Which browsers support AV1?

Chrome 70+, Edge 121+, Firefox 67+, Opera 57+, Samsung Internet 12+, and Safari 17 on Apple devices with hardware AV1 decoders all support AV1. Internet Explorer never added support, and the legacy Android Browser does not support AV1.

Does Chrome support AV1?

Yes. Chrome supports AV1 from Chrome 70 on desktop, released in October 2018. Chrome 67 to 69 had AV1 disabled by default behind a flag, and Chrome 4 to 66 did not support AV1 at all.

Does Safari support AV1?

Safari supports AV1 from Safari 17 on macOS Sonoma and iOS 17, released September 2023. Playback only works on Apple devices that have a hardware AV1 decoder, including M3 Macs, the M4 iPad Pro, the iPhone 15 Pro family, and the iPhone 16 family.

Why does AV1 not play on my older Mac?

Apple has not shipped a system-wide software AV1 decoder. Macs with Intel chips or M1 and M2 Apple silicon do not have hardware AV1 decoders, so Safari 17 on those machines cannot play AV1. The same limit applies to iPhones older than the iPhone 15 Pro.

Is AV1 better than H.264?

AV1 uses 30 to 50 percent less bitrate than H.264 at the same picture quality, based on tests by Netflix, Facebook, and Moscow State University. AV1 is also royalty-free, while H.264 carries patent fees from MPEG LA. H.264 still has wider device and browser reach.

Is AV1 better than HEVC?

AV1 is about 30 percent more efficient than HEVC at the same quality and is royalty-free, while HEVC requires patent licenses from Via LA, Access Advance, and individual patent holders. HEVC has wider hardware decoder reach today, especially on older Apple devices.

Yes. The Alliance for Open Media publishes AV1 under a royalty-free patent license. AOMedia members, including Google, Apple, Microsoft, Mozilla, Netflix, Amazon, and Meta, have agreed not to charge royalties on AV1 patents they hold.

What containers can hold AV1 video?

AV1 ships inside MP4 (ISO Base Media File Format), WebM (a profile of Matroska), and the standalone IVF container. AVIF, used for still images and short animations, is also based on AV1.

What is the AV1 Video Extension in Edge?

The AV1 Video Extension is a free Microsoft Store package that adds AV1 decoder support to Windows 10 and older Edge builds. Edge 18 to 115 needed it for AV1 playback. Edge 121 and later ship the AV1 decoder built in, so the extension is no longer required for browser video.

Does YouTube use AV1?

Yes. YouTube serves AV1 in WebM and MP4 to browsers, smart TVs, and devices that signal AV1 support. Users can force AV1 on YouTube through the account playback preferences page when their browser and hardware can decode it.

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AV1: Browser Support, Codecs, Hardware

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AV1: Browser Support, Codecs, Hardware

AV1 supports Chrome 70+, Edge 121+, Firefox 67+, Opera 57+, Samsung Internet 12+, and Safari 17 on Apple devices with hardware decoders. Learn AV1 browser support.

Prince Dewani

May 1, 2026

On This Page

About AV1
Browser Support
Key Features
Hardware Needs
AV1 vs HEVC vs H.264
Known Issues
Citations

AV1 is a royalty-free video codec from the Alliance for Open Media that delivers smaller files at the same picture quality as H.264 and HEVC. It supports Chrome 70+, Edge 121+, Firefox 67+, Opera 57+, Samsung Internet 12+, and Safari 17 on Apple devices with hardware AV1 decoders, while Internet Explorer and the legacy Android Browser remain unsupported.

This guide covers what AV1 is, the browsers that support it, the codec's main features, the hardware required for smooth playback, how AV1 stacks up against HEVC and H.264, and the known issues to plan around before you ship AV1 video.

What is AV1?

AV1, short for AOMedia Video 1, is an open, royalty-free video codec that the Alliance for Open Media published in 2018. It uses 30 to 50 percent less bitrate than H.264 for the same picture quality, and about 30 percent less than HEVC. The codec ships inside MP4, WebM, and IVF containers, and the AVIF image format is built on AV1 still frames. YouTube, Netflix, Meta, and Amazon Prime Video all stream AV1 to compatible devices.

Which browsers does AV1 support?

AV1 plays in every major desktop browser today, with Safari restricted to Apple devices that have a hardware AV1 decoder.

Loading browser compatibility data...

AV1 compatibility in Chrome

Chrome supports AV1 from Chrome 70 on desktop, released in October 2018, on Windows, macOS, Linux, and ChromeOS. Chrome 67 to 69 had AV1 disabled by default behind a flag, and Chrome 4 to 66 did not support AV1 at all. Chrome for Android plays AV1 from Android 10 and later through the dav1d software decoder; smooth hardware playback needs an AV1-capable SoC such as Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, Samsung Exynos 2200, Tensor G2, or later.

AV1 compatibility in Edge

Microsoft Edge supports AV1 by default from Edge 121, released January 2024. Edge 18 to 115 needed users to install the free AV1 Video Extension from the Microsoft Store on Windows 10 and 11 to play AV1, and Edge 12 to 17 did not support AV1 at all. Edge 121 ships the dav1d decoder inside the browser, so the extension is no longer required for web video.

AV1 compatibility in Firefox

Firefox supports AV1 from Firefox 67 on desktop, released May 2019, after Mozilla swapped in the dav1d decoder. Firefox 55 to 64 had AV1 behind the media.av1.enabled flag, and Firefox 2 to 54 did not support AV1 at all. Firefox 125, released April 2024, added AV1 inside Encrypted Media Extensions, so DRM-protected AV1 streams from Netflix, Disney+, and Amazon Prime Video now play in Firefox.

AV1 compatibility in Safari

Safari supports AV1 from Safari 17 on macOS Sonoma and iOS 17, released September 2023. Apple ties AV1 playback to devices that have a hardware AV1 decoder: Macs with the M3, M3 Pro, M3 Max, or later chip, the M4 iPad Pro, the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max with the A17 Pro, and the iPhone 16 family. Older Apple silicon (M1 and M2), Intel Macs, and iPhones before the iPhone 15 Pro install Safari 17 but cannot play AV1, since Apple has not shipped a system-wide software AV1 decoder.

AV1 compatibility in Opera

Opera supports AV1 from Opera 57, released January 2019, on Windows, macOS, and Linux. Opera 9 to 56 did not support AV1. Opera Mobile added AV1 from Opera Mobile 80 on Android.

AV1 compatibility in Samsung Internet

Samsung Internet supports AV1 from Samsung Internet 12, released April 2020, on Galaxy phones and tablets. The Galaxy S22 family and later ship with Exynos 2200 or Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 silicon, both of which carry hardware AV1 decoders for smooth 4K playback.

AV1 compatibility in Android Browser

The legacy stock Android Browser, frozen at version 4.4 before Chrome for Android took over, does not support AV1. Android 10 and later ship the dav1d software decoder system-wide, so use Chrome for Android, Firefox for Android, or Samsung Internet on modern Android phones for AV1 playback.

AV1 compatibility in Internet Explorer

Internet Explorer never added AV1 support. IE 5.5 through IE 11 cannot decode AV1 in any container. Internet Explorer reached end of life on June 15, 2022, so use Edge, Chrome, or Firefox for AV1 work.

What are the key features of AV1?

AV1 is built for high-resolution streaming over the open web, with compression that beats both H.264 and HEVC and a license that costs nothing to ship.

Royalty-free license: AOMedia members agreed not to charge patent fees on AV1, so encoders and decoders ship without per-unit licensing costs.
Better compression: Netflix, Facebook, and Moscow State University tests show AV1 cuts bitrate by 30 to 50 percent against H.264 and about 30 percent against HEVC at matching quality.
Up to 8K resolution: AV1 supports 8K at 120 frames per second through Profile 0, Level 6.0, with 10-bit and 12-bit color depth.
HDR and wide color: AV1 carries HDR10, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision metadata, plus the BT.2020 color space for high dynamic range streams.
Film grain synthesis: AV1 strips real grain at encode time and re-adds it at decode, which keeps the look of film while saving bitrate.
Container flexibility: AV1 video lives inside MP4, WebM, IVF, and ISOBMFF, so it slots into existing HLS, DASH, and HTML5 video pipelines.
AVIF still images: The AVIF image format reuses AV1 keyframes, giving the web a smaller, royalty-free alternative to JPEG and WebP.

What hardware does AV1 require?

AV1 software decoding runs on most modern CPUs, but it eats CPU cycles at 4K and drains battery on phones. Smooth, low-power playback needs a hardware AV1 decoder. Encoding hardware support is rarer and matters most for live streaming and creator workflows.

Apple silicon (decode): M3, M3 Pro, M3 Max, and M4 chips, the A17 Pro inside iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max, and the A18 inside the iPhone 16 family decode AV1 in hardware.
Qualcomm Snapdragon (decode): Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, and the X Elite include AV1 decoders. Earlier Snapdragon chips fall back to dav1d software decoding.
Samsung Exynos (decode): Exynos 2100, Exynos 2200, and Exynos 2400 include AV1 decoders, used in Galaxy S21, S22, S23, and S24 models sold outside North America.
Google Tensor (decode): Tensor G2 (Pixel 7), Tensor G3 (Pixel 8), and Tensor G4 (Pixel 9) decode AV1 in hardware.
Intel CPUs (decode): 11th-generation Tiger Lake and later, plus Arc discrete GPUs, decode AV1 in hardware.
AMD GPUs (decode): Radeon RX 6000 desktop GPUs, Ryzen 6000 mobile APUs, and later silicon decode AV1.
Nvidia GPUs (decode): RTX 30 series and later (Ampere, Ada Lovelace) decode AV1.
AV1 hardware encoders: Intel Arc, AMD Radeon RX 7000, and Nvidia RTX 40 series add AV1 encoding for live streaming and creator pipelines.

Note: AV1 playback breaks across older Macs, iPhones, and Android phones without hardware decoders. Test it on real browsers and devices with TestMu AI. Try TestMu AI free!

What is the difference between AV1, HEVC, and H.264?

AV1, HEVC, and H.264 all do the same job, encode video for streaming, but they differ on licensing, compression, hardware reach, and browser coverage. The table below lays out the trade-offs that drive codec selection in 2026.

Dimension	AV1	HEVC (H.265)	H.264 (AVC)
Standards body	Alliance for Open Media (AOMedia)	ITU-T and ISO/IEC, MPEG	ITU-T and ISO/IEC, MPEG
Year published	2018	2013	2003
Licensing	Royalty-free	Patent fees from Via LA, Access Advance, and individual holders	Patent fees from MPEG LA (now Via LA); free for HTTP streaming
Compression vs H.264	30 to 50 percent less bitrate at the same quality	25 to 50 percent less bitrate at the same quality	Baseline
Browser reach	Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera, Samsung Internet, Safari 17 on Apple silicon with hardware decoders	Safari, Edge with HEVC extension, no Chrome or Firefox by default	Every modern browser plus Internet Explorer 9+
Hardware decoder coverage	Mid-tier and flagship 2022+ silicon, all M3 and newer Apple chips	Most 2014+ phones, TVs, and Apple devices since the iPhone 6	Almost every device shipped since 2005
Best fit	4K and 8K streaming, royalty-free pipelines, AVIF images	Apple ecosystem, premium broadcast, Blu-ray	Universal compatibility, low-latency live, legacy fallback

What are the known issues with AV1?

AV1 is technically supported in every major browser, but real-world delivery still has rough edges around Apple devices, mobile battery life, and encoder cost.

Apple ties AV1 to hardware: Safari 17 plays AV1 only on Macs with M3 silicon, the M4 iPad Pro, the iPhone 15 Pro family, and the iPhone 16 family. Older Apple devices install Safari 17 but get no AV1 because Apple has not shipped a software decoder.
Battery drain on software decode: Phones and laptops without an AV1 decoder run dav1d on the CPU, which warms the device and shortens battery life on long videos. ScientiaMobile measured roughly 10 percent of global device usage with hardware AV1 decode in 2024.
Slow encoding: Software AV1 encoders such as libaom and SVT-AV1 are 5 to 10 times slower than x264 at comparable quality settings. Hardware AV1 encoders ship only in Intel Arc, AMD RX 7000, and Nvidia RTX 40 silicon, so live AV1 ingest still costs more than H.264.
Edge needed an extension for years: Edge 18 to 115 required the AV1 Video Extension from the Microsoft Store. Sites that target enterprise Windows 10 fleets running older Edge builds still need a fallback codec.
Patent claims outside AOMedia: Sisvel and other patent pools argue some AV1 patents fall outside the AOMedia license. AOMedia offers a defensive patent license and an indemnity program, but legal teams in regulated industries often want a written sign-off before shipping AV1.
HDR support is uneven: AV1 carries HDR10, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision metadata in the spec, but browser-level Dolby Vision over AV1 is still limited to Apple devices and a handful of smart TVs.
Older Smart TVs miss it: AV1 decode reaches mid- and high-tier 2022 and later Samsung, LG, Sony, Roku, Fire TV, and Apple TV 4K boxes. Older smart TVs and streaming sticks still need an HEVC or H.264 fallback.

In my experience, the trickiest production failure is shipping AV1 to a mixed Apple fleet. macOS Sonoma installs Safari 17 on Intel Macs, M1 Macs, and M2 Macs alike, but only M3 and later actually decode AV1; the Intel and earlier Apple silicon machines fail silently. Always probe canPlayType at runtime and ship an HEVC or H.264 fallback inside an MP4 source list.

Citations

All AV1 version numbers and platform notes in this guide come from these primary sources:

Alliance for Open Media - AV1 Specification: aomedia.org/specifications/av1
Wikipedia - AV1: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AV1
MDN Web Docs - Web video codec guide: developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Media/Guides/Formats/Video_codecs
WebKit - News from WWDC23: Web Features in Safari 17: webkit.org/blog/14445/news-from-wwdc23-web-features-in-safari-17
Apple Developer - Safari 17 Release Notes: developer.apple.com/documentation/safari-release-notes/safari-17-release-notes
Microsoft Apps - AV1 Video Extension: apps.microsoft.com/detail/9mvzqvxjbq9v
Bitmovin - The State of AV1 Playback Support: bitmovin.com/blog/av1-playback-support
Engineering at Meta - Video Streaming with the AV1 Codec on Mobile: engineering.fb.com/2025/09/24/video-engineering/video-streaming-with-av1-video-codec-mobile-devices-meta-white-paper
Alliance for Open Media: aomedia.org

Author

Prince Dewani

Blogs: 8

Prince Dewani is a Community Contributor at TestMu AI, where he manages content strategies around software testing, QA, and test automation. He is certified in Selenium, Cypress, Playwright, Appium, Automation Testing, and KaneAI. Prince has also presented academic research at the international conference PBCON-01. He further specializes in on-page SEO, bridging marketing with core testing technologies. On LinkedIn, he is followed by 4,300+ QA engineers, developers, DevOps experts, tech leaders, and AI-focused practitioners in the global testing community.