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An MKV file won't play on Android TV

An MKV file is a container, so whether it plays depends on what is inside it. When one will not play on Android TV, it is almost always the sound, the picture or how the file reaches the television, and each has its own fix. Yonto Player plays MKV from a USB drive, a NAS share or a media server, in the free app.

Find out which one it is

Section titled “Find out which one it is”

You see the picture but hear nothing. The sound is DTS or Dolby TrueHD, and the television or box has no decoder for it. On Android, Yonto Player tries your device’s own decoder first and decodes the track itself when there is none, and it does the same for AC3, E-AC-3, FLAC, Vorbis, Opus, ALAC and WMA (DTS, TrueHD and Dolby audio on Android TV). A player that decodes sound in software, such as VLC, fixes this the same way.

You hear the sound but the picture is black or green, or it stutters. The video is more than the device’s chip can decode: 10-bit H.264 (Hi10P), VC-1, Dolby Vision profile 5 on a device whose graphics chip cannot show it, or 4K on a small box. Yonto Player plays VC-1 and the other files its first player cannot decode in a second player, picked for you file by file, with nothing to switch (Video formats Yonto Player plays). On a Jellyfin, Plex or Emby source, the server converts what the device cannot play while you watch, as long as Let the server convert videos is on in the source’s editor.

The file will not open, or the television does not list it.

  • A USB drive formatted FAT32 cannot hold a file over 4 GB, so a long film may have failed to copy. Format the drive exFAT or NTFS, or copy the file again.
  • On a NAS, Yonto Player speaks SMB 2 and 3, not the older SMB 1, so there is no need to allow SMB 1 on the NAS (your files on Android TV).
  • A folder, USB, SMB or WebDAV source lists files ending in mkv, mp4, avi and the other video extensions named in Video formats Yonto Player plays, so a file with another ending is not listed.

The subtitles are missing. Subtitles inside the file are under Subtitles in the player. A subtitle file beside the video with the same name (Movie.srt beside Movie.mkv) is offered too: SRT, WebVTT, ASS and SSA, from an SMB share, a WebDAV server or a folder on a phone or tablet. On Android, subtitles are drawn white with a black outline and no box, sized by the system’s caption size.

What it does not do

Section titled “What it does not do”
  • It does not convert a file itself. A video neither player can decode, and no server converts, shows “This device couldn’t play this video.” under “Playback failed”, and the answer is another version of the title, if there is one (Troubleshooting).

Yonto Player provides no content. Android TV, Google TV, Jellyfin, Plex, Emby and VLC are trademarks of their owners, and Yonto Player is not affiliated with or endorsed by them.