Playhead

When editing audio or video in a contemporary computer NLE or DAW, the Playhead is a graphic line in the timeline that represents the position, or frame, of the material that is currently being accessed. The term harkens back to the days when hardware video/film playback machines used mechanical heads as part of their mechanism. When a specific audio, video or film frame ran across the hardware playhead, it literally “played” at that very instant.