Stefan Mileschin

Google has informed the world that as of yesterday, the default player on its YouTube service is HTML5.

Until yesterday Adobe Flash was the plugin of choice, but not anymore. HTML5 is a core technology markup language that was used by YouTube for more than five years under a beta program and now it made it as the default in Chrome, IE 11, Safari 8 and in beta versions of Firefox. The reason why it took so long to get HTML 5 on YouTube as default choice was the lack of Adaptive Bitrate (ABR) that lets YouTube show more videos with less buffering.

Google found a way to bridge this gap and fix the lack of ABR with web browser vendors. Google also points out that the HTML5 has a few advantages. MediaSource Extensions and its main part Adaptive Bitrate are probably the most important. According to Google, YouTube ABR has reduced buffering by more than 50 percent globally and as much as 80 percent on heavily-congested networks. MediaSource Extensions also enable live streaming in gaming consoles like Xbox and PS4, on devices like Chromecast and in web browsers.

HTML5 lets you use the VP9 codec. This Google supported codec will give you higher quality video with an average bandwidth reduction of 35 percent. This will be important for 4K and HD video file users at 60FPS that will start their videos 18 to 50 percent faster. With 4K being the dominant video format of the future, this is an important step for YouTube.

http://fudzilla.com/news/36872-html5...gin-on-youtube