Best Winamp Alternatives for Windows & Mac & Ubuntu

In the last decade, what is the most popular application on Windows operating system? If you have grown up to be quite older, then Winamp is the one that has brought you a lot of memories on Windows. This is the best music player on the Windows platform in the 1990s. In the Winamp 2 era, this is almost synonymous with music players. It has been regarded as the most efficient, stable media player which is equipped with the gorgeous interface. Some disadvantages of Winamp have been revealed. Today, let’s pay attention to some Winamp alternatives for Windows, Mac and Ubuntu.

Part 1: Pros and Cons of Winamp

Winamp is a pioneer of digital media playback, developed by Nullsoft in 1997, founder Justin Frankel, the software supports MP3, MP2, MOD, S3M, MTM, ULT, XM, IT, 669, CD-Audio, Line-In, etc. And other formats have been upgraded from version 1.0 to version 5.57. Winamp is a high-fidelity music player software that supports MP3, MP2, MOD, S3M, MTM, ULT, XM, IT, 669, CD-Audio, Line-In, WAV, VOC and other audio formats. The interface skins can be customized to support plug-ins that enhance audio visual and audio effects. The new version provides full playback support for video files, powerful skin functions, a new decoding engine, a large number of advanced media libraries, and less memory usage. But in comparison with many other innovative media players, some pros and cons of Winamp have been concluded as follows.

Pros:

1. Winamp is one of the oldest and most popular audio player software. Its novel skin-changing function and plug-in support with many functions make it the first choice for music players. It is a new era of mp3 files.
2. Winamp can add APE, MP3Pro, WMA plug-ins in three formats. After adding third-party plug-ins, almost all common and uncommon music file formats are supported.
3. Winamp can read the file information while playing. During the audio playback, you are allowed to refer to the detailed information of the digital file without quitting the playback panel.

Cons:

1. Winamp consumes too much system resources on the computer and the CPU has been heavily occupied while the software is running.
2. Winamp lacks the customized viewing features and it is limited in the supported formats. From the sight of the player, you may not put your focus on it since you have viewed too many other advanced media players.
3. Winamp’s processing power on the final excellent output audio effects is confined which makes the movie sound unclear frequently. It only has the very basic playback functions but is it not good enough in processing the audio quality carefully.

Part 2: 3 Best Alternatives to Winamp on Windows & Mac

No. 1 Leawo Blu-ray Player

The first alternative to Winamp should be Leawo Blu-ray Player which is also a totally free media program. With the comprehensive playing functions and features, Leawo Blu-ray Player can not only act as an excellent audio player to support FLAC, AC3, AAC formats, but also can be compatible with various operating systems to decrypt different media files, ranging from Blu-ray, DVD, 4K, to the common digital video formats. With advanced image and audio processing technology, Leawo Free Blu-ray Player software could provide you quality-lossless image for even 4K video, stereo audio enjoyment, all regions free DVD decryption and user-oriented playback control. Due to the audio processing technology, the audio files could be processed and presented with the best output effects. Leawo Blu-ray Player can be compatible with Windows and Mac smoothly. What even makes it better is that it enables users to convert Blu-ray file to MKV file without quality loss.

No. 2 Mediamonkey

Mediamonkey is a powerful media file management tool that can manage to convert, recording, burning and playing music files on the computer, edit file tags. Support mp3, MPC, ape, wma, flac files, M3U (playlist) and audio CD, etc. You can also play audio and video, adjust the volume, and visualize and burn CDs to MP3 files, or convert audio and video formats. In detail, Mediamonkey can edit file tags, convert cd files to OGG, MP3, and WMA. Also, convert OGG, MP3, and WMA to other formats.Create playlists and music mixes to suit any occasion. The software also has a built-in storage server function that allows you to save more than 100,000 media files. Due to the Replaygain and MP3gain, Mediamonkey can adjust the volume automatically. It supports different running systems including Windows, iOS and Android.

No. 3 AIMP

AIMP (ArtemIzmaylov Media Player) is an advanced multimedia tool from Russia. In addition to the player's basic audio playback, it also provides audio conversion, recording, ID3 tag editing and other functions. AIMP occupies fewer system resources and the installation package is not very large. The operation interface of AIMP can be said to be clear, and users can easily master the basic operations. AIMP supports most music formats, has six beautiful skins that can be changed at any time, dozens of languages to choose from, fast processing of music, and playlists can clearly distinguish each album, allowing you to find songs more conveniently.

Part 3: 3 Best Alternatives to Winamp on Ubuntu(Linux)

No. 1 Audacious

Audacious is a very widely used music player, especially loved by Linux users. Audacious is similar to Foobar. It supports multiple file formats such as APE. The software is small and compact, and the interface is beautiful. There are also rich plugins to fully meet your personalization demand which can build your customized player. Audacious is a player based on Beep-media-player and XMMS. Since BMP developers are now focusing on developing bmpx, the development of BMP has been stopped, but Audacious developers have inherited the BMP source code which has stimulated Audacious to be presented. Of course, the Audacious music player also provides a windows version, but it is not widely known. The difference with other players is that it provides support for other character sets in addition to the UTF-8 character set.

No. 2 Rhythmbox

Rhythmbox is a music player and management software under Linux, a music player installed by default for Linux distributions such as Fedora and Ubuntu. It can play music in various audio formats and manage collected music. Also, it can support playback from different digital music sources, but not including MIDI. The most common playback is music stored as a file on the local computer. Rhythmbox also supports streaming media (Internet radio stations and podcasts) and it is capable of searching and sorting music in the library. Playlists can generate groups and arrange music. Users can also create a "smart playlist", which can be automatically updated according to custom rules (just like a database queue), instead of arbitrarily arranging tracks. It can also rip audio CDs (requires optional audio CD extractor software). And, with the help of GStreamer, it can support a comprehensive audio format

No. 3 MPV-EASY Player

MPV-EASY Player is a video player based on MPV being a modified version of MPlayer and mplayer2. MPV-EASY Player has a very powerful local support function, which can perform local playback very smoothly. MPV-EASY Player has a simple and easy-to-use setting interface; you can quickly adjust many parameters. MPV is a branch of the famous open source media players MPlayer and mplayer2. MPlayer is the strongest player on the planet (no one). The cross-platform feature makes it visible on windows, mac, and Linux. Many players on computers and mobile phones are also developed based on it. And players often consumes the least amount of system resources when playing videos, so you will find that playing a high-definition movie on a very poorly configured computer, MPlayer is usually the smoothest, and the gap can be best reflected when using fast forward. Other players could encounter the picture freezing problems from now and then, but this player would not have the problem.

Part 4: Conclusion

Even though Winamp was widely known by most people in the last decade, its innovations and updates are also quite attractive in terms of the comprehensive features and functions. In this article, you can have the general knowledge about Winamp if you have never used it before, including the pros and cons. But this should depend on people’s preferences and requirements while selecting the favorite media player. No matter what systems you are running, Windows, Mac or Linux, you can refer to these Winamp alternatives based on your own needs. But if you prefer a more comprehensive and free player, Leawo Blu-ray Player can meet your requirements no matter you are trying to play all kinds of videos or audios.