What is MPD?
MPD (Music Player Daemon) is a server-client audio player long popular with Linux users. The headless daemon runs as a background service, typically on a remote audio server. Music is then accessed via a GUI client frontend, which connects to the MPD server to stream content.
Kind of like running your bespoke, curated music streaming service, in a sense.
this post was submitted on 26 Jul 2025
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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Thank you for including a description of what this about. We are too used to Linux that we forget about new users who might be overwhelmed by the ocean of possibilities.
You're welcome. I've been using Linux for 26 years and had never heard of (or at least didn't remember hearing of) MPD, so it's not just new users. We all feel a different part of the elephant.
Very cool, I haven't used MPD for 15 years, good to hear that it's alive and well!
Oooo, crossfade, nice. Not many music players have/support this, and it's an essential feature for me.
I've been wanting to get around to organizing my music and setup mpd, and this seems like a great way to practice. I'm still in a weird phase of using command-line tools and a window manager, but still relying on GUI applications like Dolphin (file manager).
i love mpd and will check this out
Fond memories of using mpd back in the day. I used sonata gtk frontend
This looks really neat!
This look great. I've always wanted to check out self hosting but it makes finding new things more difficult
I love mpd, I was a longtime ncmpcpp user, the only thing I didn't like was no synced lyrics, then I discovered rmpc and it's game over, totally customizable, fast and has all the features to compete even with gui clients
I’ll keep ncmpcpp, thanks. I haven’t used a gui music player in years. They seem so goofy now.