NEXTCLIENT

A modern, open-source GeForce NOW client for Android and Linux — a Flutter port of OpenNOW.

NEXTCLIENT is a from-scratch Dart/Flutter rewrite of the OpenNOW Electron client, built around a custom-built, hardware-accelerated streaming pipeline (VAAPI zero-copy on Linux) and a clean, modern neon UI.

Warning

Under active development. Expect rough edges, especially around the native hardware-decode transports.

Important

NEXTCLIENT is an independent community project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by NVIDIA. NVIDIA and GeForce NOW are trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation. You must use your own GeForce NOW account.

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Features

• Catalog — browse the GFN catalog (GraphQL), featured carousel, search, recently played, game details with store-variant pickers.
• Streaming — WebRTC with three selectable transports; custom VAAPI hardware decode + zero-copy render on Linux (below) — super experimental, unstable.
• Stream shader filters — live GPU post-processing (CAS sharpening, saturation / contrast / brightness / vibrance, film grain), adjustable mid-session.
• Input — OS pointer lock with sensitivity tuning, touch input, client-rendered cursor overlay, fully customizable virtual gamepad (12 themes, per-control scaling, haptics), physical gamepads on Android and Linux.
• Sign-in — browser OAuth (PKCE) or device login; tokens auto-refreshed.
• Sessions — live launch lifecycle, resume after app restart, remote terminate.
• Queue picker — free-tier server picker with live queue positions, ETAs, and pings per zone (printed-waste community data).
• Subscription — GFN tier, remaining hours, entitled resolutions.
• Quality controls — resolution, FPS, bitrate, codec, color, L4S, G-Sync sent on launch, plus advanced WebRTC settings.
• Neon UI — 17 pre-rendered background styles, global animations toggle, adaptive portrait / landscape layouts, UI scaling, optional hidden title bar.
• Diagnostics — in-stream stats overlay, session timer, in-app log viewer with redacted HTTP logging.

Platform support

Platform	Status
Android	✅ Supported — decode is already handled by flutter_webrtc (platform hardware codecs)
Linux	⚠️ Supported — custom VAAPI hardware decode + zero-copy render (super experimental, unstable)
Windows	🚧 Partially supported — builds and streams, but GPU decode isn't solved yet (runs FFmpeg software decode)
macOS	❓ Untested — I have no Mac (a CI job exists, but nothing has been validated)
Web	❌ Not built — the app depends on dart:ffi, GStreamer, and native plugins

CI (build.yml) builds Linux, Windows, and Android on every push; a macOS job exists in the matrix but is unverified (I have no Mac ), and web is deliberately excluded.

Architecture

.
├── lib/                         Flutter app (Dart)
│   ├── pages/                   home, library, game details, login, launcher
│   │                            (play flow + store picker + queue picker), settings,
│   │                            stream, log viewer
│   ├── state/                   session controller, user settings, stream
│   │                            transports, mouse/keyboard input, cursor overlay,
│   │                            stats, physical gamepad, title-bar controller
│   ├── widgets/                 neon UI kit, gamepad widgets, stream widgets
│   ├── theme/neon.dart          neon theme + animated background styles
│   └── utils/                   shared helpers (friendly error messages)
├── packages/
│   ├── gfn_core/                pure-Dart GFN API client (auth, catalog,
│   │                            cloud-match, signaling, session, subscription)
│   ├── flutter_webrtc/          vendored fork, patched for VAAPI decode +
│   │                            GPU-shader video renderer
│   └── pointer_lock/            vendored pointer-lock plugin (mouse capture)
├── native/                      libwebrtc build tree + FFI bridges
│   ├── gst_bridge/              GStreamer webrtcbin bridge over dart:ffi
│   └── nvst_bridge/             classic NVST UDP video bridge
├── vaapi_patch/                 Linux wrapper patch (VAAPI decoder, dmabuf)
├── d3d11_patch/                 Windows wrapper patch (D3D11 decoder)
└── .github/workflows/           build matrix + custom-libwebrtc Windows CI

Streaming pipeline

The stream page drives input and video through a uniform StreamTransport interface. Three transports are implemented and switchable in Settings → WebRTC:

Transport	Path
flutterWebrtc (default)	stock flutter_webrtc plugin + RTCVideoRenderer; on Linux this layers the custom-built libwebrtc.so (VAAPI decode + dmabuf) — super experimental, unstable
webrtcbinFfi	native GStreamer webrtcbin bridge over dart:ffi (native/gst_bridge) — hardware decode without a custom libwebrtc build
nvstGstreamer	classic NVST UDP video via native/nvst_bridge + GStreamer hardware decode; WebRTC is kept for SCTP input

Decode and render backends are independently selectable:

• Decode — vaapi (GStreamer VAAPI vah264dec on Linux; custom build — super experimental, unstable) or ffmpeg (forced software). Windows currently runs the FFmpeg software path until the D3D11VA decoder lands; Android decodes automatically via the platform (no custom build). Applied per-session via OPENNOW_DECODER.
• Render — cpu (libyuv ConvertToARGB into a Flutter texture) or gl (Y/U/V planes uploaded as GPU textures, YUV→RGB in a shader — GL on Linux, D3D11 shared-handle on Windows — zero CPU readback). Applied via OPENNOW_RENDERER.

See native/README.md for the daily rebuild workflow of the custom libwebrtc, vaapi_patch/README.md for the Linux build from scratch, and d3d11_patch/README.md for the Windows counterpart.

Getting started

Requires Flutter 3.44.7+ (Dart SDK ^3.12.2).

flutter pub get
flutter run -d linux    # or -d windows / -d <android-device>

Release builds:

flutter build linux --release
flutter build windows --release
flutter build apk          # Android

Incremental release rebuilds (Linux)

flutter build linux --release is a full build. Once it has run at least once (the build/linux/x64/release dir exists), you can rebuild just one plugin's native code in place with ninja — release (optimized) mode, not debug:

# After editing C++ in a plugin (e.g. packages/flutter_webrtc), rebuild only
# that plugin's .so inside the release build tree:
ninja -C build/linux/x64/release flutter_webrtc_plugin
#   [4/4] Linking CXX shared library plugins/flutter_webrtc/libflutter_webrtc_plugin.so

# Then a quick `flutter build` re-bundles the fresh .so into the app
# (ninja is incremental, so this finishes fast):
flutter build linux --release

• Targets are named <plugin>_plugin (e.g. flutter_webrtc_plugin, pointer_lock_plugin); list them with ninja -C build/linux/x64/release -t targets all | grep plugin.
• Always use build/linux/x64/release — the release app ships the release artifacts, so rebuilding build/linux/x64/debug does nothing for it.
• This covers native (C++) plugin changes. Dart-only changes still need a flutter build / flutter run (that path is incremental too — the kernel snapshot is cached).
• The custom libwebrtc .so itself (VAAPI decode) builds separately, in native/libwebrtc_build/ — see native/README.md.

Troubleshooting file INSTALL cannot find …/build/lib/libapp.so — the Dart AOT snapshot is missing. Usually caused by interrupting a build (Ctrl+C) mid-kernel-snapshot (leaves a 0-byte app.dill that the incremental check treats as fresh) or by the _phony_ assemble marker leaking into the build tree — it must never exist (see linux/flutter/CMakeLists.txt). Quick fix, keeps the build incremental:

rm build/linux/x64/release/flutter/_phony_
rm -rf .dart_tool/flutter_build/<current-build-id>   # or just: flutter clean
flutter build linux --release

Note

The Linux release app ships a locally built libwebrtc.so vendored into packages/flutter_webrtc/third_party/libwebrtc/. The stock plugin download is skipped whenever that vendored .so is present. flutter pub get can re-extract the plugin and reset it — verify with grep -c 'memory:VAMemory' packages/flutter_webrtc/third_party/libwebrtc/lib/libwebrtc.so (must be > 0) after any pub get.

License

MIT — see LICENSE. This project is a port/derivative of OpenNOW (MIT, © 2025 Zortos) and vendors modified flutter_webrtc and pointer_lock packages. Full attributions are in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md.