Though Windows Media Player is very impressive, sometimes you may encounter the problem that Windows Media Player not playing AVI files. But sometimes, you are still confused by the problem Windows Media Player will not play AVI files. Then you can't help asking, why Windows Media Player not playing AVI files? Next let's have a detailed discussion and we will give you several solutions.

Part 1: Possible Reasons for Windows Media Player not Playing AVI

AVI stands for Audio Video Interleave, which is a multimedia container format created by Microsoft. Generally speaking, according to the Windows official website, you can learn that Windows Media Player supports AVI format. Now, we are going to discuss about the issue that avi file not playing in Windows Media Player.

Reason 1. Damaged AVI files
In the first place, you must make sure the AVI file you have just loaded to Windows Media Player is not damaged without any corrupt. Sometimes, some important data and video content information may be lost during the downloading process from the Internet. If you are not sure about it, then you had better download for another time.

Reason 2. Codec issue
At first, Windows Media Player is available to support all the codecs contained in AVI files, but some new codecs in AVI invented in later years, such as Xvid, DivX, DX50, MP4V, and MPEG-4 cannot be supported by Windows Media Player since it has not been updated. Under the circumstance, how to fix the issue on AVI not playing in Windows Media Player? In such a case, what you need to do is to download the required codecs, such as Xvid. The detailed steps will be shown below.

Reason 3. AVI not associated with WMP.
Sometimes, if the AVI files are not associated with Windows Media Player, then of course Windows Media Player will not play AVI successfully. Then you need to fix it by checking the related parameters in Windows Media Player.

Reason 4. Windows Media Player is outdated.
If the above solutions can't still solve the problem of windows media player not playing AVI, it may be because the Windows Media Player is out of date. What you need to do is to check the newest version of Windows Media Player and update it immediately.

Part 2: Change Setting in Windows Media Player

Step 1. You can open WMP and press Alt to show the menu, then select “Options” to choose “File Types” tab. You need to check whether the Windows video file (.avi) is ticked or not. If not, just take a tick of it and click “OK”.

Step 2. On the System Protection tab, just click on the System Restore button. If you turned off or disabled System Restore, please turn it on and enable this function.

Step 3. Run System File Checker command to check the damaged AVI files. You can run the command by going to Start, Run and typing in CMD. Then type the following “sfc /scannow” in the box. Restart the Windows Media Player and try to play the AVI files one more time.

Part 3: Install Codec Packs

One of the possible reasons for the AVI playback failure on Windows Media Player is the lack of AVI codec for the player. Due to the limit of codecs contained within Windows Media Player, you had better download a comprehensive codec pack for the player. You can choose K-Lite Codec Pack for your player which has contained all the audio and video codecs for the playback. The downloading and installation process are quite simple.

Step 1. Search K-Lite Codec Pack and choose a proper one to download to your computer.
Step 2. Unzip the codec pack and install it by following the step-by-step instruction shown on the screen.
Step 3. Restart computer and Windows Media Player to enable the codec pack on the player.

Part 4: Alternative Player for Windows Media Player

Without downloading and installing AVI plugin for Windows Media Player, it is quite difficult to play AVI videos smoothly on the players. However, this is not the only way to success. As an alternative for Windows Media Player, Leawo Blu-ray Player can be perfectly selected as the wonderful tool to provide the AVI playback solution with the best audio and picture effects. As a totally media player, Leawo Blu-ray Player is able to support AVI format with the best and fast running speed without any buffering and crashing issues. What the most attractive is that you don’t have to download or install any video or audio codecs so as to play the digital content. Equipped with all kinds of multimedia codecs within it, Leawo Blu-ray Player can support more than 180 types of digital files, ranging from AVI, MPEG, MP4, WMV, MOV, FLV to other physical discs as well as ISO image file playback and Ultra HD 4K videos. Asides from the basic playing function, you can easily obtain other bonus features with this player, such as virtual remote controller and so on. The playing steps are quite simple.

Step 1. Download and install Leawo Blu-ray Player on the computer.
Step 2. Open the player and click “Open File” to load the AVI file to the program. Then the AVI file can be played immediately on the player. You can also simply drag the AVI file from your computer to the player.

Part 5: Convert AVI to Windows Media Player

Alternatively, if you are not familiar with the Windows Media Player settings and downloading and installation process of AVI codec, another efficient way to solve the problem is to convert AVI to another more WMP compatible format. Here you can choose WMV as the output video format which is commonly seen among the public. Based on some users’ reviews, WMV can be easier to be read and played by Windows Media Player. In order to convert AVI to WMV, a powerful third-party video converter has to be introduced.

First of all, Leawo Video Converter would worth a shot if you prefer powerful and efficient computer programs. Leawo Video Converter can play an important role in converting video and audio and it can convert other formats, including MP4, AVI, MOV, MP3, AAC, etc. Note that Leawo Video Converter has Windows version and Mac version, choose the proper version that is compatible with your computer OS.

Step 1. Enter video converter module

Kick off Leawo Video Converter to enter the main program interface, now click on “Video Converter” tab or “Convert” button to enter the video converter module.

Step 2. Import source AVI video files

Click “Add Video” button on the sub-menu to load your source AVI video files. After loading, you could play the AVI video files, join the loaded files into one, select subtitles and audio tracks, add external subtitles to the loaded AVI video files, edit loaded AVI video files, etc.

Step 3. Set WMV as output format

Click the drop-down box next to the “Add Photo” button to call out a drop-down list, and then select “Change” option. Then on the popup Profile window, select “WMV Video” from “Format” column as output format.

Step 4. Edit the video

If you need, you could click the “Edit” button instead of “Change” button on the drop-down list to enter the Profile Settings panel where you could adjust video and audio parameters like video codec, aspect ratio, frame rate, resolution, audio codec, bit rate, channel, sample rate, etc.

Step 5. Convert AVI to WMV

Click the big green “Convert” button on the sub-menu bar. And then, a sidebar will pop up. If necessary, you can set output directory for containing the converted video files. After that, click the “Convert” button right below and Leawo Video Converter would start to convert AVI to WMV immediately.

Words in the end

To sum up, for convenience, functions and privacy protection, Leawo video converter would be the best option since it has clean and clear program, user-friendly interface and customized features. You can easily convert AVI to other digital formats which are compatible with Windows Media Player. Alternatively, you can also select Leawo Blu-ray Player to play the AVI for you since it doesn't require any other codecs at all.

For more issues about Windows Media Player, you can to check on these following tutorials:

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