When comparing VLC vs DeaDBeeF, the Slant community recommends DeaDBeeF for most people. In the question“What are the best audio players for UNIX-like systems?” DeaDBeeF is ranked 2nd while VLC is ranked 13th. The most important reason people chose DeaDBeeF is:
DeadBeef has a lot of different plugins users can use to customize the interface, controls, and options.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Free, open source, and cross-platform
VLC is licensed under the CC-SA v3.0+ and available on Windows, OSX, and Linux with source code available here.

Pro Simple to setup and use
VLC is an incredibly robust application but very simple on the surface. It makes playing music simple, yet still manages to give the user all the tools he/she wants in a music player.
Pro Very versatile and easy to use
Pro Doesn't require additional codecs
Everything VLC needs to play media files is contained within which means no outside codecs are needed. This makes it one of the most hassle-free music players as it can play virtually anything as soon as it's installed.
Pro Tons of advanced settings
Besides basic configurations, video player has an extensive amount of adjustable settings.
Pro Doesn't manage your music library for you
You organize your music into folders any way you want. Want to play an album? Drag and drop. No tags, no confusion, no fluff. Easy.
Pro Can be almost completely keyboard-driven
VLC includes keyboard shortcuts for most actions. The video player can be controlled with simple and customizable keyboard commands.
Pro Surprisingly Lightest on Resources
Yes. Lightest. Even better than the ones known to be light. Both when playing music, only a single song or when playing a video. Either in terms of Ram and Cpu. Compared with almost all, including the ones from Windows like mpc-hc .. or light ones from Linux like Alsa Player, Audacious, SmPlayer .
Pro Can play every format video available (as of 2017)
Pro Supports a GUI interface and an ncurses terminal interface
Pro Can easily stream music across your home network from any device on the network
Using sftp/ssh music (and videos) can be streamed from any server on the network to any device running VLC. VLC can also be used as a webcam for streaming and snapshots. Amazing all in one package
Pro Large amount of extensions
VLC has a large amount of extensions.
Pro A lot of plugins
DeadBeef has a lot of different plugins users can use to customize the interface, controls, and options.

Pro Lightweight
DeadBeef uses few system resources, making it great for low end systems and for those requiring a media player that uses as few resources as possible.
Pro Extremely customizable
DeaDBeef has support for title formatting scripting, like foobar2000, which allows you to customize group patterns, the converter output, the window titles, etc. to your needs. DeaDBeeF also has a Design Mode, which allows you to add new widgets to the interface and move/delete existing ones.
Pro Uses GTK2 or GTK3
Users are able to choose a GTK2 or GTK3 build of the application to use within DeaDBeeF.
Pro ALSA plugin allows bit-perfect pipeline to DAC
Pro Supports single-album CUE files
Pro Smooth and easy
Pro Offers a ReplayGain scanner out-of-the-box
Cons

Con Not really meant to be a music player
VLC is made to be a video player. Therefore, it won't carry out actions such as managing your music library.
Con Lacks libraries and advanced music player features
VLC is a media player first and foremost. There is no library management (aside from playlists), limited usage of tags, and no rating system. VLC is best at playing a file directly from a folder, but falls behind when it comes to helping you manage or find good songs in your music library.
Con Absence of personalization
VLC Player has only one basic interface in white or black, and overall personalization opportunities are quite narrow. Unfortunately, you're pretty much stuck to the default look.
Con Contains some insignificant but irritating flaws
Despite all keyboard shortcuts, the width of the picture can't be controlled by trackpad. Besides that, the VLC start-up window doesn’t open at the same place or the same width at which it was previously closed.
Con shuffle mode doesn't play an entire huge playlist (over 25 days)
Con GTK-App
So there is basically no integration into non-GTK desktops.
Con Terrible GUI
stop reinventing (ugly) guis. play music and get out of my way.
Con Fails when opening a CUE file
Doesn't work even after 30 minutes of tweaking. Not as good as Audacious.
Con Ubuntu's sound menu buttons don't work
DeaDBeeF shows up in the sound menu; however, clicking the next/previous buttons doesn't do anything.
Con Not as many options as other players
When it comes to options DeaDBeef may not have as many as other more prominent music playing applications.
Con Clunky
I've seen people showing lyrics - but I can't figure out how to make that work.
It's very difficult to use the 'design' function (unlike Guayadeque) to re-arrange and design the interface beyond something like a music list and artwork...
