Shortcut Keys

1. Contextual Menu

Shortcut Key: C

This shortcut key helps you find the contextual menu of files, folders, and add-ons. For example, if you have selected a video file, pressing C key will provide you few options including “Play”, “Add to Queue”, “Mark as Watched”, etc. Basically, this shortcut key is an alternative to the right-click on the mouse.

2. Live TV Window

Shortcut Key: H

No matter where you are on Kodi, just press H key and it will switch to the live TV window. This shortcut comes handy when you are juggling between your local library and live TV window.

3. Seek Forward or Backward

Shortcut Key: Ctrl + → or Ctrl + ←

If you are watching a video then press Ctrl key and the right/left navigation key to seek forward or backward. It will seek the playback by 5 seconds.

4. Move to Queued Video

Shortcut Key: Page Up or Page Down

You can use page up and page down key to skip to the next queued video. It will mostly come handy when you are watching a TV series or have queued videos in your playlist.

5. Toggle Fullscreen Playback

Shortcut Key: tab

If you are playing a video and want to keep it playing in the background, just hit the tab key and you will exit the full-screen playback. Meanwhile, you can choose a different video or complete some other task on Kodi. To go back to the full-screen mode, press the tab key again.

6. Mute

Shortcut Key: M

Now you can mute video or audio playback by just pressing the M key. No need to press the minus key several times to bring down the volume.

7. Exit Kodi

Shortcut Key: Ctrl + End

If you are on the home screen, just press Ctrl and End key at once to close Kodi. Do note that, you will have to be on Kodi home screen to be able to perform this shortcut.

8. Toggle between Full-screen and Windowed Mode

Shortcut Key: \

Kodi opens in full screen mode by default. By using this keyboard shortcut, one can easily toggle from full screen to windowed mode. This will allow the user to access other software/apps simultaneously while using Kodi.

9. Audio delay control

Shortcut Key: A

Sometimes audio and video of a particular video doesn’t sync well. In such cases, you can use this keyboard command to adjust audio delay, so that it syncs well with the video.

10. Fast forward

Shortcut Key: F

If you want to skip a particular part of a movie or a music video, simply press ‘F’ key. If you press once, the video will fast forward at 2x pace; if you press it twice, the video will fast forward at 4x pace and so on. Alternatively, you can use right arrow key to forward the video 30 seconds.

11. Play

Shortcut Key: P

Pressing ‘P’ will start the video.

12. Stop

Shortcut Key: X

To stop a particular video, just press ‘X’ key.

13. Rewind

Shortcut Key: R

If you love a particular scene of a movie or a music video, simply press ‘R’ key to rewind back. If you press once, the video will rewind at 2x pace; if you press it twice, the video will rewind at 4x pace and so on.  Alternatively, you can use the left arrow key to rewind the video 3o seconds.

14. Toggle Subtitles On/Off

Shortcut Key: T

If you want to turn subtitles on/off for a movie or a video, just press ‘T’. However, Subtitles settings must be properly configured before trying this shortcut.

15. Previous Menu or Home Screen

Shortcut Key: Esc

If you want to go back to a previous menu or want to go back to the home screen, just press ‘Esc’ key. It will save you from multiple clicks.

16. Take A Screenshot

Shortcut Key: Ctrl + S or Prt Sc

If you want to take screenshot of what’s playing on your Kodi media center, just press ‘Ctrl+S’. Once you press it, a dialog box will ask you for preferred location for saving that screenshot.

Or an alternate way of taking screenshot is to hit ‘PrtSc’. The screenshot will be saved to clipboard which you can retrieve by opening ‘Paint’ and pressing ‘Ctrl+V’.

If you wish to take print out of the screenshot, you can easily do so since it is available in ready to use printable format.

17. Volume Down, Volume Up or Mute

Shortcut Key: – (minus), + Plus

For decreasing volume of a video, just press ‘-‘ key and for increasing the volume, press ‘+’ key. You will have to press a particular key multiple times to change the volume to a required level.

If you want to mute a video completely, press ‘-‘ key multiple times so that the volume becomes zero.

18. Shut down Menu

Shortcut Key: S

For quickly getting yourself out of the system, just press the ‘S’ key. It will give you an option for exiting Kodi with just one click. Also, it has the option to directly shut down/hibernate your system. This helps you save a lot of time when you are in hurry.

19. Pause / Play

Shortcut Key: Space bar

For playing/pausing a particular video, all you have to do is to hit ‘space’ bar. It’s the same keyboard shortcut that we have for VLC and YouTube.

20. Zoom / Aspect Ratio

Shortcut Key: Z

If you wish to adjust the aspect ratio of a video according to its resolution, just press the ‘Z’ key. Every time you press the key, the video will adjust to a different resolution such as (320 x 240), (1024 x 768), etc. Choose the one with better clarity.

Kodi Shortcuts For Pictures

21. Zoom Picture From Level 1 to level 9

Shortcut Key: 1-9

Pressing numerical keys from 1-9 will zoom the images in increasing order.

22. Next Picture

Shortcut Key: . period

You can browse through images without having to use your cursor. Just press ‘.’ key and you can scroll to the next image.

23. Previous Picture

Shortcut Key: , comma

For viewing the previous image, just press ‘,’.

Platform Specific Keyboard Shortcuts

24. For Windows

Shortcut Key: Windows Key

If you wish to access an option on your system, outside of Kodi but without having to exit it. Just press the Windows key and you are good.

25. For Mac

Some helpful Kodi keyboard shortcuts for Mac users.

  • ⌘ Cmd+Q to quit
  • ⌘ Cmd+H and ⌘ Cmd+M to hide/minimize to the dock
  • ⌘ Cmd+F to toggle fullscreen
  • ⌘ Cmd+S to take a screen shot
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