How to List NVDEC Decoders in FFmpeg

This guide explains how to check your FFmpeg installation for available NVIDIA NVDEC (formerly NVCUVID) hardware-accelerated decoders. By running specific terminal commands, you can quickly verify whether your build includes NVIDIA GPU acceleration and see the exact video codecs your hardware can decode.

Step 1: Verify Hardware Acceleration Support

Before checking for specific decoders, confirm that your FFmpeg binary was compiled with NVDEC/CUDA support. Run the following command:

ffmpeg -hwaccels

Look for cuda and nvdec in the output list. If these entries appear, your FFmpeg build supports NVIDIA hardware decoding.

Step 2: List NVDEC Decoders

In FFmpeg, NVDEC implementations are typically identified with the _cuvid suffix. You can list all installed decoders and filter the results using standard command-line tools.

On Linux or macOS:

ffmpeg -decoders | grep cuvid

On Windows (Command Prompt):

ffmpeg -decoders | findstr cuvid

On Windows (PowerShell):

ffmpeg -decoders | Select-String "cuvid"

Understanding the Output

Running the filter command produces a list of available hardware decoders formatted like this:

 V..... av1_cuvid            Nvidia CUVID AV1 decoder (codec av1)
 V..... h264_cuvid           Nvidia CUVID H264 decoder (codec h264)
 V..... hevc_cuvid           Nvidia CUVID HEVC decoder (codec hevc)
 V..... mjpeg_cuvid          Nvidia CUVID MJPEG decoder (codec mjpeg)
 V..... mpeg1_cuvid          Nvidia CUVID MPEG1VIDEO decoder (codec mpeg1video)
 V..... mpeg2_cuvid          Nvidia CUVID MPEG2VIDEO decoder (codec mpeg2video)
 V..... mpeg4_cuvid          Nvidia CUVID MPEG4 decoder (codec mpeg4)
 V..... vc1_cuvid            Nvidia CUVID VC1 decoder (codec vc1)
 V..... vp8_cuvid            Nvidia CUVID VP8 decoder (codec vp8)
 V..... vp9_cuvid            Nvidia CUVID VP9 decoder (codec vp9)

The leading V indicates a video decoder. Any codec listed in the second column can be passed to FFmpeg using the -c:v option (for example, ffmpeg -c:v h264_cuvid -i input.mp4 output.mkv) to enable hardware-accelerated decoding. If the command returns no output, your FFmpeg build lacks NVDEC support or is missing the necessary NVIDIA graphics drivers.