Design Doc: video_player background playback with media notifications

[Deni-al]

Summary

This design document describes adding system media notification support to the video_player plugin, enabling Flutter developers to display media controls on the lock screen, notification shade (Android), and Control Center (iOS/macOS) when playing video/audio in the background.

Design Doc

flutter.dev/go/video-player-media-notifications

Problem Statement

Flutter app developers building media applications expect video/audio playback to continue when the app is backgrounded, with system-level media controls that users are accustomed to from native apps.

Currently, while video_player supports basic background audio via allowBackgroundPlayback, there is no built-in way to:

• Display media metadata (title, artist, album art) on system UI
• Provide play/pause/seek controls from lock screen or notification shade
• Integrate with platform media session APIs

This forces developers to implement complex native code or use third-party packages for a feature that should be part of the core video player experience.

Proposed Solution

Add a new NotificationMetadata class and notificationMetadata parameter to VideoPlayerOptions that enables system media notifications when combined with allowBackgroundPlayback: true.

Platform implementations:

• Android: Media3 MediaSessionService with foreground service notifications
• iOS/macOS: MPNowPlayingInfoCenter and MPRemoteCommandCenter
• Web: Not supported (browser limitations)

Related PR

flutter/packages#10915