When comparing Cantata vs VLC, the Slant community recommends VLC for most people. In the question“What are the best media managers for Linux?” VLC is ranked 4th while Cantata is ranked 10th. The most important reason people chose VLC is:
VLC is licensed under the CC-SA v3.0+ and available on Windows, OSX, and Linux with source code available [here](http://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-sources.html).
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Fast
Since it is a front-end for mpd, queries within Cantata are lightning fast.
Pro Full-featured
Not only can it help manage a music collection but Cantata also features easily configurable dynamic playlists and support for a variety of audio-streaming sites and digital devices. Furthermore, it supports last.fm scrobbling out of the box (not common with mpd front-ends).
Pro Excellent for large libraries
Pro Excellent at tagging/renaming files
Cantata can guess tags from what's already in your music directories and it can rename files so to match tag info (if that's what you want).
Pro Easy copy to mobile
The user simply needs to right-click in order to copy an album to their phone.
Pro Artist image view for scrolling.
Pro Good lyrics support
Ok lyric support. Many songs missing and slow to load.
Pro Support for ratings
Cantata is one of the few mpd front-ends that permits ratings to be stored and queried.
Pro Customisable keyboard shortcuts
You may setup Cantata practically in any aspect to match your keyboard preferences.
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.
Cons
Con No longer developed.
Con MPD client = tricky to setupì
MPD is known to be troublesome to get it working properly. It may be really frustrating to make it work properly thus you may find Cantata not playing your music files. Otherwise it's a great music player.
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.