The Video Codec Wars: H.264 to AV1 and Why Licensing Matters
Every video you watch has been compressed by a codec, and for twenty years the industry's choice of codec has been as much a legal fight as an engineering one.
This video traces that fight from H.264, finished in 2003 and kept free for internet video by a single 2010 pledge from its patent pool, MPEG LA, through HEVC's split into three competing patent pools in the 2010s, to the Alliance for Open Media's 2018 answer: AV1, a codec built to be royalty-free from the start.
AV1's own cost was speed - encoding it once took about ten times longer than H.264, a gap that has closed to roughly four times as encoders and hardware caught up. Even so, patent licensing has found its way back: a Sisvel-administered pool now licenses AV1-related patents to device makers, and in 2026 Via Licensing Alliance replaced H.264's old flat streaming cap with tiers reaching $4.5 million a year for the largest platforms, while HEVC's own licensors raised their rates at almost the same time.
The video closes on where YouTube, Netflix and TikTok actually land in 2026 - AV1 as a premium tier layered on HEVC, not a replacement for it - and on AV2, AOMedia's next codec, finalised in May 2026 and still years from the hardware support it will need.
Educational documentary. Not financial or investment advice.
In these topics
Chapters
- Why video needs a codec
- H.264 arrives (2003)
- The MPEG LA patent pool
- HEVC promises a better codec
- Three pools, one codec
- The industry revolts: AOMedia is founded
- AV1 ships royalty-free (2018)
- The slow-encode problem
- Licensing goes geopolitical
- 2026 fee shock: Via LA's new tiers
- What YouTube, Netflix and TikTok actually use
- What's next: AV2 and the future codec wars
Sources and credits
Photo credits (Wikimedia Commons)
- Googleplex, Google's Mountain View headquarters (AOMedia founding member): Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ABikes_that_are_used_by_employees_to_ride_between_buildings._Google_Headquarters%2C_Mountain_View%2C_California_LCCN2013630576.tif
- Microsoft's Redmond, Washington headquarters campus (AOMedia founding member): Jelson25, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AAerial_Microsoft_West_Campus_August_2009.jpg
- Apple's former Cupertino campus (Apple joined AOMedia after its 2015 founding): Carol M. Highsmith, Public domain - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AApple_Campus%2C_Cupertino%2C_California_LCCN2013630575.tif
Primary sources
- ITU-T Recommendation H.264 (2003) / H.265 (2013)
- MPEG LA, press release on the AVC/H.264 royalty-free pledge for free internet video, August 2010.
- AOMedia, founding press release, 1 September 2015.
- VentureBeat / StreamTV Insider / AppleInsider, reporting Apple joining AOMedia, January 2018.
- AOMedia, AV1 1.0 specification announcement, 28 March 2018.
- AOMedia, 'Alliance for Open Media Releases AV2 Codec' press release, 9 June 2026; AV2 1.0.0 spec dated 28 May 2026.
- TechSpot and Tom's Hardware, reporting on Via Licensing Alliance's 2026 H.264 streaming fee tiers.
- Access Advance, press release on the HEVC Advance rate increase and its postponement to 30 June 2026, January 2026.
- Sisvel, AV1/VP9 patent pool relaunch announcement, 10 March 2025, and its AV1 patent brochure.
- Gigazine / AVCesar, reporting Netflix's AV1 streaming share at about 30%, December 2025.
- Fora Soft, 'AV1: The State of the Codec in 2026', Nikolay Sapunov, 16 May 2026.
Not regulated financial advice.