How to open .M3U files (playlists) on Android, Windows and Linux

You copied an old music collection to your phone and it came with Favourites.m3u. Or you have an .m3u8 from a live stream, a .cue next to a FLAC album, or a .url sent from a Windows PC. You tap it and nothing plays.

None of these files contain music or video: they’re lists of where the media is. Folders opens them as text on Android, Windows and Linux, so you can see what they point to and fix them, and a stream link from one can go straight into Folders’ video player.

What is an .m3u file?

An M3U file is a plain-text playlist: one entry per line, each a file path (Music/Album/01 Intro.mp3, or D:\Music\Album\01 Intro.mp3 on Windows) or a web address. The “extended” form starts with #EXTM3U and puts a line like #EXTINF:215,Artist - Title before each entry, giving its length in seconds and a name to show. The format goes back to the MP3 players of the 1990s, Winamp among them, and nearly every player still reads it.

M3U8 means two things. It’s an M3U playlist saved in UTF-8, so names in any language survive. And it’s the playlist format of HLS (HTTP Live Streaming), the streaming method Apple created and many live streams use. An HLS playlist lists short video segments (.ts or .m4s files) with lines such as #EXT-X-TARGETDURATION:6, and a “master” playlist lists the same stream at several qualities (#EXT-X-STREAM-INF:...,RESOLUTION=1280x720). A downloaded .m3u8 is not the video, only directions to it.

Extension	What it is	Where you meet it
.m3u	A playlist of paths or links	Music libraries, internet radio, IPTV channel lists
.m3u8	A UTF-8 M3U, or an HLS stream playlist	Live streams, video sites, newer music players
.pls	A playlist in INI style: [playlist], File1=, Title1=, Length1=, NumberOfEntries=	Internet radio stations
.cue	A cue sheet: the track list and start times for one long audio file or a CD image	Albums ripped as one FLAC, APE or WAV file plus a .cue; BIN/CUE disc images
.url	A Windows internet shortcut: [InternetShortcut] and a URL= line	Favourites and links dragged to a Windows desktop

In a cue sheet, each track has a line such as INDEX 01 03:41:62, which is minutes, seconds and frames, at 75 frames per second as on an audio CD.

How to open an .m3u file with Folders

On Android:

1. Install Folders from the download page and allow file access.
2. Find the playlist, or search for it by name.
3. Tap it. It opens in the text editor.
4. From another app, tap the file and choose Open with → Folders.

To play a stream from a playlist:

1. Copy the stream’s address from the file, the line starting with http (for HLS, usually ending in .m3u8).
2. Open Toolbox from the sidebar, then Video player, then Network stream.
3. Paste the address. The player takes http, HLS, RTSP and RTMP addresses.

On Windows and Linux:

1. Double-click the file in Folders.
2. On Windows, the installer adds Folders to File Explorer’s Open with menu for .m3u, .m3u8, .pls and .cue. Windows keeps .url files for itself and opens the link in your browser when you double-click one, so open a .url from inside Folders to read the address first.

What you can do with it in Folders

• See what a playlist contains: every path or link, plus durations and titles in extended M3U.
• Fix paths after moving your music. A playlist made on a PC may point to D:\Music\. Use Find and replace to change that part of every line to a path that exists on the new device, or to a relative path such as Music/, then Save.
• Repair a cue sheet. The most common fault is a FILE "Album.wav" WAVE line naming a file you’ve since converted or renamed, say to Album.flac. Correct the name and it works again; track titles and performers can be fixed the same way.
• Check a .url before opening it. The URL= line shows exactly where the shortcut leads. Copy it into your browser if it looks right.
• Document info shows the encoding. An .m3u with accented names in an old Windows encoding is often why titles look wrong in other players. Saving keeps the encoding, and Folders asks before switching a file to UTF-8.

Folders reads playlists as text. Its music player gathers all the audio on your device into one queue, but it doesn’t load .m3u, .pls or .cue files.

Other ways to open .m3u files

• VLC (free on Windows, Linux and Android) plays M3U, M3U8, PLS and CUE files and network streams.
• foobar2000 handles CUE-plus-FLAC albums well, as does Audacious on Linux.
• mpv plays playlists and streams from the command line.
• Any browser opens the address inside a .url file.

Problems opening an .m3u file?

• The playlist opens but nothing plays. The paths point to another computer’s drives, or the files were renamed or moved. Correct the paths in Folders.
• An .m3u8 stream won’t play. Many stream links expire (look for long tokens in the address), only work with the website’s own cookies, or are protected with DRM, which no ordinary player may unlock.
• A cue sheet shows no tracks. The audio file named on its FILE line isn’t there, or has a different name. Check the spelling, including the extension.
• An IPTV list stopped working. Many lists shared online point to streams that vanish quickly, or are shared without the broadcaster’s permission. Folders doesn’t supply channels; it only shows what a list contains.

Questions people ask

How do I open an M3U file on Android? Install Folders and tap the file to read or edit it. Paste a stream link from it into Network stream in Folders’ video player; for whole music playlists, use VLC.

What’s the difference between M3U and M3U8? The same format, but .m3u8 is always UTF-8, and it’s also the extension HLS streaming uses for its playlists.

How do I convert M3U to M3U8? Check Document info in Folders: if the encoding is already UTF-8, renaming the file to .m3u8 is enough. Otherwise, open the playlist in VLC and save it again as an M3U8 playlist.

What is a .cue file for? It splits one long audio file, a whole album ripped in one piece, into tracks, with titles and start times. Players that read cue sheets show the album as separate songs.

More on media: how to open MP3 files and how to open FLAC files, or see all 382 file types Folders opens.