If there's one video player to rule them all, it's the VLC media player with its familiar traffic cone icon, and the media player is back with a massive update.

The new version of the media player, VLC 3.0, will be available on all platforms at the same time: Windows, macOS, Android, iOS, Linux and even Apple TV and Android TV.

Codenamed Vetinari (after the Discworld character), VLC 3.0 has been in development since June 2016. It features 1,500 bug fixes and uses the same code for all of its platforms. VLC has established itself as a fuss-free media player that can play anything, and the update promises the same experience alongside new features.

The big one is Google Chromecast support, a feature that's been often requested by users and was supposed to be released back in 2015. VLC's Chromecast will also let you cast formats that aren't normally supported, such as DVDs, by re-encoding the stream on the fly, though subtitle support without re-encoding is not yet supported, but is in the works.

Besides Chromecast, VLC has plenty of new stuff such as the ability to browse network drives and support for HDR video, though this is limited to Windows 10 for now, until the other operating systems add support for it. Other enhancements include 360 video with 3D audio, support for newer video formats and codecs such as WebVTT, TTML, HQX and 8K video playback.

Check out the full list of improvements and download VLC 3.0 for your desktop here. For mobile users, head to your respective app store for the update.

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