The simplest thing to do is to use the tsMuxerGUI. A screenshot of that can be seen below:
The tsMuxerGUI displays an auto-generated meta file in the "Meta file" section. This preview shows the exact content that will be used when you start muxing.
You can now manually edit this meta file directly in the GUI to use advanced options not available through the visual interface. This is useful when you need to:
- Combine options that the GUI doesn't provide
- Apply specialized parameters for particular encoding scenarios
- Test different muxing configurations without creating separate project files
How to edit:
- Click in the "Meta file" text area to position your cursor
- Edit the meta file content directly (add/remove/modify lines)
- The GUI will remember your changes and use the edited version when you click "Start muxing"
Reverting changes:
- If you've manually edited the meta file and want to go back to the auto-generated version, click the "Reset meta to auto-generated" button
- This will discard your manual edits and regenerate the meta file based on current GUI settings
Saving edited meta files:
- Use the "Save meta file" button to save your edited meta file as a
.metaproject file - This allows you to reuse complex configurations later
- When you load the saved
.metafile from the command line, it will use your custom settings
Note: Once you manually edit the meta file, subsequent GUI changes will no longer automatically update it. You can reset it at any time using the "Reset meta to auto-generated" button, or make additional manual edits as needed.
When working with Dolby TrueHD and AC-3 tracks in Matroska files, the GUI provides options to automatically merge them into a Blu-ray compatible format.
GUI usage:
Select the TRUE-HD track, then set:
track=to the TrueHD Matroska track number- Merge AC-3 track to the AC-3 Matroska track number (when the AC-3 exists as a track in the MKV), or
- Merge AC-3 file to a standalone
.ac3file (when the MKV does not contain an AC-3 track)
The GUI will emit either merge-ac3-track=<n> or merge-ac3-file="path" into the meta preview.
If the MKV has no AC-3 track:
Create an AC-3 compatibility stream from the TrueHD audio with FFmpeg (choose the correct audio index for 0:a:N):
ffmpeg -i input.mkv -map 0:a:0 -c:a ac3 -b:a 640k -ac 6 compat.ac3
Then either:
- use Merge AC-3 file /
merge-ac3-file="compat.ac3"directly, or - remux
compat.ac3back into the MKV as a separate audio track (e.g. withmkvmerge) and use Merge AC-3 track /merge-ac3-trackwith the new AC-3 track number.
Alternatively you can use tsMuxer via the command-line.
Examples:
tsMuxeR <media file name>
tsMuxeR <meta file name> <out file/dir name>
tsMuxeR can be run in track detection mode or muxing mode. If tsMuxeR is run with only one argument, then the program displays track information required to construct a meta file. When running with two arguments, tsMuxeR starts the muxing or demuxing process.
Supported output formats:
- TS - MPEG Transport Stream
- M2TS - Blu-ray MPEG-2 Transport Stream
- MKV/MKA - Matroska Video/Audio container
- ISO - Blu-ray disc image
- Blu-ray folder structure - BDMV directory layout
The output format is determined by the file extension of the output file name (e.g. .ts, .m2ts, .mkv, .mka, .iso).
The output of the program is encoded in UTF-8, which means that non-ASCII characters will not show up properly in the Windows console by default. If you want to see the output properly, run chcp 65001 before running tsMuxeR.
File MUST have the .meta extension. This file defines files you want to multiplex. The first line of a meta file contains additional parameters that apply to all tracks. In this case the first line should begin with the word MUXOPT.
The file should be encoded with UTF-8. However, since older versions of the GUI saved the file in the "active code page" encoding on Windows, it is used as a fallback on this platform. In the very rare event of the program not being able to open some files referenced by a meta file saved with an older GUI version, please convert it to UTF-8 manually by opening it in Notepad and selecting ANSI as the encoding, and then saving it via "Save As", but this time selecting UTF-8 as the encoding.
The following lines form a list of tracks and their parameters. The format is as follows: <code name>, <file name>, <parameters>. Parameters are separated with commas, with each parameter consisting of a name and a value, separated with an equals sign.
Example of META file:
MUXOPT --blu-ray
V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC, D:/media/test/stream.h264, fps=25
A_AC3, D:/media/test/stream.ac3, timeshift=-10000ms
In this example one AC3 audio stream and one H264 video stream are multiplexed into BD disc. The input file name can reference an elementary stream or a track located inside a container.
Example of META file for MKV output:
MUXOPT --vbr
V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC, D:/media/test/stream.h264, fps=25
A_AC3, D:/media/test/stream.ac3, timeshift=-10000ms
When the output file has an .mkv or .mka extension, tsMuxeR automatically uses the Matroska muxer. Most MUXOPT parameters related to TS/Blu-ray (such as --blu-ray, --new-audio-pes, --pcr-on-video-pid) are not applicable to MKV output and will be ignored.
Supported input containers:
- TS/M2TS/MTS
- EVO/VOB/MPG/MPEG
- MKV
- MOV/MP4
- MPLS (Blu-ray media play list file)
Names of codecs in the meta file:
| Meta File Code | Description |
|---|---|
| V_MPEGI/ISO/VVC | H.266/VVC |
| V_MPEGH/ISO/HEVC | H.265/HEVC |
| V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC | H.264/AVC |
| V_MPEG4/ISO/MVC | H.264/MVC |
| V_MS/VFW/WVC1 | VC1 |
| V_MPEG-2 | MPEG2 |
| V_AV1 | AV1 |
| A_AC3 | AC3/AC3+/TRUE-HD |
| A_AAC | AAC |
| A_DTS | DTS/DTS-Express/DTS-HD |
| A_MP3 | MPEG audio layer 1/2/3 |
| A_LPCM | raw pcm data or PCM WAV file |
| A_FLAC | FLAC (MKV and demux output only) |
| A_OPUS | Opus (TS, MKV, and demux output only) |
| S_HDMV/PGS | Presentation graphic stream (BD subtitle format) |
| S_TEXT/UTF8 | SRT subtitle format. Encoding MUST be UTF-8/UTF-16/UTF-32 |
Each track may have additional parameters. Track parameters do not have dashes. If a parameter's value consists of several words, it must be enclosed in quotes.
Common additional parameters for any type of track:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| track | track number if input file is a container. |
| lang | track language. MUST contain exactly 3 letters. |
Additional parameters for audio tracks:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| timeshift | Shift audio track by the given number of milliseconds. Can be negative. |
| down-to-dts | Available only for DTS-HD tracks. Filter out HD part. |
| down-to-ac3 | Available only for TRUE-HD tracks. Filter out HD part. |
| secondary | Mux as secondary audio. Available for DD+ and DTS-Express. |
| default | Mark this track as the default when muxing to Blu-ray. |
| stretch | Stretch audio by a given factor. Can be a decimal value or a fraction (e.g. 25/24). Useful for fixing A/V sync issues caused by frame rate discrepancies. |
| merge-ac3-track | MKV only, A_MLP only. Matroska track number of a classic AC-3 stream to interleave with this TrueHD track for Blu-ray-style muxing. Requires track=<TrueHD track number>. Do not add the AC-3 track as a separate meta line. |
| merge-ac3-file | A_MLP only. Path to an external classic AC-3 (.ac3) file to interleave with a standalone TrueHD (.thd) stream for Blu-ray-style muxing. |
Some remuxed Blu-ray MKVs store Dolby TrueHD and the AC-3 compatibility track as separate tracks. For Blu-ray output, tsMuxer can merge them into the Blu-ray style interleaved TrueHD+AC-3 stream during muxing.
- Note: You can merge either:
- an AC-3 Matroska track from the same MKV (
merge-ac3-track), or - an external AC-3 file (
merge-ac3-file).
- an AC-3 Matroska track from the same MKV (
MUXOPT --blu-ray
V_MPEG4/ISO/AVC, "movie.mkv", track=1
A_MLP, "movie.mkv", track=2, merge-ac3-track=3
If you have standalone TrueHD and AC-3 files, you can merge them directly:
MUXOPT --blu-ray
A_MLP, "audio.thd", merge-ac3-file="compat.ac3"
Additional parameters for video tracks:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| fps | The number of frames per second. If not defined, the value is auto detected from the source stream or the container metadata (e.g. MKV default_duration, MP4 timescale). If neither source is available, the GUI defaults to 23.976 and the CLI defaults to 25. |
| delPulldown | Remove pulldown from the track, if it exists. If the pulldown is present, the FPS value is changed from 30 to 24. |
| ar | Override video aspect ratio. 16:9, 4:3 e.t.c. |
Additional parameters for H.264 video tracks:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| level | Overwrite the level in the H264 stream. Do note that this option only updates the headers and does not reencode the stream, which may not meet the requirements for a lower level. |
| insertSEI | If the original stream does not contain SEI picture timing, SEI buffering period or VUI parameters, add this data to the stream. This option is recommended for BD muxing. |
| forceSEI | Add SEI picture timing, buffering period and VUI parameters to the stream and rebuild this data if it already exists. |
| contSPS | If the original video doesn't contain repetitive SPS/PPS, then SPS/PPS will be added to the stream before each key frame. This option is recommended for BD muxing. |
| subTrack | Used for combined AVC/MVC tracks only. TsMuxeR always demultiplexes such tracks to separate AVC and MVC streams. Setting this to 1 sets the reference to the AVC part, while 2 sets it to the MVC part. |
| secondary | Mux as secondary video (PIP). |
| pipCorner | Corner for PIP video. Allowed values: "TopLeft","TopRight", "BottomRight", "BottomLeft". |
| pipHOffset | PIP window horizontal offset from the corner in pixels. |
| pipVOffset | PIP window vertical offset from the corner in pixels. |
| pipScale | PIP window scale factor. Allowed values: "1", "1/2", "1/4", "1.5", "fullScreen". |
| pipLumma | Allow the PIP window to be transparent. Transparent colors are lumma colors in range [0..pipLumma]. |
Additional parameters for PG and SRT tracks:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| video-width | The width of the video in pixels. |
| video-height | The height of the video in pixels. |
| default | Mark this track as the default when muxing to Blu-ray. Allowed values are all which causes all subtitles to be shown, and forced which shows only elements marked as "forced" in the subtitle stream. |
| fps | Video fps. It is recommended to define this parameter in order to enable more careful timing processing. |
| 3d-plane | Defines the number of the '3D offset track' which is placed inside the MVC track. Each message has an individual 3D offset. This information is stored inside 3D offset track. |
Additional parameters for SRT tracks:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| font-name | Font name to render. |
| font-color | Font color, defined as a hexadecimal or decimal number. 24-bit long numbers (for instance 0xFF00FF) define RGB components, while 32-bit long ones (for instance 0x80FF00FF) define ARGB components. |
| font-size | Font size in pixels. |
| font-italic | Italic display text. |
| font-bold | Bold display text. |
| font-underline | Underlined text. |
| font-strike-out | Strikethrough text. |
| font-charset | Font character set (numeric). Allows selection of a specific character set for font rendering. |
| bottom-offset | Distance from the lower edge while displaying text. |
| font-border | Outline width. |
| fadein-time | Time in ms for smooth subtitle appearance. |
| fadeout-time | Time in ms for smooth subtitle disappearance. |
| line-spacing | Interval between subtitle lines. Default value is 1.0. |
Currently tsMuxer only supports fonts in TTF format. It also will only load fonts from /usr/share/fonts/ on Linux and /Library/Fonts/ on Mac. As such our recommendation is to use font "FreeSans" on Linux and "OpenSans" on Mac.
tsMuxeR supports additional tags inside SRT tracks. The syntax and parameters coincide with HTML: <b>, <i>, <u>, <strike>, <font>. Default relative font size (used in these tags) is 3. For example:
<b><font size=5 color="deepskyblue" name="Arial"><u>Test</u>
<font size= 4 color="#806040">colored</font>text</font>
</b>
Global additional parameters are placed in the first line of the META file, which must begin with the MUXOPT token. All parameters in this group start with two dashes:
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| --no-pcr-on-video-pid | Allocate a separate PID for PCR and do not use the existing video PID. |
| --new-audio-pes | Use bytes 0xfd instead of 0xbd for AC3, True-HD, DTS and DTS-HD. Activated automatically for BD muxing. |
| --no-hdmv-descriptors | Use ITU-T H.222.0 / ISO/IEC 13818-1 descriptors instead of HDMV descriptors. Not activated for BD or AVCHD muxing. |
| --vbr | Use variable bitrate. This is the default mode. |
| --minbitrate | Sets the lower limit of the VBR bitrate. If the stream has a smaller bitrate, NULL packets will be inserted to compensate. |
| --maxbitrate | The upper limit of the vbr bitrate. |
| --cbr | Muxing mode with a fixed bitrate. --vbr and --cbr must not be used together. |
| --bitrate | Set a fixed bitrate in Mbps (e.g. --bitrate=35). This sets both the minimum and maximum bitrate to the same value, enabling CBR mode. |
| --vbv-len | The length of the virtual buffer in milliseconds. The default value is 500. Typically, this option is used together with --cbr. The parameter is similar to the value of vbv-buffer-size in the x264 codec, but defined in milliseconds instead of kbit. |
| --no-asyncio | Do not create a separate thread for writing. This option also disables the FILE_FLAG_NO_BUFFERING flag on Windows when writing. This option is deprecated. |
| --auto-chapters | Insert a chapter every minutes. Used only in BD/AVCHD mode. |
| --custom-chapters | A semicolon delimited list of hh:mm:ss.zzz strings, representing the chapters' start times. |
| --demux | Run in demux mode : the selected audio and video tracks are stored as separate files. The output name must be a folder name. All selected effects (such as changing the level of a H264 stream) are processed. When demuxing, certain types of tracks are always changed : - Subtitles in a Presentation Graphic Stream are converted into sup format. - PCM audio is saved as WAV files. |
| --blu-ray | Mux as a BD disc. If the output file name is a folder, a Blu-Ray folder structure is created inside that folder. SSIF files for BD3D discs are not created in this case. If the output name has an .iso extension, then the disc is created directly as an image file. |
| --blu-ray-v3 | As above - except mux to UHD BD discs. If you're using the GUI, this will be automatically set if one of the streams is HEVC. |
| --avchd | Mux to AVCHD disc. |
| --cut-start | Trim the beginning of the file. The value should be followed by the time unit : "ms" (milliseconds), "s" (seconds) or "min" (minutes). |
| --cut-end | Trim the end of the file. Same rules as --cut-start apply. |
| --split-duration | Split the output into several files, with each of them being seconds long. |
| --split-size | Split the output into several files, with each of them having a given maximum size. KB, KiB, MB, MiB, GB and GiB are accepted as size units. |
| --right-eye | Use base video stream for right eye. Used for 3DBD only. |
| --start-time | Timestamp of the first video frame. May be defined as 45Khz clock (just a number) or as time in hh:mm:ss.zzz format |
| --mplsOffset | The number of the first MPLS file. Used for BD disc mode. |
| --m2tsOffset | The number of the first M2TS file. Used for BD disc mode. |
| --insertBlankPL | Add an additional short playlist. Used for cropped video muxed to BD disc. |
| --blankOffset | Blank playlist number. |
| --label | Disk label when muxing to ISO. |
| --extra-iso-space | Allocate extra space in 64K units for ISO metadata (file and directory names). Normally, tsMuxeR allocates this space automatically, but if split condition generates a lot of small files, it may be required to define extra space. |
| --constant-iso-hdr | Generates an ISO header that does not depend on the program version or the current time. Normally, the ISO header's "application ID", "implementation ID", and "volume ID" fields are set to strings containing the program version and/or a random number, while the access/modification/creation times of the files in the image are set to the current time. This option disables this behaviour by filling these fields with hardcoded values and setting the file times to the equivalent of Wed 1 Jul 20:00:00 UTC 2020 in the local timezone. Using this option is not recommended for normal usage, as it is meant only for testing ISO output validity. |