FFConverter

A simple video, audio, and image converter for Linux, Windows, and macOS, built with Python, Tk/CustomTkinter, and FFmpeg.

Features

• Video, audio, and image tabs with format-specific options
• Batch conversion with per-file progress and working cancellation
• High-quality Lanczos scaling for video and image resizing
• Does not register itself as the default handler for media files
• Drag and drop, native file dialogs, and “Open with” support
• Optional system tray icon
• No Python packages are installed with pip and no network access is required at install time

Requirements

Component	Version / package
Platform	Linux (x86_64 / ARM64), Windows 10/11 (x64), macOS 11+ (Intel / Apple Silicon)
Python	Linux: 3.8 or newer; Windows/macOS builds bundle Python
Tk bindings	Linux: python3-tk, python3-tkinter or tk; Windows/macOS: bundled
FFmpeg	Linux: 5.0 or newer; Windows/macOS builds include FFmpeg/FFprobe

FFConverter checks for FFmpeg at startup. Without it the GUI still opens, but conversion is disabled and a clear warning is shown.

Install

Portable archive (recommended)

The portable archive contains the Python GUI dependencies in vendor/, so it works on any distribution with Python 3 + Tk:

curl -LO https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-portable-x86_64.tar.xz
tar -xf FFConverter-portable-x86_64.tar.xz
cd FFConverter
./run.sh

For ARM64 (Raspberry Pi 4/5, ARM servers) use FFConverter-portable-arm64.tar.xz.

To add a menu entry, run ./install-desktop.sh from the extracted directory. The portable run.sh uses the bundled FFmpeg when the archive contains usr/bin/ffmpeg; otherwise it requires a system FFmpeg.

Windows 10/11 (64-bit)

FFmpeg is bundled, so no separate installation is required. Two variants are available:

Portable ZIP (recommended) — fast startup, contains FFConverter.exe, ffmpeg.exe, and ffprobe.exe:

Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-1.1.0-windows-x86_64.zip" -OutFile "FFConverter.zip"
Expand-Archive -Path "FFConverter.zip" -DestinationPath "."
.\FFConverter\FFConverter.exe

Single-file EXE — one file, FFmpeg included, but startup is slower because it is unpacked to a temporary directory on each run:

Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-1.1.0-windows-x86_64.exe" -OutFile "FFConverter.exe"
.\FFConverter.exe

The Windows builds are not code-signed. If SmartScreen shows “Windows protected your PC”, click More info → Run anyway after verifying the SHA256 checksum. Do not disable Microsoft Defender or your antivirus. If a scanner reports a false positive, open an issue instead of disabling protection.

macOS 11+ (Intel / Apple Silicon)

FFmpeg is bundled. Download the DMG for your architecture, open it, and drag FFConverter.app to Applications:

• Apple Silicon: FFConverter-1.1.0-macos-arm64.dmg
• Intel: FFConverter-1.1.0-macos-x86_64.dmg

The macOS build is ad-hoc signed but not notarized. On first launch macOS may say: “Apple could not verify ‘FFConverter’ is free of malware…”. This is Gatekeeper, not a virus report. After verifying the SHA256 checksum, use System Settings → Privacy & Security → Open Anyway (or right-click the app → Open on older macOS versions). Do not disable Gatekeeper globally.

Debian / Ubuntu

sudo apt install ffmpeg
curl -LO https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/ffconverter_1.1.0_all.deb
sudo apt install ./ffconverter_1.1.0_all.deb
FFConverter

apt install ./file.deb resolves python3-tk and libxcursor1 automatically. The package is architecture-independent; the Python dependencies are bundled inside it.

Fedora / RHEL

sudo dnf install ffmpeg          # from RPM Fusion if it is not in your repos
curl -LO https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-1.1.0-1.noarch.rpm
sudo dnf install ./FFConverter-1.1.0-1.noarch.rpm
FFConverter

Do not use rpm -ivh --nodeps: it hides missing Tk/X11 libraries instead of installing them.

Arch Linux

Use the portable archive, or install from a checkout into ~/.local:

sudo pacman -S python tk ffmpeg
git clone https://github.com/369arc/FFConverter.git
cd FFConverter
./packaging/install.sh
~/.local/bin/FFConverter

The installer writes to ~/.local by default. It does not run sudo, pip, or any network request.

Flatpak

The release includes a Flatpak bundle. It requires the org.freedesktop.Platform 25.08 runtime from Flathub:

curl -LO https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.flatpak
flatpak install --user ./FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.flatpak
flatpak run com.ffconverter.FFConverter

To build it from source:

flatpak-builder --user --install --force-clean build-dir com.ffconverter.FFConverter.yml
flatpak run com.ffconverter.FFConverter

AppImage

The AppImage is self-contained: it bundles Python, Tk and the Python GUI dependencies. It uses the system FFmpeg for conversions and needs glibc 2.35+ (Ubuntu 22.04 or newer).

curl -LO https://github.com/369arc/FFconverter/releases/latest/download/FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.AppImage
chmod +x FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.AppImage
./FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.AppImage

If FUSE is unavailable, run it with ./FFConverter-1.1.0-x86_64.AppImage --appimage-extract-and-run.

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/369arc/FFConverter.git
cd FFConverter
python3 -m unittest discover -s tests -v
./packaging/build-deb.sh       # dist/ffconverter_<version>_all.deb
./packaging/build-rpm.sh       # dist/FFConverter-<version>-1.noarch.rpm
./packaging/build-portable.sh  # dist/FFConverter-portable-x86_64.tar.xz
./packaging/build-appimage.sh  # dist/FFConverter-<version>-x86_64.AppImage
./packaging/build-flatpak.sh   # dist/FFConverter-<version>-x86_64.flatpak

Windows (from PowerShell):

.\packaging\build-windows.ps1
# dist/FFConverter-<version>-windows-x86_64.zip
# dist/FFConverter-<version>-windows-x86_64.exe

macOS (Homebrew Python with Tk; static FFmpeg is downloaded automatically):

brew install python@3.12 python-tk@3.12
PYTHON="$(brew --prefix python@3.12)/bin/python3.12" \
  ./packaging/build-macos.sh
# dist/FFConverter-<version>-macos-arm64.dmg (or x86_64)

To include FFmpeg in a portable archive, pass a directory containing self-contained ffmpeg and ffprobe binaries:

./packaging/build-portable.sh --with-ffmpeg /path/to/static/ffmpeg

packaging/build-portable.sh --arch arm64 builds the ARM64 archive. The build scripts never install anything with pip; packaging/vendor.py unpacks the committed pure-Python wheels into vendor/.

Troubleshooting

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'customtkinter'

Use a package/portable build from Releases. Do not run pip install --break-system-packages as root: it can break the distribution's Python and was the cause of most v1.0 installation failures.

No module named 'tkinter'

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt install python3-tk
# Fedora
sudo dnf install python3-tkinter
# Arch
sudo pacman -S tk

“FFmpeg was not found”

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt install ffmpeg
# Fedora (RPM Fusion)
sudo dnf install ffmpeg
# Arch
sudo pacman -S ffmpeg

Drag and drop does not work on a minimal system

The bundled tkinterdnd2 needs libXcursor. Debian/Ubuntu: sudo apt install libxcursor1; Fedora: sudo dnf install libXcursor. If the library is unavailable, FFConverter now starts normally and simply disables drag and drop.

Windows SmartScreen or antivirus warning

The Windows builds are not code-signed. Verify the SHA256 from SHA256SUMS, then use More info → Run anyway if you trust the download. Do not disable Microsoft Defender or your antivirus. Report false positives via GitHub Issues so they can be submitted to the scanner vendor.

macOS: “Apple could not verify FFConverter”

This build is not notarized by Apple, so Gatekeeper shows this warning. It is not a virus report. Verify the DMG SHA256, then open System Settings → Privacy & Security, find the FFConverter entry and click Open Anyway. On older macOS versions you can also right-click the app → Open → Open.

If macOS says the app is damaged:

xattr -cr /Applications/FFConverter.app

Do not disable Gatekeeper globally.

Permission denied

chmod +x run.sh

Uninstall

# DEB
sudo apt remove ffconverter
# RPM
sudo dnf remove FFConverter
# User-local install
./packaging/install.sh --uninstall
# Portable
rm -rf FFConverter

Windows: delete the extracted FFConverter folder or the single .exe file. macOS: move FFConverter.app from Applications to the Trash. No registry entries, system files or launch agents are created.

Project layout

Path	Purpose
ffc.py	Application (GUI + conversion pipeline)
run.sh	Launcher with dependency/FFmpeg checks
packaging/	Reproducible DEB/RPM/portable/user-local installers
pip-wheels/	Pure-Python wheels used offline by the build scripts
tests/	Unit tests for argument building and helpers
com.ffconverter.FFConverter.yml	Flatpak manifest

License

FFConverter is free software under the GNU GPL v3 or later. See LICENSE.

Bundled FFmpeg builds are distributed under their own license, which may be GPL-3.0-or-later depending on the build. See THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md. FFmpeg is a separate project: https://ffmpeg.org/.