# Can't Play Videos

**URL:** https://forum.torproject.org/t/cant-play-videos/22189
**Category:** Tor Browser Desktop
**Tags:** tor-browser
**Created:** [September 26, 2026, 9:29pm UTC](https://forum.torproject.org/t/cant-play-videos/22189 "2026-09-26T21:29:28Z")
**Posts on this page:** 2
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![Logical](https://forum.torproject.org/user_avatar/forum.torproject.org/logical/32/9245_2.png) [@Logical](https://forum.torproject.org/u/Logical)
#### Post date: [September 26, 2026, 9:29pm UTC](https://forum.torproject.org/t/cant-play-videos/22189/1 "2026-09-26T21:29:29Z")

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I am experiencing difficulty playing any video outside of YouTube, and even YouTube live streams fail, displaying a notice that my browser is unsupported and that I need to install a different one.

When I attempt to play a regular video, I receive errors such as “No video with supported format and MIME type found.” Video playback works correctly in Firefox, which I installed from the distribution’s package repository.

I have tried the following troubleshooting steps without success:

```
* Enabling “Temporarily trust this page” in the NoScript extension (no effect).
* Verifying that all about:config settings remain at their default values.
* Toggling hardware acceleration on and off.
* Confirming that the security level is set to “Standard.”

```

System details:

```
* Distribution: Arch Linux
* Kernel: 7.2.6-arch2-1 (64‑bit)
* Graphics platform: Wayland

```

I am using Tor Browser installed from the Arch Linux extra repository (torbrowser-launcher version 0.3.9‑1). I suspect this issue may be unique to Linux environments, but I am also considering the possibility that it stems from a deliberate privacy‑oriented policy or restriction imposed by the organization behind the browser.

Any guidance on how to resolve these video playback problems would be greatly appreciated. I’ve already tried everything I found here on the forum. 🧅 🧑‍💻

---

<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![paulsup](https://forum.torproject.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/ecc23a/32.png) [@paulsup](https://forum.torproject.org/u/paulsup)
#### Post date: [October 10, 2026, 10:32pm UTC](https://forum.torproject.org/t/cant-play-videos/22189/2 "2026-10-10T22:32:39Z")

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This looks like a known compatibility problem rather than a privacy restriction.

On Linux, Tor Browser (like Firefox) relies on your system’s FFmpeg libraries to play common formats such as H.264, which most video sites and YouTube live streams need. Tor Browser 15 is based on Firefox ESR 140, and ESR 140 can’t load FFmpeg 8 (libavcodec 62). Mozilla added FFmpeg 8 support in Firefox 146/147 and marked it “wontfix” for ESR 140: [https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show\_bug.cgi?id=1962139](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1962139)

That fits what you’re seeing: your distro’s Firefox plays video, while Tor Browser (and Mullvad Browser, also ESR-based) shows “No video with supported format and MIME type found”.

To check: run ffmpeg -version. If it shows 8.x, that’s almost certainly the cause. Possible workarounds:

- If your distro offers an FFmpeg 7.x compatibility package (one that provides libavcodec.so.61), installing it alongside FFmpeg 8 should let Tor Browser find a version it supports.
- Otherwise, this should be resolved by Tor Browser 16, which moves to a newer Firefox ESR base.