zlacker

>>Charle+(OP)
Something doesn’t quite add up to me. The post says “AV1 powers approximately 30% of all Netflix viewing”. Impressive, but I’m wondering why it isn’t higher? I’m guessing most devices should support AV1 software decoders. 88% of devices in certified in the last 4 years support AV1, all browsers support AV1 software decoding, Netflix apps on Android (since 2021) and iOS (since 2023) obviously do.

So why isn’t it AV1 higher? The post doesn’t say, so we can only speculate. It feels like they’re preferring hardware decoding to software decoding, even if it’s an older codec. If this is true, it would make sense - it’s better for the client’s power and battery consumption.

But then why start work on AV2 before AV1 has even reached a majority of devices? I’m sure they have the answer but they’re not sharing here.

>>testde+J51
Smart TVs, TV sticks, and a lot of mobile devices will not be capable of decoding AV1 in software in realtime, given their low-spec CPUs. I imagine that Netflix is only serving AV1 to devices with hardware decoding support.