Video

Introduction

 * For an excellent introduction to the issues around audio and video formats, see A Primer on Codecs for Moving Image and Sound Archives - and 10 Recommendations for Codec Selection & Management PDF version
 * Basics of streaming protocols

Pure video formats
These formats are "monolithic" video formats, meaning that the file format and the encoding of the video data are tied to each other.


 * Bink Video (BIK)
 * Enhanced VOB
 * FLIC (FLI/FLC; animation format used by older Autodesk products)
 * GRASP GL animation format
 * RealVideo
 * Smacker/SMK (created by RadGameTools; mostly used in games)
 * WMV

Video container formats
These formats are only containers for video, which can contain videos in many different encodings (or even other data like audio)


 * ASF
 * AVI
 * FLV
 * M4V
 * MKV
 * MXF
 * QuickTime
 * Replay
 * VOB
 * VP8
 * WebM
 * OGG containers (with their variants OGM, OGV, etc.)

Video stream formats
These formats are raw bitstream formats commonly contained in one of the above containers (but not necessarily)


 * Apple Intermediate Codec
 * Cinepak
 * Dirac
 * H.264
 * HuffyYUV
 * Indeo
 * Moving Blocks - Acorn Replay stream
 * MPEG and all of its variants (MPEG2, MPEG4, etc.)
 * 3ivx (this is just another fourcc for an MPEG4 variant)
 * DivX (this is essentially MPEG4 with some quirks)
 * XviD (another MPEG4 variant)
 * Sorenson Video Codec
 * Theora
 * VC-1
 * VC-3

Simple animation formats

 * Ace Film

See Graphics: Animated image formats.

Metadata formats

 * SRR (reScene files)
 * SRS (reSample files)

Subtitle formats

 * SUB and IDX (VobSub subtitle format)
 * SUP (HD-DVD subtitle format)
 * SSA and ASS (SubStation Alpha)
 * SRT (SubRip)
 * SMI (SAMI subtitle format)
 * USF (subtitles) (Universal Subtitle Format)
 * SSF (subtitles) (Structured Subtitle Format)
 * CMML (Continuous Media Markup Language)
 * CVD (An SVCD subtitle format)
 * DVD (DVD subtitle format)
 * DXFP (Distribution Format Exchange Profile)
 * JACOsub (Subtitles for Amiga video)
 * Kate (Kate subtitle format)
 * OGT (Philips Overlay Graphics Text)
 * STL (Spruce Subtitle Format)
 * XSUB (XSUB subtitle format)

Video streaming services

 * Amazon Instant Video
 * Hulu
 * Netflix Streaming
 * Vimeo
 * Xfinity On Demand
 * YouTube

Television broadcast formats

 * BTSC (NTSC with multichannel sound carrier)
 * NTSC
 * PAL
 * SECAM

See Radio for more details of how such broadcasts are transmitted.

Unknown
These formats still need to be sorted into the above categories
 * AVS
 * Canopus ProCoder
 * Cineform
 * Cinema Craft Encoder
 * Elecard
 * FIASCO
 * InterVideo
 * MJ2
 * MainConcept
 * MSU Lossless Video Codec
 * NSD (Nero Super Video CD)
 * SheerVideo
 * TechSmith Screen Capture Codec