Prime Video and other large streaming platforms have been moving their catalogs to AV1, an open-source, royalty-free video codec built by the Alliance for Open Media. Compared with older formats such as H.264, AV1 holds up picture quality at a noticeably lower bitrate, which is why it has become the default choice for mobile playback on constrained networks.
This section covers the engineering side of modern video delivery: codec comparisons, hardware decoding support on recent phone chipsets, and how adaptive bitrate streaming keeps playback smooth as network conditions change. Start with the guide below for a full breakdown of AV1's compression advantage.