Player tools

The Bitmovin MCP server turns any MCP-compatible chat client — Claude, ChatGPT, and others — into a place where you can play back a video stream inline. You paste a URL, the assistant calls the player tool, and a real Bitmovin Player appears embedded in the conversation.

This is powered by the MCP Apps / MCP UI extension to MCP: the server exposes a UI component that the client renders in a sandboxed frame.

These are the player_* tools on mcp.bitmovin.com. To connect, see AI at Bitmovin.

Playing a public stream doesn't depend on what your Bitmovin account has access to.

Tools

Tool	What it does
`player_render_stream`	Renders a Bitmovin Player inline in the conversation. Accepts the stream URL and, optionally, a full Bitmovin Player `PlayerConfig` and `SourceConfig` (DRM, subtitles, advertising, poster image, and so on).

Supported formats

HLS (.m3u8)
DASH (.mpd)
Smooth Streaming (.ism)
Progressive (MP4, WebM)

Supported features via config

Widevine / PlayReady / FairPlay DRM
Subtitle tracks (WebVTT)
Thumbnail tracks
Poster images
VAST/VMAP advertising
Autoplay, muted start, playback-rate presets

Example prompts

"Play https://bitmovin-a.akamaihd.net/content/sintel/hls/playlist.m3u8 with autoplay and mute."
"Play https://your-stream.mpd and enable Widevine with license URL https://license.example.com/widevine."
"Play this MP4 and start it muted."
"Play this VOD and set a VAST ad tag: https://example.com/vast.xml."

Once the player is on screen, use its own controls to play, pause, seek, and adjust volume.

Notes

The player is rendered in a sandboxed frame inside the chat client. Two network paths are supported: a direct CDN fetch where the host environment permits it, and an MCP-proxied fetch otherwise, so playback works without requiring the host to reach your CDN. The faster direct path is used where possible.
Player tools are stateless — they do not log or retain your stream URLs or configurations beyond the scope of a single request.