FFmpeg 9.0.2 Released with A Large Amount of Fixes & Improvements

FFmpeg 9.0.2, the second maintenance release for the 9.0 series of this popular multimedia library, is out!

The new version of this free open-source software introduced a large number of bug-fixes, stability and performance improvements.

The 9.0.2 includes numerous codec updates. The H.264 direct decoder now performs the validity check before loading the data. It includes a boundary-value correctness fix that can prevent an out-of-bounds read.

It also includes a multi-threading/synchronization correctness fix, ensures that both fields of an interlaced reference picture are decoded before using their data for direct prediction, as well the H.264 decoder now clears its error-recovery picture state when starting the second field of an interlaced picture.

The VP8 decoder got a fix that avoids waiting for invalid negative reference-frame rows. And, the PowerPC optimized VP8 decoder now supports storing 16-pixel rows at any memory alignment.

The Vulkan accelerated HEVC decoder has been updated with fix for reference-frame handling by limiting per-category reference counts. And, it does no longer report error when the decoder encounters the remaining slices of a picture that has already been skipped.

The VVC (aka H.266) decoder features improved IBC initialization by checking the CTU area, and, a memory-leak / error-handling fix by freeing the allocated table/data structures if pic_arrays_init() fails.

The CFHD （CineForm HD） decoder now validates the channel number after processing each tag, resets allocated band sizes when freeing buffers, and enforces that relevant CFHD header tags must appear at the appropriate point in the bitstream, before the frame buffer is allocated.

The MOV demuxer in FFmpeg 9.0.2 got some performance and security improvements. It now stops unnecessarily zero-initializing an array before filling it with file data, improving allocation efficiency.

It avoids unnecessarily clearing a key-string buffer before reading the actual key into it. Thus, saving a small amount of memory initialization work and optimize performance and efficiency.

And, it now limits the number of metadata-key entries according to the size of the keys atom, preventing a malformed MOV/MP4 file from specifying an impossibly large number of entries.

There are as well numerous other changes, see the Changelog file for details.

Get FFmpeg 9.0.2

The source tarball as well as the community maintained packages for Linux, Windows, and macOS are available in FFmpeg website via the link below:

Download FFmpeg

For Ubuntu, besides waiting for the distribution package update, I’ve updated the PPA package for Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 24.04 and Ubuntu 26.04.

Launch terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run the commands below one by one to add the PPA and install/update to FFmpeg 9.0.2:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/ffmpeg9

sudo apt update

sudo apt install ffmpeg

NOTE: the PPA packages are not well tested. Please report issues and run the commands below to downgrade if something goes wrong.

sudo apt install ppa-purge

sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/ffmpeg9

source https://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2026/09/ffmpeg-9-0-2-released-with-a-large-amount-of-fixes-improvements/