The Plex team has taken the Plex Media Player out of subscriber only circulation and opened it up for everyone. Previously it was only available to subscribers to Plex Pass, a paid subscription which gave early access to new updates and pre-release software.
Plex Media Player is a front-end for the Plex Media Server. It is one of the few full featured media servers that are available freely. It is also available on nearly every platform that would be capable of playing back video from the server. The user interface is meant as a lean-back style interface for use with tvs. There is also web UI mode which allows the use of wireless mouse and keyboards.
Plex is probably the most popular of the media servers in the market. The next most popular, called Kodi is also getting something out of this update cycle. Plex Pass members will have access to an add-on that will allow Kodi users to access a Plex library. For many users, this brings together the favorite home theater apps.
The Plex Media Player has been in development for over a year after support was removed for its predecessor Plex Home Theater. The long delay was due to the sheer effort required to build the player from scratch for every platform and then gradually introduce bugfixes. Now everyone has access to Plex Media Player’s silky smooth playback, complex subtitle rendering, and lightning fast seeking.