
`⌘O`	Open file

10 Formats

It plays what you throw at it.

Video

H.264/AVC · HEVC/H.265 · ProRes · VP9 · AV1 · MPEG-2 · MPEG-4 · VC-1 · DV

Audio

AAC · AC-3 · E-AC-3 · DTS · TrueHD · FLAC · ALAC · Opus · Vorbis · MP3 · PCM

Containers

MP4 · MOV · MKV · WebM · AVI · MPEG-TS · MXF · FLV

Hardware decoding via VideoToolbox for H.264, HEVC, ProRes, VP9 and AV1 where your Mac supports it.

11 Requirements

Self-contained. Nothing else to install.

macOS 13 (Ventura) or later
Apple silicon Mac
Self-contained — nothing else to install

Download — [REPLACE: price]

[REPLACE: version + release date] · Support · Privacy

12 Open source

Open-source acknowledgements

libmpv & FFmpeg — LGPL v2.1

CM Video Player includes libmpv and FFmpeg, licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License v2.1. The corresponding source code for the versions used, along with the scripts used to build them, is available at [REPLACE: open-source source-code URL]. A copy of the LGPL v2.1 is available here.