Thanks for confirming this workaround! We're working hard to make FFmpeg work as out of the box as possible.

After Homebrew automatically upgraded ffmpeg v4 to v5 I found that Mathematica could no longer find the extra codec files on my Intel Mac running OSMonterey 12.3. To resolve the issue I had to do the following in Homebrew terminal:

• brew uninstall ffmpeg
• brew install ffmpeg@4
• brew link ffmpeg@4

The first line removes ffmpeg v5.The second line installs ffmpeg v4. The last line is critical as it installs the symlinks that Mathematica needs to find ffmpeg. These symlinks are NOT installed automatically when Homebrew installs ffmpeg v4 because this version is now considered outdated. Evidently, Mathematica 13.0.1 is not currently compatible with ffmpeg v5; at least I couldn't find a way to make it work.

Good luck!

In 12.3, there is a nice dialog box that comes up and tells me how to install ffmpeg with MacPorts:

Clicking the command copies it.

The problem is that it copies the wrong command. The clipboard will contain sudo port install ffmpeg + gpl3 + nonfree, which is incorrect and does not work as intended. There must be no spaces after the + signs. The correct command is sudo port install ffmpeg +gpl3 +nonfree (which is what is displayed, but is not what is copied).

I have made the reinstall. I think I understand what the problem was.

I already had a ffmpeg in /usr/local/bin (don't ask me why ... I don't know).

The installer told me it could not create a symlink because of this and as consequence the symlinks for the libraries were not created.

I removed the binary I had. I made a reinstall again and now it looks like all the libraries are symlinked in /usr/local/lib.

So, next time : I'll read the output of the homebrew installer because I probably got the same warning the first time I installed the x86 version.

I'll test later if it works when I have removed the other symlinks I had created.

I have /usr/local/bin/brew. Don't know how to check if this executable is x86 or arm.

I don't have the symlinks in /usr/local/lib pointing to ffmpeg in Cellar.

But I do have ffmpeg in /usr/local/Cellar.

The /usr/local/opt/ffmpeg is a symlink to the version in /usr/local/Cellar.

So in short : it looks like /usr/local/lib was not used but instead it is /usr/local/opt/ffmpeg.

I do see some codecs in /usr/local/lib like libvorbisenc.a

But the libavcodec.58 libavformat.58 libavutil.56 libavfilter.7 libswscale.5 libswresample.3 are in the ffmpeg folder.

I have the x86 homebrew in /usr/local and the ARM homebrew in /opt/homebrew

ls -ls /usr/local/lib/libavc*

is giving nothing :-) It is empty.

But I have the lib here: /usr/local/opt/ffmpeg/lib/libavcodec.58.91.100.dylib

And by creating the symbolic links to that place, everything is working.

At least, I see the list of codecs in

$VideoDecoders

and

FFmpegTools`$SystemFFmpegQ

is returning True.

It is not a problem for me. But I wanted to share just in case other people may have similar issues. I have not yet tested if the encoding is working.

I have followed your instructions to install the x86 version of home-brew and ffmpeg. I have done nothing special.

With both the ARM and x86 versions of Homebrew installed it does not work. But using the symbolic links to point to the x86 version solved the issue.

The Windows version of this post can be found here

The Linux version of this post can be found here