Eighth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Video Codecs Comparison (original) (raw)
Eighth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Video Codecs Comparison - Standard Version
MSU Graphics & Media Lab (Video Group)
Video group head: Dr. Dmitriy Vatolin
Project head: Dr. Dmitriy Kulikov
Measurements, analysis: Marat Arsaev
REPORT IS UPDATED!
Now it contains Appendixes with GPU encoders comparsion and Very High Speed Encoders comparison.
Different Versions of Report
There are two different versions of H.264 Comparison 2012 report:
- MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Video Codecs Comparison - Standard (Free) Version (this report)
- MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Video Codecs Comparison - Pro Version (Enterprise Edition)
This is a pack of all the graphs with user-friendly systems for switching the graphs
Here is the comparison of the versions:
Pro version of comparison will be available immediately after report purchasing.
Report Overview
Video Codecs that Were Tested
H.264
DivX H.264
Elecard H.264
Intel Ivy Bridge QuickSync (GPU encoder)
MainConcept H.264 (software)
MainConcept H.264 (CUDA based encoder)
MainConcept H.264 (OpenCL based encoder)
DiscretePhoton
x264
Non H.264
XviD (MPEG-4 ASP codec)
Overview
Sequences
Table 1. Summary of video sequences
| Sequence | Number of frames | Frame rate | Resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| VideoConference (5 sequences) | |||
| Deadline | 1374 | 30 | 352x288 |
| Developers 4CIF | 3600 | 30 | 640x480 |
| Developers 720p | 1500 | 30 | 1280x720 |
| Presentation | 548 | 30 | 720x480 |
| Business | 493 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
| Movies (10 SD sequences) | |||
| Ice Age | 2014 | 24 | 720x480 |
| City | 600 | 60 | 704x576 |
| Crew | 600 | 60 | 704x576 |
| Indiana Jones | 5000 | 30 | 704x288 |
| Harbour | 600 | 60 | 704x576 |
| Ice Skating | 480 | 60 | 704x576 |
| Soccer | 600 | 60 | 704x576 |
| Race Horses | 300 | 30 | 832x480 |
| State Enemy | 6500 | 24 | 720x304 |
| Party Scene | 500 | 50 | 832x480 |
| HDTV sequences (16 sequences) | |||
| Park Joy | 500 | 50 | 1280x720 |
| Riverbed | 250 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Rush Hour | 500 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Blue Sky | 217 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Station | 313 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Stockholm | 604 | 50 | 1280x720 |
| Sunflower | 500 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Tractor | 690 | 25 | 1920x1080 |
| Bunny | 600 | 24 | 1920x1080 |
| Dream | 600 | 24 | 1920x1080 |
| Troy | 300 | 24 | 1920x1072 |
| Water Drops | 535 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
| Capitol | 600 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
| Parrots | 600 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
| Citybus | 600 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
| Underwater | 600 | 30 | 1920x1080 |
Objectives and Testing Tools
H.264 Codec Testing Objectives
The main goal of this report is the presentation of a comparative evaluation of the quality of new H.264 codecs using objective measures of assessment. The comparison was done using settings provided by the developers of each codec. The main task of the comparison is to analyze different H.264 encoders for the task of transcoding video�e.g., compressing video for personal use. Speed requirements are given for a sufficiently fast PC; fast presets are analogous to real-time encoding for a typical home-use PC.
H.264 Codec Testing Tools
- For all measurements the PRO version of the YUVsoft Video Codec Scoring System was used
- The following computer configuration was used for the main tests:
- Sugar Bay platform, 3rd Generation Core i7 3xxx(IVB), 4 Cores CPU @3.4 GHz,
- Integrated GPU: Intel HD Graphics 4000
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580
- HDD: SSD160G
- Total Physical Memory: 2x2 Gb RAM (1600 MHz)
- OS Name: Microsoft Windows 7
Overall Conclusions
Overall, the leader in this comparison for software encoders is x264, followed by MainConcept, DivX H.264 and Elecard.
The overall ranking of the software codecs tested in this comparison is as follows:
- x264
- MainConcept
- DivX H.264
- Elecard
- Intel Ivy Bridge QuickSync
- XviD
- DiscretePhoton
- MainConcept CUDA
This rank is based only on the encoders� quality results. Encoding speed is not considered here.
Professional Versions of Comparison Report
H.264 Comparison Report Pro 2012 version contains:
- Additional objective metrics (PSNR, 3-SSIM, MS-SSIM)
- All metrics results for all colorplanes (Y,U,V and overall)
- Results for all the sequences, codecs and presets used in comparison
- Much more figures
- etc.
Acknowledgments
The Graphics & Media Lab Video Group would like to express its gratitude to the following companies for providing the codecs and settings used in this report:
- DiscretePhoton team
- Elecard Ltd
- Intel Corporation
- MainConcept GmbH
- x264 Development Team
The Video Group would also like to thank these companies for their help and technical support during the tests.
Thanks
Special thanks to the following contributors of our previous comparisons
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Codec Analysis and Tuning for Codec Developers and Codec Users
Computer Graphics and Multimedia Laboratory of Moscow State University:
- 10 years working in the area of video codec analysis and tuning using objective quality metrics and subjective comparisons.
- 20+ reports of video codec comparisons and analysis (H.264, MPEG-4 MPEG-2, decoders� error recovery).
- Methods and algorithms for codec comparison and analysis development, separate codec�s features and codec�s options analysis.
We could perform next task for codec developers and codec users.
Strong and Weak Points of Your Codec
- Deep encoder parts analysis (ME, RC on GOP, mode decision, etc).
- Weak and strong points for your encoder and complete information about encoding quality on different content types.
- Encoding Quality improvement by the pre and post filtering (including technologies licensing).
Independent Codec Estimation Comparing to Other Codecs for Different Use-cases
- Comparative analysis of your encoder and other encoders.
- We have direct contact with many codec developers.
- You will know place of your encoder between other newest well-known encoders (compare encoding quality, speed, bitrate handling, etc.).
Encoder Features Implementation Optimality Analysis
We perform encoder features effectiveness (speed/quality trade-off) analysis that could lead up to 30% increase in the speed/quality characteristics of your codec. We can help you to tune your codec and find best encoding parameters.
Contact Information
See all MSU Video Codecs Comparisons
MSU video codecs comparisons resources:
- Introduction to Video Codecs Comparison
- Lossless Video Codecs Comparison 2004 (October 2004)
- MPEG-4 SP/ASP Video Codecs Comparison (March 2005)
- JPEG 2000 Image Codecs Comparison (September 2005)
- First Annual MPEG-4 AVC/ H.264 Video Codecs Comparison (January 2005)
- Second Annual MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Video Codec Comparison (December 2005)
- Subjective Comparison of Modern Video Codecs (February 2006)
- MPEG-2 Video Decoders Comparison (May 2006)
- WMP and JPEG2000 Comparison (October 2006)
- Third Annual MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (December 2006) (All versions for free!)
- Lossless Video Codecs Comparison 2007 (March 2007)
- Fourth Annual MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (December 2007) (All versions for free!)
- Options Analysis of MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Codec x264 (December 2008)
- Fifth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (May 2009) (All versions for free!)
- Sixth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (May 2010)
- Seventh MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (May 2011)
- Eighth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (May 2012)
- Ninth MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 Comparison (Dec 2013)
- Tenth Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Oct 2015)
- Eleventh Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Aug 2016)
- Twelfth Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Aug 2017)
- Thirteen Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Aug 2018)
- Fourteen Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Sept 2019)
- Cloud Encoding Servoces Comparison 2019 (Dec 2019)
- Fifteen Video Codec Comparison (HEVC) (Dec 2020)
- Sixteen Video Codec Comparison (Dec 2021)
- Seventeen Video Codecs Comparisons (Nov 2022)
- Eighteenth Video Codecs Comparisons (Apr 2025)
- Nineteenth Video Codecs Comparisons (2025)
- Codec Analysis for Companies:
Other Materials
Last updated: 28-May-2025
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Project updated by Server Team and MSU Video Group
Project sponsored by YUVsoft Corp.
Project supported by MSU Graphics & Media Lab