What is WebM?
WebM is an open, royalty-free, media file format designed for the web.
WebM defines the file container structure, video and audio formats. WebM files consist of video streams compressed with the VP8 video codec and audio streams compressed with the Vorbis audio codec. The WebM file structure is based on the Matroska container.
For more information about WebM, see the FAQ.
Developers: To get involved visit our Code page.
Benefits of WebM
-
Openness and innovation. A key factor in the web's success is that its core technologies such as HTML, HTTP, and TCP/IP are open for anyone to implement and improve. With video being core to the web experience, a high-quality, open video format choice is needed. WebM is 100% free, and open-sourced under a BSD-style license.
-
Optimized for the web. Serving video on the web is different from traditional broadcast and offline mediums. Existing video formats were designed to serve the needs of these mediums and do it very well. WebM is focused on addressing the unique needs of serving video on the web.
-
Low computational footprint to enable playback on any device, including low-power netbooks, handhelds, tablets, etc.*
-
Simple container format
-
Highest quality real-time video delivery
-
Click and encode. Minimal codec profiles, sub-options; when possible, let the encoder make the tough choices.
-
* Note: The initial developer preview releases of browsers supporting WebM are not yet fully optimized and therefore have a higher computational footprint for screen rendering than we expect for the general releases. The computational efficiencies of WebM are more accurately measured today using the development tools in the VP8 SDKs. Optimizations of the browser implementations are forthcoming.
We'd like to thank the many vendors and web community members who have endorsed WebM and are integrating it into their products.