Ez FFmpeg
Dev tools
ffmpeg wrapper cli
SHOW HN2025
How HN took it
12 positive, 20 neutral or asking, 1 mixed, 28 critical, out of 61 comments about the project. Thread score -0.16.
Idea: 11 for, 14 againstExecution: 0 for, 7 againstDocs: 0 for, 3 againstDesign: 0 for, 3 againstPrivacy: 0 for, 1 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Useful for people who repeatedly look up ffmpeg syntax
From 2 comments
This looks handy.. along with the odd gist of "convert mkv to mp4" that I have to use every other week. Quite telling that these tools need to exist to make ffmpeg actually…
alexellisuk on HNSometimes an idea comes along thats so obvious it makes me angry. I have been struggling with ffmpeg commands for over well a decade. All the time I wasted googling and creating…
bdbdbdb on HN
Non-LLM approach appeals to some users
From 2 comments
interesting approach, i solved similar problem by creating visual tool to generate ffmpeg commands but its not the same(it cant do conversion etc.) I like that you took no AI…
pdyc on HNThis is extremely sexy and represents a great trade off where the ergonomics can be improved without sacrificing the incredible investments in a high performance library.
anymouse123456 on HN
Objections
Hides ffmpeg complexity, so default re-encoding loses quality where a remux would do
From 2 comments
Days since last ffmpeg CLI wrapper: 0 It's incredible what lengths people go to to avoid memorizing basic ffmpeg usage. It's really not that hard, and the (F.) manual explains…
qbow883 on HN> Some people just want to use a tool to do a job swiftly. Not everything has to be educational. > some folks want to use lossless cut In that case I would encourage you to…
hnarn on HN
Node.js dependency is a poor fit for a CLI tool
From 2 comments
I like the idea, but a CLI utility dependent on Node.js is not a good idea frankly.
broken-kebab on HNThis is very nice. When I use ffmpeg recently I usually ask an LLM first but it often takes a few tries to get the exact incantation right. On a side note (I’m not a web…
nextstep on HN
GitHub repo link is broken
From 3 comments
Can't access the githup repo https://github.com/josharsh/ezff
vithalreddy on HNGitHub repo link returns 404.
Kwpolska on HNWhere's the public Git repository for this project? The GitHub link on the NPM page seems broken to me.
amcsi on HN
Ambiguous phrasing such as 'trim from' and 'slow down by 2x'
From 2 comments
Small English nitpick: > ff slow down video.mp4 by 2x How do you slow something down by 2x? x is a multiplier. 2 is a number greater than 1. Multiplying by a number greater than…
naikrovek on HNSometimes English is not swell as a specification format. > ff trim video.mp4 from 0:30 to 1:00 Does this mean I keep the indicated section or does it mean I throw it away? And…
imglorp on HN
Requests
Public working repository link
From 2 comments
Can't access the githup repo https://github.com/josharsh/ezff
vithalreddy on HNWhere's the public Git repository for this project? The GitHub link on the NPM page seems broken to me.
amcsi on HN
Tab completion
From 1 comment
Very cool idea since ffmpeg is one of those tools that has a few common tasks but most users would need to look up the syntax every time to implement them (or make an alias). In…
mmahemoff on HN
Standalone binary without Node.js
From 1 comment
Love the simplification of ffmpeg flags. I noticed some comments about Node.js dependencies. Are there plans to make this a standalone binary for faster server-side processing?
GajendraSahu23 on HN
Questions
Whether the 90% coverage claim is accurate
From 1 comment
> it handles 20 common patterns ... that cover 90% Could you elaborate on this? I see a lot of AI-use and I'm wondering if this is claude speaking or you
ramon156 on HN
Whether the README was written by an LLM or the code was vibecoded
From 2 comments
> it handles 20 common patterns ... that cover 90% Could you elaborate on this? I see a lot of AI-use and I'm wondering if this is claude speaking or you
ramon156 on HNThat's beautiful! I see a .claude folder in your code, I am curious if you've "vibecoded" the whole project or just had claude there for some tasks! not that it matters or takes…
ramigb on HN
Alternatives named
LLM CLI tools and coding agents for generating ffmpeg commands
From 3 comments
I have a little script that I use on the CLI to do this kind of stuff (calls an LLM to figure out how to do CLI stuff) but you can just as easily now use any of the coding agents.
spullara on HNI actually just use Claude code. “Stabilize the video x.mp4 and keep my daughter Astra as the subject. Convert it to a GIF that is under a megabyte”. It does a great job. It will…
arjie on HNis this better than just ask any llm cli tool (warp, codex, gemini, claude code, etc.) to generate ffmpeg command for you?
johanyc on HN
LosslessCut GUI
From 1 comment
As the other person said (and this is my mistake for not capitalizing), Lossless Cut is a popular CLI wrapper for ffmpeg with a (somewhat) intuitive interface. Someone is going…
Forgeties79 on HN
wtffmpeg, llmpeg, ai-ffmpeg-cli
From 1 comment