Ask Paul: Movies & TV App in Windows 10 Won’t Keep Playing When Minimized

In Windows 10, Microsoft has overhauled its media player solutions with new universal app versions. But the new Movies & TV app won’t keep playing when it’s minimized. In fact, it stops playing the video all together.

Jeff T. asks:

I was just wondering if there was a way to, on Windows Ten, when I am playing a video, to lower it and still have the audio work.  When I play a music file, it starts Grove Music and when lowered, it continues playing. When I open a video file it uses Movies & TV, and when lowered, it will pause the file, and when I come back to it, I have to hit the play button to have it resume. Very Annoying. Am I using the wrong player for videos, or is that the only player on Windows 10?

Answer:

Unfortunately, this is by design in this app, and I agree there should at least be an option to change that. Maybe it will come in a future update.

A few options.

First, don’t minimize the Movies & TV app. It will still keep playing video—and thus the associated audio too—when you use other apps. The video pauses—and audio playback stops—only when you minimize the app.

Another more obvious option would be to use a third-party video player like VLC media player, which doesn’t have this behavior. (That is, audio continues playing when the app is it’s minimized.) Or, almost any other video player: even Windows Media Player, which comes with Windows 10 too, handles this properly.