4 ms·

Netflix Starts Using VP9 Codec, Saving Up to 36% of Bandwidth

41 points by salemh 10y ago

salemh 10y ago
Note to observers/moderators, title of article: "How Netflix Keeps Downloads From Eating Up All Your Phone Storage" Title-page of site: "Netflix Starts Using VP9 Codec, Saving Up to 36% of Bandwidth" Site-title seems more descriptive/of interest to HN.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
shakna 10y ago
A lot more technical information over at Netflix's blog [0]. I'm unsure what to think about VP9 gaining some decent ground. Firstly, it's great that effort is going into more effecient video streaming, considering how difficult to compress and encode quality video can be. However, the chosen standard doesn't seem to be the best on offer. Just sort of Google randomly choosing one [1], and Netflix hedging their bets that others will adopt if they do, so the codec continues to get improved, and they aren't left hanging with the bill if everyone else ignores it. [0] http://techblog.netflix.com/2016/12/more-efficient-mobile-encodes-for.html http://techblog.netflix.com/2016/12/more-efficient-mobile-en... [1] Not quite, Google developed VP9 themselves.
- ZeroGravitas 10y ago
  Netflix and, well basically everyone of note in web video, from Amazon to Microsoft, is now on board with the Alliance for Open Media and their AV1 codec, which is largely based on VP10. So this just gives them a head start on that. On Netflix's YouTube channel they have technical presentation on some of the research they are doing on codec quality and objective metrics. https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCK2q3q4dshZHzn-EP3ZdUeA https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCK2q3q4dshZHzn-EP3ZdUeA
occamrazor 10y ago
Why not H.265? Other benchmarks suggest a comparable or even higher benefit moving from H.264 Main to H.265 Main, and hardware support for decoding is already present in many phones.
- jamesfmilne 10y ago
  H265 is a patent licensing minefield at the moment.
giovannibajo1 10y ago
Can somebody elaborate on how many Android devices support VP9 with hardware decoding (wrt to AVC Main support)? The article is shallow on this, but I think it's an important point, because it affects how much battery is being consumed on the client side, and thus user satisfaction with the service.
- andybak 10y ago
  Some info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP9#Hardware_encoding.2Fdecoding_support https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP9#Hardware_encoding.2Fdecodi...
- user5994461 10y ago
  More than battery, I'd be worried if the CPU has enough processing power to decode full HD on the fly in software.

41 points by salemh 10y ago

Note to observers/moderators, title of article: "How Netflix Keeps Downloads From Eating Up All Your Phone Storage" Title-page of site: "Netflix Starts Using VP9 Codec, Saving Up to 36% of Bandwidth" Site-title seems more descriptive/of interest to HN.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

shakna 10y ago

A lot more technical information over at Netflix's blog [0]. I'm unsure what to think about VP9 gaining some decent ground. Firstly, it's great that effort is going into more effecient video streaming, considering how difficult to compress and encode quality video can be. However, the chosen standard doesn't seem to be the best on offer. Just sort of Google randomly choosing one [1], and Netflix hedging their bets that others will adopt if they do, so the codec continues to get improved, and they aren't left hanging with the bill if everyone else ignores it. [0] http://techblog.netflix.com/2016/12/more-efficient-mobile-encodes-for.html http://techblog.netflix.com/2016/12/more-efficient-mobile-en... [1] Not quite, Google developed VP9 themselves.

ZeroGravitas 10y ago
Netflix and, well basically everyone of note in web video, from Amazon to Microsoft, is now on board with the Alliance for Open Media and their AV1 codec, which is largely based on VP10. So this just gives them a head start on that. On Netflix's YouTube channel they have technical presentation on some of the research they are doing on codec quality and objective metrics. https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCK2q3q4dshZHzn-EP3ZdUeA https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCK2q3q4dshZHzn-EP3ZdUeA

occamrazor 10y ago

Why not H.265? Other benchmarks suggest a comparable or even higher benefit moving from H.264 Main to H.265 Main, and hardware support for decoding is already present in many phones.

jamesfmilne 10y ago
H265 is a patent licensing minefield at the moment.

giovannibajo1 10y ago

Can somebody elaborate on how many Android devices support VP9 with hardware decoding (wrt to AVC Main support)? The article is shallow on this, but I think it's an important point, because it affects how much battery is being consumed on the client side, and thus user satisfaction with the service.

andybak 10y ago
Some info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP9#Hardware_encoding.2Fdecoding_support https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP9#Hardware_encoding.2Fdecodi...
user5994461 10y ago
More than battery, I'd be worried if the CPU has enough processing power to decode full HD on the fly in software.