LocalSound

All features

LocalSound is a free music player for Windows and Linux, built as a MusicBee alternative for Linux. Here's everything it does, by area, the big things first. The little helpers in between you'll find on your own.

Your library

Your music stays in your files

  • Tags and ratings in the files

    Ratings, tags and covers are saved in the music files themselves, so other players and other computers see them too.

  • MP3, FLAC, WAV, AIFF and Ogg

    Plays the common formats. You choose which file types each music folder includes.

  • As many music folders as you like

    On your disk or a network share, with or without their subfolders.

  • Folder watcher

    New files show up in the library by themselves, while LocalSound is running.

  • Update when you want

    Scan everything, or only pick up the latest changes. Moved and deleted files only show up in a complete update. On request at every start.

  • More than one library

    Create, open and switch library files, with a list of recent ones. One for your music, one for the audiobooks, one for the kids.

  • A library file you can read

    Plain JSON, wherever you want it. Move it later from the library settings. What's inside

  • Deleting, carefully

    Remove tracks from the library only, or from the disk as well. LocalSound asks which one you mean.

Tidy folders

Every file in its place

  • A save pattern per folder

    You decide how files are filed and named, for example artist, then album, then track number and title.

  • Organizes by itself

    As soon as a track has the tags it needs, LocalSound moves and renames it to match the pattern. You can switch that off.

  • Reorganize all files

    Brings a whole existing collection into shape in one go. A dry run shows first what would move.

  • Undo, even after a crash

    Every move is written down before it happens. Cancel, close the window or have the computer crash, and the files go back where they were.

  • The file follows the tags

    Fix an album name, save, and the file moves to the right folder right away.

  • Covers next to the music

    Album covers are saved as an image in the album folder, under a file name you choose, like Cover.jpg.

Browse and find

From a track to its album and back

  • Artists, albums and genres

    Browse your collection as covers instead of rows. Each artist shows a stack of their album covers, the best-rated on top.

  • Pages that link to each other

    Every track links to its artist, album and genre, and every page links on from there.

  • Column filters

    Filter any column: words, ratings, years, dates, lengths or file sizes, as an exact value or a from–to range. Dates come with a calendar to pick from.

  • Columns your way

    Pick the columns, drag them into order and sort by any of them. Each view remembers its own setup.

  • Search

    Type a few letters to narrow down artists, albums, genres and radio stations.

  • Track details

    Format, length, file size and path at a glance, and one click shows the file in its folder.

Playing

Press play

  • Play queue

    Add tracks to play next, at the end or as a new queue, and drag them into the order you want.

  • Play from here

    Start anywhere in a list, an album or a playlist, and it plays on from there.

  • Repeat and shuffle

    Repeat the current list, or play it in random order.

  • Audio output and its own volume

    Pick the audio output in the Sound menu or the player's context menu. Volume and mute only touch LocalSound; the rest of your computer keeps its own.

  • A player bar in cover colors

    In the Dark, Light and OS themes, the player bar takes its colors from the cover that's playing.

Playlists

Hand-picked or self-filling

  • Dynamic playlists

    Set rules on any column, like rating and genre, and the playlist fills itself as your library grows.

  • Limits and picks

    Cap a dynamic playlist at an hour, 4 GB or 20 albums, and pick the tracks at random, by rating, or newest or oldest first.

  • A fresh random mix

    One click recalculates a random playlist when you've heard this selection enough.

  • Hand-picked playlists

    Add tracks from any list, drag them into order, and use the same track twice if it's that good.

  • M3U import and export

    Take playlists to another computer or another player, and bring old ones in.

Tags and covers

Complete albums, with pictures

  • Missing tags and covers from MusicBrainz

    LocalSound looks them up on MusicBrainz and the Cover Art Archive. When several releases match, you pick the right one.

  • Load all missing covers

    Fetches covers for every album without one, in the background while you listen. It tells you first how long it'll take.

  • Covers as you listen

    Play a track from an album without a cover, and LocalSound quietly fetches one in the background. Switch that off in the settings if you like your albums plain.

  • Edit many tracks at once

    Select a whole album and set the year once. Fields that differ stay as they are.

  • Star ratings

    Rate tracks with stars, then filter, sort and build playlists by rating.

  • Suggestions while you type

    When you edit tags, the artist, album and genre fields suggest what's already in your library, so "Beatles" and "The Beatles" don't both end up there.

  • Your own pictures

    Pick a local image as the cover of one track or of a whole album folder, and view any cover full size.

Internet radio

Stations from around the world

  • Station directory

    Search the open Radio Browser directory by name, and see each station's country, language, genre, quality and votes.

  • My stations

    Keep your favorites in your own list, and add any station by its stream address.

  • Search the song on YouTube

    The player shows what's on air, and one click looks it up on YouTube.

  • Station websites

    The station's own website is one click away, for the playlist or the morning show.

CDs and drives

The CD shelf, digitized

  • Rip CDs to MP3 or FLAC

    Pick the format and the quality, and the tracks land in your library folder, named by your save pattern.

  • Tags and cover while ripping

    LocalSound recognizes the disc on MusicBrainz and fills in album, artists, titles, year and cover, also for disc 2 of 3.

  • Rip only what you want

    One track, a few or the whole disc, with progress per track and a Stop button. Tracks you already ripped are skipped, unless you want them again.

  • Play audio CDs

    Straight from the drive, without ripping first.

  • Computer

    Browse disks, USB sticks, network shares and your Downloads folder, and play any file right where it is.

  • Add a folder with one click

    Found music under Computer? Add that folder to the library from there.

  • Export to a USB stick

    The whole library or the playlists you pick, filed by your path pattern, with playlist files and covers. Only new files are copied, unless you want them all again.

  • MP3 on the fly

    Convert while exporting, at the bitrate you choose. Files that are already small enough are copied as they are.

  • A stick that stays in sync

    Remove from the stick what you no longer picked, after a question with the count. The free space is checked first, and every stick keeps its own settings.

  • Import from a USB stick

    Music from a stick lands in your library folder, filed by your path pattern, covers included. Files that are already there are skipped.

  • Eject

    CDs and USB sticks come out from inside LocalSound.

Looks and languages

Four themes, four languages

  • Dark, Light, Eighties and OS

    Eighties has an LCD-style display, OS uses the plain look of your system.

  • Follows your system

    Dark and Light switch along with your system's dark mode.

  • Your layout

    Put the main navigation on the left or at the top, and the player at the top or the bottom.

  • English, German, French and Italian

    Pick the language in the settings. Everything else follows, from the menus to the messages.

  • Dates and numbers your way

    By default your language meets your system's region, so the same date reads 27.10.2026 in Switzerland and 10/27/2026 in the US. Or pick another regional format in the settings.

  • Your own themes and languages

    Drop a theme folder or a language file next to the app, and LocalSound offers it at the next start. Here's how

  • Browser access for theme builders

    Opens LocalSound in any browser on the same computer, developer tools included.

Windows and Linux

At home on your computer

  • The same app on Windows and Linux

    Same features, same look, same library file format. Switch systems and take your library along.

  • Your default player

    One command in the settings makes LocalSound the player for your music files and audio CDs. On Windows it opens Default apps, because Windows wants you to pick yourself.

  • Double-click to play

    Open a music file from your file manager and it plays in the LocalSound window that's already open. No second copy.

  • Menus like on Windows

    Click a menu to open it and hover to the next one, or work through it with the arrow keys and first letters.

  • Updates

    LocalSound checks for new versions, unless you switch that off. Windows installs them on a restart, Linux with the system updates.

  • News, if you want it

    About once a month LocalSound asks this website for news and shows it at the start. Switch news off in the settings, and only a heads-up about a problem you should know of still gets through.

  • Help close at hand

    The Help menu leads to support and feature requests, opens the folder with the log files for a bug report, and tells you the version in About.

  • Free, no account

    No sign-up, no cloud. LocalSound only goes online for radio, tag and cover lookups, the update check and, about once a month, news. Details