Making VLC automatically reload the favorite playlist

I sometimes use VLC as an mp3 player and it would be nice if it did automatically load my default playlist when it starts. It is not apparent from the settings within VLC how to accomplish this, but some googling brought up an old blog post from 2007 that explained how to do it. Sort of. The information was outdated, but the remaining piece of the puzzle was provided in one of the comments.

This is how to make VLC automatically load a specific playlist:

  • Select the menu Tools->Settings.
  • Click to show all settings and not just the simple ones.
  • Click on playlist.
  • Fill out the path to the playlist in the field “Standard stream”: file:///C:/audio_files/playlist.m3u
  • Click Save.

Note that there shall be three slashes after file: and that the slashes shall be forward (/), not backward (\) as is usually the case in file paths on Windows.

 

13 thoughts on “Making VLC automatically reload the favorite playlist

  1. I wanna just say “thank you” too. It’s not obvious from the prefs and I’ve spent a while on other forums where people just argue about this topic but without a solution! Thanks!

  2. Now I can load my favorite streaming stations playlist when VLC starts. Thank you!

  3. Thanks. To think of it, its 2021 and yet people at VLC never thought of making this a bit easy.

  4. It is 07/01/23 and there is no longer a Settings option in the Tools menu. Does anyone know an alternative solution?

    1. Its Tools > Preferences
      And its also called “Default stream” in the playlist options.

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