Real HDR & Dolby Vision
HDR10, HDR10+ (per-frame ST 2094-40), Dolby Vision (P5, P7 as single-layer 8.1, P8.1, P8.4, AV1 P10.x), and HLG, with full metadata and automatic Match Content.
AetherEngine
A media player engine for Apple platforms. FFmpeg demuxes, VideoToolbox decodes, AVPlayer handles Dolby Atmos.
Latest 6.7.0
Used by
Section titled “Used by”Apps shipping AetherEngine today:
Sodalite Native Jellyfin client for Apple TV.
AetherPlayer Native macOS media player.
NowSeen IPTV / Manifest app for tvOS.
Shipping something on AetherEngine? Submit it to get listed here and in the README.
What it handles
Section titled “What it handles”Dolby Atmos
EAC3+JOC stream-copied on every route (HDMI MAT 2.0, AirPods spatial, Bluetooth downmix), plus 5.1 / 7.1 surround with correct channel layout.
Broad codec coverage
H.264, HEVC, and AV1 via VideoToolbox; AV1 without hardware, VP9, MPEG-2, and VC-1 via the software dav1d path. MKV, MP4, WebM, MPEG-TS, AVI, and more.
Audio-only path
A lean pipeline with no video machinery and system Now-Playing on tvOS and iOS, driven by a single LoadOptions flag.
Live TV & DVR
Unbounded live with optional timeshift, and direct HLS ingest with AES-128 clear-key and SSAI ad-pod handling.
You ship the UI
No AVPlayerViewController, no opinionated controls, no analytics. Bind the view, call play(), read the published state.
How it compares
Section titled “How it compares”On Apple platforms the real choice is between AVPlayer, with deep OS integration but only the formats Apple ships, and a VLC- or mpv-derived engine, which plays almost anything but renders its own frames and bypasses the system’s Dolby Vision, Atmos, and HDR handling. AetherEngine is built to give you both: FFmpeg’s format breadth layered on top of VideoToolbox and AVPlayer, so Dolby Vision, Atmos, and Match Content keep working. KSPlayer is the closest analog, it reaches the same outcome through the same AVPlayer route, but it ships as a full player with its own UI and gates MKV, Dolby Vision, and Atmos behind a paid LGPL tier (the free build is GPL); AetherEngine is an embeddable engine you drive from your own SwiftUI, with that codec and HDR breadth in the open-source core.
| AetherEngine | KSPlayer | AVPlayer | VLCKit | libmpv | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Approach | Embeddable engine, Apple-only | Full player with bundled UI, FFmpeg + AVPlayer, Apple-only | Apple’s built-in player | libVLC wrapped for Apple | libmpv, cross-platform |
| Container & codec breadth | Wide, FFmpeg demux | Wide, FFmpeg demux | Narrow, Apple’s set | Wide | Wide |
| Hardware decode | VideoToolbox, dav1d SW fallback | VideoToolbox, FFmpeg SW fallback | VideoToolbox | VideoToolbox plus software | VideoToolbox plus software |
| Dolby Vision | P5, P7 as 8.1, P8.1, P8.4, AV1 P10.x, real display switch | P5, P8 via AVPlayer, paid LGPL tier | P5 and P8.1 only | Tone-maps, no DV display | Tone-maps, no DV display |
| Dolby Atmos | EAC3+JOC stream-copied (HDMI MAT, spatial) | EAC3+JOC via AVPlayer, paid LGPL tier | EAC3+JOC passthrough | Decodes to PCM, no object passthrough | No Atmos passthrough on Apple |
| HDR on tvOS | Native Match Content switch | Native Match Content on AVPlayer path, else Metal tone-map | Native Match Content | Software tone-mapping | Software tone-mapping |
| Rendering & UI | OS-native, you ship SwiftUI | Own Metal renderer, bundled controls | OS-native, you ship UI | Own renderer, bundled controls | Own renderer, bundled OSC |
| Apple TV / App Store | Yes, LGPL plus store exception | Free tier GPL, DV / Atmos / MKV need paid LGPL | Yes | Yes, LGPL | Not practical, GPL, no tvOS |
The engine leans on the platform where the platform is best (hardware decode, Dolby Vision display, Atmos passthrough) and only falls back to its own software path (dav1d, libavcodec) for the formats VideoToolbox cannot handle.
Just want to watch?
Section titled “Just want to watch?”AetherEngine is the engine, not an app. If you are here to actually watch something, Sodalite is the native Apple TV client for Jellyfin built on top of it. This site is for developers integrating the engine.
Read the introduction to get started.