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WaveFlow
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WaveFlow QuickPlay

Stablev1.6.0

Double-click. Just listen.

No library, no waiting, nothing in the way.

QuickPlay opens the song in front of you in a small window, from a double-click or the right-click menu: FLAC, Opus, DSD and the rest, with its lyrics, its cover and a playlist. When you want more, WaveFlow takes over.

Download QuickPlayDiscover WaveFlow Desktop

Windows x64 · macOS, Apple silicon and Intel · Linux, x86_64 and Arm

QuickPlaySlow Morning1:244:02Slow MorningWindow Light · The Quiet HoursFLAC 912 kbps 44.1 kHz1:24 / 4:02
Compact mode, 440 × 154 · illustration of the 1.5.0 window

What it does

  1. Up before you blink

    The window is on screen in under 300 ms, and the next song you open goes to the same player, not to a second window.

  2. Every format WaveFlow plays

    MP3, FLAC, WAV, AIFF, Vorbis, Opus, AAC, ALAC and DSD, with the WaveFlow player's own decoders.

  3. Small, or with the cover

    A compact bar of 440 × 154, or the album cover above the controls in a window you can resize.

  4. Carry on in WaveFlow

    One button hands the queue and your spot in the song to WaveFlow Desktop, which picks up where you were.

Where it stands

Stable. Version 1.6.0 is out for Windows, macOS and Linux, and QuickPlay looks for the next one on its own.

  • Windows Stable

    A per-user installer, no administrator rights, that adds QuickPlay to the right-click menu of songs and folders. SmartScreen may warn once: the installer carries WaveFlow's self-signed certificate.

  • macOS Stable

    One app for Apple silicon and Intel Macs, macOS 11 or later. It is not signed by an Apple Developer ID, so allow its first launch in System Settings › Privacy & Security.

  • Linux Stable

    A .deb, an .rpm or an AppImage, for x86_64 PCs and 64-bit Arm boards such as a Raspberry Pi 4 or 5.

Links

Measured, not promised

On screen in under 300 ms

From the moment the program starts to the moment its window is drawn. One release build, one song, one machine per system, measured on 2026-10-18.

How: QuickPlay writes that time in its own log when the window is ready. The sound engine starts on the first play, right after. These are single machines, not a benchmark.

  • Windows 11

    276ms

  • macOS 26.6 · MacBook Air, Apple M2

    216ms

    581 ms on the very first launch.

  • Fedora 44 · GNOME on Wayland

    62ms

While a song plays on Windows, QuickPlay uses 3.8 % of one processor core with the spectrum hidden, and nothing at all when paused.

All the measurements

Formats

Plays what you already have

The decoders of the WaveFlow player, in a window the size of a notification: lossless, compressed and DSD.

  • MP3
  • FLAC
  • WAV
  • AIFF
  • Vorbis
  • Opus
  • AAC
  • ALAC
  • DSF
  • DFF

Songs, whole folders and .m3u or .m3u8 playlists: drop them on the window, open them, or pick them from the right-click menu.

The details

Small, not bare

  • Compact or with the cover

    The whole player in a bar of 440 × 154, or the cover edge to edge above the controls. Press A to switch; the size and the mode are remembered.

  • A playlist beside it

    A second window docked to the player, which follows it when it moves. Repeat, shuffle, and .m3u playlists queued in their own order.

  • Lyrics from a .lrc file

    Put song.lrc next to song.flac and the current line takes the title's place as the song plays. Nothing is fetched from the internet.

  • Spectrum and live bitrate

    The bars follow what you hear, and the format shows the bitrate of what is playing, measured every second.

  • From the right-click menu

    On Windows, Play with QuickPlay and Add to QuickPlay playlist on songs and folders; on macOS and Linux, Open With.

  • Updates on its own

    QuickPlay looks for a new version at launch and installs it when you close it. A .deb or an .rpm only tells you, and your package manager does the rest.

  • Eight languages

    English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese and Korean. It follows your system unless you choose.

  • Made for the keyboard

    Space to pause, N and P to skip, the arrows to seek and set the volume, L for the playlist, T to keep it on top.

Continue in WaveFlow

Start here, carry on in WaveFlow

When WaveFlow Desktop is installed, a button with its logo appears in QuickPlay. Press it: WaveFlow opens at the same spot, from its library when the songs are in it, and QuickPlay closes.

Needs WaveFlow Desktop 2.0.0-beta.1 or later. The button stays hidden with an older WaveFlow, with one whose version cannot be read (such as an AppImage put on the PATH by hand), and when only the Flatpak build is installed: its sandbox cannot take the handoff.

QuickPlay

What goes over

  • The queue
  • The song that is playing
  • Where you are in it
  • Playing or paused
WaveFlow2.0+
One press, and the music goes on in WaveFlow.

WaveFlow QuickPlay

One song, right now

Open a file and listen. No library to build, no setup, no account.

WaveFlow Desktop

Your whole library

Organize, explore and shape your music: mixes from your listening, synced lyrics, equalizer, crossfade, gapless playback.

Discover WaveFlow Desktop

Download

Get QuickPlay 1.6.0

Free, with no account and no ads. Pick the package for your system.

Then double-click a song, or right-click it. That is the whole setup.

Release notes and checksums

The WaveFlow family

One way to listen, on every screen.

It starts with the player. A music server, a phone app and a lyrics editor are built the same way: your files, on your devices, with nothing to pay.