Quick Comparison Choose the right codec for your library based on encoding speed, file size, and device compatibility.
New to video encoding? A codec is the format used to compress video. See the codec glossary entry for a simple explanation.Feature HEVC (H.265)AV1 File Size Reduction 40-60% smaller vs H.264 50-70% smaller vs H.264 Encoding Speed Fast (CPU/GPU ) Slow (CPU only) Hardware Acceleration NVIDIA, Intel, AMD Limited (Intel Arc only) Device Compatibility Widespread (2015+) Limited (2020+) Quality at Same Bitrate Good Excellent Browser Playback Safari, Edge Chrome, Firefox, Edge Smart TV Support Most 2016+ models Few 2021+ models Best For Balanced speed + compatibility Maximum storage savings
TL;DR: Use HEVC for faster encoding and broad device support. Use AV1 for maximum space savings if you have time and modern playback devices.
When to Use HEVC HEVC (H.265) is the balanced choice for most users who want significant file size reduction without sacrificing encoding speed or device compatibility.
Ideal Scenarios
Fast Encoding Required Encoding large libraries (1000+ movies) where time matters more than maximum compression. HEVC encodes 5-20x faster than AV1.
Hardware Encoder Available NVIDIA RTX 20/30/40 series, Intel 6th gen+, or AMD RX 6000+ GPUs provide 3-10x speedup with NVENC/QSV/VCE hardware acceleration .
Apple Ecosystem iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple TV all support HEVC natively since 2016. Safari requires HEVC for efficient video streaming.
Smart TV Playback Most smart TVs from 2016+ support HEVC hardware decoding. Older or budget TVs often lack AV1 support.
Hardware Resolution Speed Time for 2-hour movie Intel i5-12400 (CPU) 1080p 15-25 FPS 45-75 minutes Intel i9-13900K (CPU) 1080p 30-50 FPS 25-40 minutes NVIDIA RTX 3060 (GPU) 1080p 60-100 FPS 12-20 minutes NVIDIA RTX 4090 (GPU) 4K 80-120 FPS 20-30 minutes Intel i5-12400 (CPU) 4K 5-10 FPS 3-5 hours
Enable hardware acceleration in Settings → Encoding to unlock GPU speeds. HEVC on NVIDIA RTX 3060+ provides near-identical quality to CPU at 5-10x the speed. HEVC File Size Savings Typical storage reduction when converting from H.264 to HEVC:
Original Size Resolution HEVC Size Savings 10 GB 1080p BluRay 5-6 GB 40-50% 20 GB 4K BluRay 8-10 GB 50-60% 2 GB 1080p TV Episode 1-1.2 GB 40-50% 50 GB 4K HDR Remux 20-25 GB 50-60%
Real example: A 500-movie library (5 TB H.264) shrinks to 2.5 TB HEVC in 2-3 days with NVIDIA RTX 3060.
When to Use AV1 AV1 delivers maximum compression at the cost of much slower encoding. Best for users with time to spare and modern playback devices.
Ideal Scenarios
Maximum Storage Savings When disk space is expensive and you prioritize smallest file sizes over encoding speed. AV1 achieves 10-20% better compression than HEVC.
Future-Proofing Library AV1 is royalty-free and backed by Google, Netflix, Amazon. It’s the long-term successor to HEVC with improving hardware support.
Chrome/Firefox Streaming Web-based media servers (Plex, Jellyfin, Emby) benefit from AV1’s native support in Chrome/Firefox for efficient browser playback.
Archival Encodes Encoding a library once for long-term storage where speed doesn’t matter. AV1 provides best quality-per-byte for archival purposes.
Hardware Resolution Speed Time for 2-hour movie Intel i5-12400 (CPU) 1080p 2-5 FPS 4-8 hours Intel i9-13900K (CPU) 1080p 5-10 FPS 2-4 hours AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (CPU) 1080p 6-12 FPS 1.5-3 hours Intel i9-13900K (CPU) 4K 1-3 FPS 10-20 hours Intel Arc A770 (GPU)* 1080p 20-40 FPS 30-60 minutes
AV1 hardware encoding is rare. Only Intel Arc GPUs (2022+) support AV1 encoding acceleration. Most users will encode on CPU at 1/10th the speed of HEVC.
AV1 File Size Savings Typical storage reduction when converting from H.264 to AV1:
Original Size Resolution AV1 Size Savings 10 GB 1080p BluRay 4-5 GB 50-60% 20 GB 4K BluRay 6-8 GB 60-70% 2 GB 1080p TV Episode 0.8-1 GB 50-60% 50 GB 4K HDR Remux 15-20 GB 60-70%
Real example: A 500-movie library (5 TB H.264) shrinks to 2 TB AV1 but takes 2-3 weeks to encode on Intel i9 CPU.
Quality Settings (CRF Values) Both HEVC and AV1 use CRF (Constant Rate Factor)
CRF Range Quality File Size Use Case 18-22 Visually Lossless Large (80-90% of source) 4K HDR archival, reference quality 23-28 High Quality Medium (40-60% of source) Recommended for most users 29-35 Acceptable Small (20-40% of source) Low-bitrate streaming, mobile 36+ Low Quality Very Small (10-20% of source) Not recommended
BitBonsai default: CRF 23 for both HEVC and AV1. This provides transparent quality indistinguishable from the source for most content.CRF Comparison Examples Encoding a 10 GB 1080p H.264 BluRay movie:
CRF HEVC Size AV1 Size Quality Notes 18 8 GB 7 GB Visually identical to source 23 5 GB 4 GB Transparent quality (default) 28 3 GB 2.5 GB Minor banding in dark scenes 33 1.5 GB 1.2 GB Visible compression artifacts
How to adjust CRF : Settings → Encoding → Quality → CRF slider. Lower for archival quality, higher for streaming/mobile libraries .Recommended CRF by Content Type Content Type Recommended CRF Reasoning 4K HDR Movies 20-23 High detail, large screen viewing 1080p Movies 23-26 Balanced quality and size TV Shows 24-28 Fast-paced action, smaller screens Animation 20-24 Flat colors compress well, benefit from high quality Old DVDs 28-32 Source already low quality, no benefit from low CRF
Hardware Transcoding Hardware encoding uses GPU /iGPU for 3-10x speedup vs CPU. Quality is slightly lower but visually transparent for most content.What is hardware transcoding? Using your graphics card to encode videos 5-10x faster than CPU-only encoding. See hardware acceleration in the glossary.NVIDIA NVENC (GeForce/RTX) Supported cards: GTX 1650+, RTX 20/30/40 seriesCodecs: HEVC only (no AV1 on consumer cards)Performance: 5-10x faster than CPUQuality: Near-identical to CPU at default settingsSetup:
Install NVIDIA drivers 450+
Settings → Encoding → Hardware Acceleration → Enable NVENC
Select HEVC codec
Start encoding (GPU usage visible in nvidia-smi)
GPU Model 1080p Speed 4K Speed Max Concurrent Jobs GTX 1660 40-60 FPS 10-15 FPS 2-3 RTX 3060 60-100 FPS 20-30 FPS 3-4 RTX 4070 80-120 FPS 30-40 FPS 4-5 RTX 4090 100-150 FPS 40-60 FPS 5-6
NVENC quality tip: Use preset p7 (slowest) for best quality. Only 10-20% slower than p4 but significantly better quality.
Intel Quick Sync (QSV) Supported CPUs: Intel 6th gen (Skylake) to 14th gen (Raptor Lake)Codecs: HEVC, AV1 (Arc GPUs only)Performance: 3-8x faster than CPUQuality: Good (slightly lower than NVENC)Setup:
Enable iGPU in BIOS (may require dummy HDMI plug)
Settings → Encoding → Hardware Acceleration → Enable QSV
Select HEVC codec
Docker: Pass /dev/dri device to container
CPU/GPU Model 1080p Speed 4K Speed AV1 Support Intel i5-12400 30-50 FPS 8-12 FPS No Intel i9-13900K 40-70 FPS 12-18 FPS No Intel Arc A380 50-80 FPS 15-25 FPS Yes (AV1) Intel Arc A770 80-120 FPS 25-40 FPS Yes (AV1)
Intel Arc is the only consumer GPU with AV1 encoding. If you want fast AV1 encodes, Arc A380/A750/A770 is your best option.
AMD VCE/VCN Supported GPUs: RX 5000 series (VCN), RX 6000/7000 series (VCN 2.0/3.0)Codecs: HEVC only (no AV1)Performance: 3-6x faster than CPUQuality: Lower than NVENC/QSV (noticeable in complex scenes)Setup:
Install AMD drivers
Settings → Encoding → Hardware Acceleration → Enable VCE
Docker: Pass /dev/dri and /dev/kfd devices
GPU Model 1080p Speed 4K Speed Notes RX 6600 XT 30-50 FPS 8-12 FPS VCN 3.0 RX 6800 XT 40-70 FPS 12-18 FPS VCN 3.0 RX 7900 XTX 50-80 FPS 15-25 FPS VCN 3.0
AMD hardware encoders have lower quality than NVIDIA/Intel. Recommended only for non-critical encodes or when NVENC/QSV unavailable.
Hardware vs CPU Quality Comparison Encoder Quality Speed Recommendation CPU (x264/x265) Excellent Slow Use for archival quality, small batches NVENC (NVIDIA) Near-identical Very Fast Best balance of speed + quality QSV (Intel) Good Fast Great for large batches, slightly lower quality VCE (AMD) Fair Fast Last resort, noticeable quality drop
Codec Compatibility Matrix Playback Device Support Device HEVC (H.265) AV1 iPhone/iPad ✅ Yes (iOS 11+) ❌ No Mac (Apple Silicon) ✅ Yes (hardware decode) ✅ Yes (M3+, software) Mac (Intel) ✅ Yes (7th gen+) ❌ No Apple TV ✅ Yes (4K model+) ❌ No Android Phone ✅ Yes (Android 5.0+) ⚠️ Partial (Android 10+, software) Windows PC ✅ Yes ✅ Yes (software decode) Chromebook ⚠️ Partial (software) ✅ Yes (native support)
Smart TV Support TV Brand HEVC (H.265) AV1 Samsung ✅ 2016+ models ⚠️ 2020+ high-end models only LG ✅ 2016+ models ⚠️ 2019+ OLED models only Sony ✅ 2016+ models ⚠️ 2021+ select models TCL ✅ 2017+ models ⚠️ 2020+ Roku models Vizio ✅ 2016+ models ❌ No
AV1 smart TV support is extremely limited. If you watch on TV, use HEVC for guaranteed hardware decoding. AV1 may software-decode (slow, stuttering).
Browser Support Browser HEVC (H.265) AV1 Chrome ⚠️ Windows 10+ only (software) ✅ Yes (native) Firefox ❌ No (licensing issues) ✅ Yes (native) Safari ✅ Yes (native, hardware) ⚠️ Partial (macOS 14+, software) Edge ✅ Yes (native) ✅ Yes (native)
For web streaming (Plex, Jellyfin): Use HEVC if users watch in Safari/Edge, AV1 if primarily Chrome/Firefox.
Server HEVC (H.265) AV1 Plex ✅ Direct play + transcode ✅ Direct play (transcoding experimental) Jellyfin ✅ Full support ✅ Full support (10.8+) Emby ✅ Full support ⚠️ Partial support Kodi ✅ Yes (hardware decode) ✅ Yes (19.0+, software) VLC ✅ Yes ✅ Yes (3.0+)
Decision Flowchart Recommended Presets Fast Balanced (HEVC + GPU) Best for: Large libraries, broad device support, fast encodingCodec : HEVC CRF : 23 Hardware : NVENC/QSV Speed : 60-100 FPS (1080p) Encoding time : 500 movies in 2-3 days File size : 40-50% reduction
Maximum Compression (AV1 + CPU) Best for: Small libraries, archival, modern devicesCodec : AV1 CRF : 23 Hardware : CPU only Speed : 2-5 FPS (1080p) Encoding time : 500 movies in 2-3 weeks File size : 50-60% reduction
Ultra Quality Archival (HEVC + Low CRF) Best for: Reference quality, 4K HDR collectionCodec : HEVC CRF : 18-20 Hardware : CPU or NVENC p7 Speed : 10-30 FPS (4K) Encoding time : 100 4K movies in 1 week File size : 20-30% reduction (high quality)
Fast Streaming (HEVC + High CRF) Best for: Mobile/web streaming, non-critical contentCodec : HEVC CRF : 28-30 Hardware : NVENC/QSV Speed : 80-120 FPS (1080p) Encoding time : 500 movies in 1-2 days File size : 60-70% reduction (lower quality)
