Player events

Changes to the Player's state (such as playback starting, buffering, or errors) trigger events that are sent to registered Player.Listener instances. These events are represented by integer constants and are defined by Player.Event and Player.Events.

Register a Player.Listener

Player events are reported to registered Player.Listener instances. To register a listener to receive such events:

Kotlin

// Add a listener to receive events from the player.
player.addListener(listener)

Java

// Add a listener to receive events from the player.
player.addListener(listener);

If you are using Kotlin, you can also use the suspending extension functions provided by the media3-common-ktx module to listen to events using coroutines. In that case, you won't need to register or unregister a Player.Listener explicitly.

Listen to playback events using Player.Listener

Player.Listener has empty default methods, so you only need to implement the methods you're interested in. See the Javadoc for a full description of the methods and when they're called. Some of the most important methods are described in more detail below.

Listeners have the choice between implementing individual event callbacks or a generic onEvents callback that's called after one or more events occur together. See Individual callbacks vs onEvents for an explanation of which should be preferred for different use cases.

Playback state changes

Changes in player state can be received by implementing onPlaybackStateChanged(@State int state) in a registered Player.Listener. The player can be in one of four playback states:

  • Player.STATE_IDLE: This is the initial state, the state when the player is stopped, and when playback failed. The player will hold only limited resources in this state.
  • Player.STATE_BUFFERING: The player is not able to immediately play from its current position. This mostly happens because more data needs to be loaded.
  • Player.STATE_READY: The player is able to immediately play from its current position.
  • Player.STATE_ENDED: The player finished playing all media.

In addition to these states, the player has a playWhenReady flag to indicate the user intention to play. Changes in this flag can be received by implementing onPlayWhenReadyChanged(playWhenReady, @PlayWhenReadyChangeReason int reason).

A player is playing (that is, its position is advancing and media is being presented to the user) when all three of the following conditions are met:

  • The player is in the Player.STATE_READY state
  • playWhenReady is true
  • Playback is not suppressed for a reason returned by Player.getPlaybackSuppressionReason

Rather than having to check these properties individually, Player.isPlaying can be called. Changes to this state can be received by implementing onIsPlayingChanged(boolean isPlaying):

Kotlin

player.addListener(
  object : Player.Listener {
    override fun onIsPlayingChanged(isPlaying: Boolean) {
      if (isPlaying) {
        // Active playback.
      } else {
        // Not playing because playback is paused, ended, suppressed, or the player
        // is buffering, stopped or failed. Check player.playWhenReady,
        // player.playbackState, player.playbackSuppressionReason and
        // player.playerError for details.
      }
    }
  }
)

Java

player.addListener(
    new Player.Listener() {
      @Override
      public void onIsPlayingChanged(boolean isPlaying) {
        if (isPlaying) {
          // Active playback.
        } else {
          // Not playing because playback is paused, ended, suppressed, or the player
          // is buffering, stopped or failed. Check player.getPlayWhenReady,
          // player.getPlaybackState, player.getPlaybackSuppressionReason and
          // player.getPlaybackError for details.
        }
      }
    });

Playback errors

Errors that cause playback to fail can be received by implementing onPlayerError(PlaybackException error) in a registered Player.Listener. When a failure occurs, this method will be called immediately before the playback state transitions to Player.STATE_IDLE. Failed or stopped playbacks can be retried by calling ExoPlayer.prepare.

Note that some Player implementations pass instances of subclasses of PlaybackException to provide additional information about the failure. For example, ExoPlayer passes ExoPlaybackException, which has type, rendererIndex, and other ExoPlayer-specific fields.

The following example shows how to detect when a playback has failed due to an HTTP networking issue:

Kotlin

player.addListener(
  object : Player.Listener {
    override fun onPlayerError(error: PlaybackException) {
      val cause = error.cause
      if (cause is HttpDataSourceException) {
        // An HTTP error occurred.
        val httpError = cause
        // It's possible to find out more about the error both by casting and by querying
        // the cause.
        if (httpError is InvalidResponseCodeException) {
          // Cast to InvalidResponseCodeException and retrieve the response code, message
          // and headers.
        } else {
          // Try calling httpError.getCause() to retrieve the underlying cause, although
          // note that it may be null.
        }
      }
    }
  }
)

Java

player.addListener(
    new Player.Listener() {
      @Override
      public void onPlayerError(PlaybackException error) {
        @Nullable Throwable cause = error.getCause();
        if (cause instanceof HttpDataSourceException) {
          // An HTTP error occurred.
          HttpDataSourceException httpError = (HttpDataSourceException) cause;
          // It's possible to find out more about the error both by casting and by querying
          // the cause.
          if (httpError instanceof HttpDataSource.InvalidResponseCodeException) {
            // Cast to InvalidResponseCodeException and retrieve the response code, message
            // and headers.
          } else {
            // Try calling httpError.getCause() to retrieve the underlying cause, although
            // note that it may be null.
          }
        }
      }
    });

Playlist transitions

Whenever the player changes to a new media item in the playlist onMediaItemTransition(MediaItem mediaItem, @MediaItemTransitionReason int reason) is called on registered Player.Listener objects. The reason indicates whether this was an automatic transition, a seek (for example after calling player.next()), a repetition of the same item, or caused by a playlist change (for example, if the currently playing item is removed).

Metadata

Metadata returned from player.getCurrentMediaMetadata() can change due to many reasons: playlist transitions, in-stream metadata updates or updating the current MediaItem mid-playback.

If you are interested in metadata changes, for example to update a UI that shows the current title, you can listen to onMediaMetadataChanged.

Seeking

Calling Player.seekTo methods results in a series of callbacks to registered Player.Listener instances:

  1. onPositionDiscontinuity with reason=DISCONTINUITY_REASON_SEEK. This is the direct result of calling Player.seekTo. The callback has PositionInfo fields for the position before and after the seek.
  2. onPlaybackStateChanged with any immediate state change related to the seek. Note that there might not be such a change.

Individual callbacks versus onEvents

Listeners can choose between implementing individual callbacks like onIsPlayingChanged(boolean isPlaying), and the generic onEvents(Player player, Events events) callback. The generic callback provides access to the Player object and specifies the set of events that occurred together. This callback is always called after the callbacks that correspond to the individual events.

Kotlin

override fun onEvents(player: Player, events: Player.Events) {
  if (
    events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED) ||
      events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAY_WHEN_READY_CHANGED)
  ) {
    uiModule.updateUi(player)
  }
}

Java

@Override
public void onEvents(Player player, Events events) {
  if (events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED)
      || events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAY_WHEN_READY_CHANGED)) {
    uiModule.updateUi(player);
  }
}

Individual events should be preferred in the following cases:

  • The listener is interested in the reasons for changes. For example, the reasons provided for onPlayWhenReadyChanged or onMediaItemTransition.
  • The listener only acts on the new values provided through callback parameters or triggers something else that doesn't depend on the callback parameters.
  • The listener implementation prefers a clear readable indication of what triggered the event in the method name.
  • The listener reports to an analytics system that needs to know about all individual events and state changes.

The generic onEvents(Player player, Events events) should be preferred in the following cases:

  • The listener wants to trigger the same logic for multiple events. For example, updating a UI for both onPlaybackStateChanged and onPlayWhenReadyChanged.
  • The listener needs access the Player object to trigger further events, for example seeking after a media item transition.
  • The listener intends to use multiple state values that are reported through separate callbacks together, or in combination with Player getter methods. For example, using Player.getCurrentWindowIndex() with the Timeline provided in onTimelineChanged is only safe from within the onEvents callback.
  • The listener is interested in whether events logically occurred together. For example, onPlaybackStateChanged to STATE_BUFFERING because of a media item transition.

In some cases, listeners may need to combine the individual callbacks with the generic onEvents callback, for example to record media item change reasons with onMediaItemTransition, but only act once all state changes can be used together in onEvents.

Listen to playback events using coroutines

Alternatively, you can launch a Kotlin coroutine using Player.listenTo and specify the relevant Player.Event:

Note that Player.listen and Player.listenTo can be called from any thread, while the callback lambda is always invoked on the thread associated with Player.getApplicationLooper. Therefore, it is safe to access Player methods and state properties inside the callback lambda even if the coroutine was launched on a different thread.

Playback state changes

coroutineScope.launch {
  player.listenTo(Player.EVENT_IS_PLAYING_CHANGED) {
    // `Player` is a receiver scope for this trailing lambda
    if (isPlaying) {
      // Active playback.
    } else {
      // Not playing.
    }
  }
}

Playback errors

coroutineScope.launch {
  player.listenTo(Player.EVENT_PLAYER_ERROR) {
    val error = playerError ?: return@listenTo
    val cause = error.cause
    if (cause is HttpDataSourceException) {
      // An HTTP error occurred.
      if (cause is InvalidResponseCodeException) {
        // Retrieve the response code, message and headers
      } else {
        // Try calling cause.cause to retrieve the underlying cause
      }
    }
  }
}

Individual callbacks versus onEvents

When listening to player events inside a coroutine, you will always be providing the implementation for the onEvents callback, as opposed to an individual callback. You may choose between Player.listen and Player.listenTo, depending on which events should trigger an invocation of your lambda. But the functions are otherwise equivalent:

listen

coroutineScope.launch {
  player.listen { events ->
    // `Player` is a receiver scope for this trailing lambda
    if (events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED)) {
      // Access the player state directly from the receiver
      updateUi(playbackState)
    }

    if (events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYER_ERROR)) {
      // Access the error directly from the player
      handleError(playerError)
    }
  }
}

listenTo

coroutineScope.launch {
  player.listenTo(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED, Player.EVENT_PLAYER_ERROR) { events ->
    // `Player` is a receiver scope for this trailing lambda
    if (events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED)) {
      // Access the player state directly from the receiver
      updateUi(playbackState)
    }

    if (events.contains(Player.EVENT_PLAYER_ERROR)) {
      // Access the error directly from the player
      handleError(playerError)
    }
  }
}

If you are interested in multiple event types, you can pass a list of events to Player.listenTo. Your lambda will be invoked whenever any of those events occur, and you can inspect the Events parameter to check which events actually fired:

coroutineScope.launch {
  player.listenTo(Player.EVENT_PLAYBACK_STATE_CHANGED, Player.EVENT_PLAYER_ERROR) { events ->
    // Unclear which event got triggered without querying `events` parameter
    // The following function will fire whenever either one is caught
    updateUiAndHandleError(playbackState, playerError)
  }
}

Because these functions operate on onEvents, they don't provide access to the transient arguments passed to individual callbacks, such as the reason in onMediaItemTransition(..., int reason) or the oldPosition in onPositionDiscontinuity(...). If your logic relies on these specific arguments (and they are not available as state properties on the Player), you should use the standard Player.Listener interface instead.

Use AnalyticsListener

When using ExoPlayer, an AnalyticsListener can be registered with the player by calling addAnalyticsListener. AnalyticsListener implementations are able to listen to detailed events that may be useful for analytics and logging purposes. Please refer to the analytics page for more details.

Use EventLogger

EventLogger is an AnalyticsListener provided directly by the library for logging purposes. Add EventLogger to an ExoPlayer to enable useful additional logging with a single line:

Kotlin

player.addAnalyticsListener(EventLogger())

Java

player.addAnalyticsListener(new EventLogger());

See the debug logging page for more details.

Fire events at specified playback positions

Some use cases require firing events at specified playback positions. This is supported using PlayerMessage. A PlayerMessage can be created using ExoPlayer.createMessage. The playback position at which it should be executed can be set using PlayerMessage.setPosition. Messages are executed on the playback thread by default, but this can be customized using PlayerMessage.setLooper. PlayerMessage.setDeleteAfterDelivery can be used to control whether the message will be executed every time the specified playback position is encountered (this may happen multiple times due to seeking and repeat modes), or just the first time. Once the PlayerMessage is configured, it can be scheduled using PlayerMessage.send.

Kotlin

player
  .createMessage { messageType: Int, payload: Any? -> }
  .setLooper(Looper.getMainLooper())
  .setPosition(/* mediaItemIndex= */ 0, /* positionMs= */ 120000)
  .setPayload(customPayloadData)
  .setDeleteAfterDelivery(false)
  .send()

Java

player
    .createMessage(
        (messageType, payload) -> {
          // Do something at the specified playback position.
        })
    .setLooper(Looper.getMainLooper())
    .setPosition(/* mediaItemIndex= */ 0, /* positionMs= */ 120_000)
    .setPayload(customPayloadData)
    .setDeleteAfterDelivery(false)
    .send();