We have already covered 15 killer Windows 7 keyboard shortcuts that might surprise you. Today we will see 15 cool keyboard shortcuts you can use on VLC, one of the leading cross platform media players, to increase your productivity. The chances of you knowing them all is unlikely, so I insist you check them out. You never know, some of these could make things really easy for you when it comes to playing videos on VLC. Important Note: We have written an amazing guide on VLC called The Ultimate Guide to VLC Media Player. It’s available as a beautiful page as well as a downloadable ebook. Make sure you check that out.
1. Space Bar to Play or Pause
Now, two of the most-used functions while playing a video are play and pause, and thus VLC assigned it to the biggest key on your keyboard, the Space Bar. While Space Bar is the de facto play/pause key when it comes to media players, you can’t take it for granted. For example, many versions of Windows Media Player don’t have it. So knowing where it works and where it doesn’t is useful.
2. F to toggle Full Screen
So you have selected a movie, embedded the subtitle (if any), prepared a tub of popcorn, switched off the lights and then finally, you are all set to switch the movie to full screen and play it. Don’t bother with the mouse, just hit the ‘F’ key. It’ll let you toggle between full screen mode and window mode on VLC.
3. A to Change Aspect ratio
Aspect ratio in simple words is the width to the height ratio of the video. When you play a video, it will not automatically fit your window, and thus you will have to try various predefined available aspect ratios to bring out the best. Using the context menu to cycle aspect ratio can be really time talking. Just press the button A on the keyboard to do that quickly.
4. Z to Change Zoom Mode
Using Z you can quickly zoom in and out the video in window mode. It cycles between one-quarter, half, original and double.
5. Alt+Left/Alt+Right to Fast Forward slow
Want to skip few seconds on the video? Simply press the Alt button along with the direction key in which you want to skip (right for forward and left to go back). Each key event will skip 10 seconds of your video.
6. Ctrl+Left/Ctrl+Right to Fast forward Medium
To skip a minute in the video, replace the Alt key in the above shortcut with the Ctrl key.
7. Ctrl+Alt+Left/Ctrl+Alt+Right = fast forward long
If the seconds and a minute is not long enough, just combine both, the Alt and the Ctrl key along with the directional button to skip 5 minutes of the video. Well, that’s the longest you can get using the shortcut, any more than that, and you will have to use the seek bar. Note: People who are using Intel HD Graphics card might want to disable their cards’ global hotkey before using the above shortcut. I didn’t do it, and my screen turned upside down.
8. Ctrl+Up/Ctrl+Down to Increase or Decrease Volume
To decrease or increase the volume of the video, just press the Ctrl key and use the up and down directional keys. It’s always easier to use the mentioned shortcut key than to hunt for the volume button. If your laptop is bestowed with some quick volume function button, you can directly use them to control the windows device volume.
9. M to Mute
There is nothing much to say about this. Pressing the M button will mute or un-mute your video.
10. CTRL + E to Adjust Audio/Video Effects
While playing a video or listening to a song, if at all you want to adjust the audio or video effects like equalizer, color contrasts, etc. pressing the Ctrl button along with E will bring on the Audio/Video Effects window.
11. T to Show Time(Remaining and Elapsed)
In window mode, you can just look at the seek bar to get information regarding the elapsed and remaining video time. If you want to know the remaining or elapsed time of the video in full-screen mode, simply press the T button to get a three-second info on the top right hand corner of the video.
12. +/- to Play Faster/Slower
If you want to watch your videos in adrenaline or bullet time mode (If you are not a gamer, you will probably not get that), pressing the minus(-) button will slow your video playback speed, and the plus (+) will increase it.
13. N/P = Play next in list/Play previous in the list
If you have multiple tracks in your playlist you can simply press the N or P to play the next or previous media respectively.
14. S to Stop the playback
If you didn’t like the video or you some urgent work came up, press the S button to stop your video. If you are in full-screen mode, your video will be stopped, and VLC will return to window mode.
15. Ctrl+ H to Hide/Unhide Controls
Which of the above you discovered today? Which ones you are likely to use most frequently from now on? Any cool shortcuts we missed? Tell us!
Liked the Article? Then You Would Love Our Ebook on VLC
Here’s the link, check it out: The Ultimate Guide to VLC Media Player. The above article may contain affiliate links which help support Guiding Tech. However, it does not affect our editorial integrity. The content remains unbiased and authentic.
