Membrane Framework

Membrane is a versatile multimedia streaming & processing framework. You can use it to build a media server of your need, that can:

• stream via WebRTC, RTSP, RTMP, HLS, HTTP and other protocols,
• transcode, mix and apply custom processing of video & audio,
• accept and generate / record to MP4, MKV, FLV and other containers,
• handle dynamically connecting and disconnecting streams,
• seamlessly scale and recover from errors,
• do whatever you imagine if you implement it yourself :D Membrane makes it easy to plug in your code at almost any point of processing.

The abbreviations above don’t ring any bells? Visit membrane.stream/learn and let Membrane introduce you to the multimedia world!

If you have questions or need consulting, we’re for you at our Discord, forum, GitHub discussions, X (Twitter) and via e-mail.

You can also follow Membrane on X (Twitter) or join our Discord to be up to date and get involved in the community.

If you already had a chance to use Membrane, we will be greateful if could fill out quick survey to help us improve framework and decide on what to do next.

For people who write Membrane code with AI assistants, we ship a dedicated skill for them.

Membrane is maintained by Software Mansion.

Quick start

Mix.install([
  :membrane_hackney_plugin,
  :membrane_mp3_mad_plugin,
  :membrane_portaudio_plugin,
])

defmodule MyPipeline do
  use Membrane.Pipeline

  @impl true
  def handle_init(_ctx, mp3_url) do
    spec =
      child(%Membrane.Hackney.Source{
        location: mp3_url, hackney_opts: [follow_redirect: true]
      })
      |> child(Membrane.MP3.MAD.Decoder)
      |> child(Membrane.PortAudio.Sink)

    {[spec: spec], %{}}
  end
end

mp3_url = "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/membraneframework/membrane_demo/master/simple_pipeline/sample.mp3"

Membrane.Pipeline.start_link(MyPipeline, mp3_url)

This is an Elixir snippet, that streams an mp3 via HTTP and plays it on your speaker. Here’s how to run it:

• Option 1: Click the button below:

  

  It will install Livebook, an interactive notebook similar to Jupyter, and it’ll open the snippet in there for you. Then just click the ‘run’ button in there.

• Option 2: If you don’t want to use Livebook, you can install Elixir, type iex to run the interactive shell and paste the snippet there.

After that, you should hear music playing on your speaker :tada:

To learn step-by-step what exactly happens here, follow this tutorial.

Learning

The best place to learn Membrane is the membrane.stream/learn website and the membrane_demo repository. Try them out, then hack something exciting!

Membrane skill for AI assistants

This repo includes skills/membrane-framework/SKILL.md, a structured guide that helps AI coding assistants write Membrane code.

If you use Claude Code, install it via the plugin system:

/plugin marketplace add membraneframework/membrane_core
/plugin install membrane-framework@membrane

After install, Claude automatically pulls in the skill whenever you work on Membrane code (mentioning Membrane.Pipeline, Bin, Filter, Pad, etc).

If you use Cursor, drop the skill into your project’s rules directory:

mkdir -p .cursor/rules && curl -fL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/membraneframework/membrane_core/master/skills/membrane-framework/SKILL.md -o .cursor/rules/membrane-framework.mdc

For a cross-agent install, use skills.sh’s CLI via npx:

npx skills add membraneframework/membrane_core -g

For agents skills.sh doesn’t support, include the SKILL.md file directly in the agent’s context, or copy its contents into whatever instruction file the tool reads.

Structure of the framework

The most basic media processing entities of Membrane are Elements. An element might be able, for example, to mux incoming audio and video streams into MP4, or play raw audio using your sound card. You can create elements yourself, or choose from the ones provided by the framework.

Elements can be organized into a pipeline - a sequence of linked elements that perform a specific task. For example, a pipeline might receive an incoming RTSP stream from a webcam and convert it to an HLS stream, or act as a selective forwarding unit (SFU) to implement your own videoconferencing room. The Quick start section above shows how to create a simple pipeline.

Membrane packages

To embrace modularity, Membrane is delivered to you in multiple packages, including plugins, formats, core and standalone libraries. The complete list of all the Membrane packages maintained by the Membrane team is available here.

Plugins

Plugins provide elements that you can use in your pipeline. Each plugin lives in a membrane_X_plugin repository, where X can be a protocol, codec, container or functionality, for example membrane_opus_plugin. Plugins wrapping a tool or library are named membrane_X_LIBRARYNAME_plugin or just membrane_LIBRARYNAME_plugin, like membrane_mp3_mad_plugin. Plugins are published on hex.pm, for example hex.pm/packages/membrane_opus_plugin and docs are at hexdocs, like hexdocs.pm/membrane_opus_plugin. Some plugins require native libraries installed in your OS. Those requirements, along with usage examples are outlined in each plugin’s readme.

Formats

Apart from plugins, Membrane has stream formats, which live in membrane_X_format repositories, where X is usually a codec or container, for example membrane_opus_format. Stream formats are published the same way as packages and are used by elements to define what kind of stream can be sent or received. They also provide utility functions to deal with a given codec/container.

Core

The API for creating pipelines (and custom elements too) is provided by membrane_core. To install it, add the following line to your deps in mix.exs and run mix deps.get

{:membrane_core, "~> 1.3"}

Standalone libraries

Last but not least, Membrane provides tools and libraries that can be used standalone and don’t depend on the membrane_core, for example video_compositor, ex_sdp or unifex.

Goals

The main goals of Membrane are:

• To make work with multimedia a more pleasant experience than it is now.
• To provide a welcoming ecosystem for learning multimedia development.
• To power resilient, maintainable and scalable systems.

Elixir language

We chose Elixir for Membrane because it’s a modern, high-level, easy-to-learn language, that lets us rapidly develop media solutions. Elixir’s main selling points are built-in parallelism and fault-tolerance features, so we can build scalable systems that are self-healing. It also runs on the battle-tested BEAM VM, that’s been widely used and actively developed since the '80s. When we need the performance of a low-level language, we delegate to Rust or C.

If you don’t know Elixir, try this tutorial - it shouldn’t take long and you’ll know more than enough to get started with Membrane.

Supported platforms

Membrane was created and is being worked on mainly with UNIX-based operating systems in mind - in most cases that means MacOS and Linux. When it comes to Windows, if a project uses any native code, not just pure Elixir, we can’t guarantee it works correctly. To use Membrane on Windows we strongly recommend using WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux), which allows for running a Linux environment on a Windows machine. If you wish to get more insight into direct support for Windows, see this discussion.

Contributing

We welcome everyone to contribute to Membrane. Here are some ways to contribute:

• Spread the word about Membrane! Even though multimedia are present everywhere today, media dev is still quite niche. Let it be no longer!
• Create learning materials. We try our best but can cover only a limited number of Membrane use cases.
• Improve docs. We know it’s not the most exciting part, but if you had a hard time understanding the docs, you’re the best person to fix them ;)
• Contribute code - plugins, features and bug fixes. It’s best to contact us before, so we can provide our help & assistance, and agree on important matters. For details see the contribution guide.

Support and questions

If you have any questions regarding Membrane Framework or need consulting, feel free to contact us via Discord, forum, GitHub discussions, X (Twitter) or e-mail.

All packages

General

Plugins

General purpose

AI

Streaming protocols

Containers

Audio codecs

Video codecs

Raw audio

Raw video

External APIs

Formats

Standalone media libs

Utils

Authors

Membrane Framework is created by Software Mansion.

Since 2012 Software Mansion is a software agency with experience in building web and mobile apps as well as complex multimedia solutions. We are Core React Native Contributors and experts in live streaming and broadcasting technologies. We can help you build your next dream product – Hire us.

Copyright 2018, Software Mansion

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0