The video player offers a seamless learning experience by delivering course content such as clips, learning checks, and links to cloud labs. Additionally, it provides you with control over settings like autoplay, subtitles, and playback speed. You don't need to install any specific software on your computer to access the player; simply use one of our recommended browsers. Depending on your plan, you'll encounter a variety of content types within the player.
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Video player features
Captions, translations, and transcriptions
Skills courses include subtitles and captions.
To turn captions on or off, click the CC icon.
When captions are on, they appear at the bottom of the video player by default. To move the captions position to the top of the page, click the Settings gear icon, then click the Captions (Position) menu and choose Top.
To translate the captions into a different language, click the Settings gear icon, then click the Captions (Language) menu and choose a language.
Note: You may need to pause the video and refresh the page to load the captions in a selected language.
Google Translate provides translations of video course captions. You can view a list of Google Translate's available languages (external site, opens in new tab) to find one that fits your needs.
Note: Transcripts are also offered for our video courses. Learn more about transcripts. Courses are only transcribed in English.
If you have a specific course captioning request, please contact Pluralsight Support (opens contact form).
Playback speed
Click the Speed icon in the video control bar to choose a playback speed ranging from .5x (half speed) to 2.0x (double speed).
Thumbnail previews
Use thumbnail previews to skip to a specific section of a video clip. Hover over the progress bar to see a preview of the video at any point without leaving your current place. Once you’ve found the section you’re interested in, click the progress bar or drag the progress marker to move to that point.
Note: Thumbnail previews are currently available on all courses published after January 18, 2023, and we're adding them to earlier courses on a continual basis.
Video quality adjustment
The video player automatically adjusts the streaming quality to optimize your experience.
Modify the video quality in the settings menu to adjust for any bandwidth issues you may be having. Click the Settings gear icon, then click Quality and choose your resolution. See bandwidth troubleshooting and tips to resolve issues.
Video format adjustment
By default, all videos play using HLS format. If your browser or OS cannot play HLS, the video will play as an MP4.
Badges
As you work through a course, the video player provides badge updates, displaying badges earned and badge progress between video modules. Check out our badges article to learn more.
Keyboard Shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts control playback settings for the video player.
Press Shift+? to view the shortcuts in the player.
A list of these shortcuts is below:
| Keystroke | Action |
|---|---|
| K, Spacebar | Play/Pause |
| F | Full screen |
| M | Mute on/off |
| + | Increase playback speed |
| - | Decrease playback speed |
| → | Forward 10 seconds |
| ← | Back 10 seconds |
| ↑ | Volume up |
| ↓ | Volume down |
| ESC | Close menu / exit full screen |
| H, ? (Shift + /) | Toggle keyboard shortcut list |
| C | Toggle closed captions |
| C (Shift + C) | Toggle closed captions position |
Feature and Course Feedback
Ready to share your thoughts on features or courses? Click Send Feedback in the Settings menu to access the feedback form. Then, follow these steps:
- Fill out your personal information.
- Provide a subject.
- Choose Feedback/feature request from the Select an option that best describes your request dropdown menu.
- Use the What would you like to send us feedback about? dropdown menu to narrow your request to a specific area or topic.
- Include additional details in the description field.
- Click Submit.
We value input from our learners and work very closely with our content and product teams to make sure your feedback reaches the right people. We may reach out to you for clarification, but most feedback won't receive a personal response.
Troubleshooting and tips
Start by checking your connection and identifying video playback issues using our video checkup tool (opens in new tab).
Next, make sure you're using one of our recommended browsers without any active extensions or add-ons, as some browser extensions interfere with video playback. If you don't see any improvement, please try another recommended browser.
You need a minimum of 3 megabits per second (Mbps) for watching Pluralsight Skills video courses to avoid buffering.
If you don't have a minimum of 3 Mbps available to watch content without buffering, you can create a channel or bookmark courses you want to view, then download them when your bandwidth allows. Learn how to download courses for offline viewing with our mobile and desktop apps (opens in new tab). This allows you to learn anytime, anywhere, even without an internet connection. You can also use apps like Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV to stream directly to a TV. Refer to Desktop and mobile app troubleshooting if you have questions.
WFH troubleshooting
Sometimes, internet bandwidth isn't large enough to handle the demand. There are a few reasons why this might happen.
We find that most buffering issues occur when users switch from the Auto setting to a higher quality setting. The video player automatically detects bandwidth availability and adjusts play quality accordingly to keep a continuous stream. If you manually adjusted it to a higher quality setting, try changing it back to Auto.
Other reasons for buffering issues include:
- an increased number of people watching Skills video content on the same network
- a large number of devices using your Wi-Fi
- your Wi-Fi connection not being strong enough
If you're having buffering issues, you can:
- Make sure your Wi-Fi router is centrally located.
- Switch the video player setting to Auto.
- Download the video using our mobile and desktop apps. Once your video is downloaded, you can watch the video without an internet connection. See instructions on downloading courses for offline viewing on our mobile apps, the macOS desktop app, and the Windows offline player.
- Decrease the bandwidth demand by turning off other internet devices.
Advanced troubleshooting
If the previous steps didn't resolve the issue, you can perform some advanced troubleshooting by using your browser’s diagnostic tool and sending our Support team the results. To run your browser’s diagnostics tool:
- Open our video player in your desktop browser, then open your browser's diagnostic tools (F12 or CMD-OPTION-I on Mac)
- Go to the console tab, then reload or refresh the page.
- Take a screenshot of any errors that show up under the console tab.
- Navigate to the network tab, refresh again, and take another screenshot. You must refresh the page to get the network tab to populate.
- Please contact Pluralsight Support (opens contact form) with those screenshots and information, and we will look into this further for you.