How To Play AV1 Videos On Windows 10

how to play av1 videos windows 10

AV1 is a promising video codec as big names including Microsoft, Apple, Google, and Mozilla are very interested in it and have spent much time developing it. It is a royalty-free media codec with super high compression performance that aims to supersede Google’s VP9 and compete with HEVC codec, thus allowing for highly-compressed videos up to 4K 60fps sharing over the internet, faster, easier and cheaper. 

Now that AV1 has giant backstage supporters that make it superior than HEVC/H.265 video codec, how to play AV1 on Windows 10 successfully since HEVC playback on Windows 10 is not that easy? Here explains two best ways. 

Download AV1 Video Extension To Play AV1 On Windows 10 

av1 video windows 10 missing codec

If you try to play an AV1 video on Windows 10 with the default Windows 10 application, you will receive an error message: Missing Codec. This item was encoded in a format that’s not supported. 0xc00d5212. Actually, AV1 playback is difficult as of now due to the limited software and hardware support. In detail, Windows 10 can’t supply native software to enable AV1 playback. But the good news is that Microsoft has prepared AV1 Video Extension to help decode AV1 videos on Windows 10. 

By opening Microsoft Store, you can search for AV1 Video Extension and install it on your Windows 10 computer. After that, your Windows 10 computer has AV1 decoder to let the Movies & TV app or Edge to open AV1 videos on Windows 10 successfully. 

However, the Windows 10 AV1 Video Extension is still a beta version, performance issues like choppy playback are inevitable. So, try a third-party AV1 player must be a better choice. 

5KPlayer - Free AV1 Player To Play AV1 Videos On Windows 10 Without Hiccup 

5k free av1 video player windows 10

According to the test from Bitmovin, current AV1 codec offers about 20% and 30% better compression rate compared to VP9 and HEVC respectively, and it is predicted that the compression rate should be 50% better. What does that mean? It tells that AV1 is a heavier yet better video codec which needs more powerful media player software to decode it. 

Besides Windows 10 AV1 Video Extension, the only other way at present to play AV1 videos on Windows 10 is to use third-party AV1 video player. The player should be typically designed to meet the demand of playing videos with high compression standard, say playing HEVC and AV1 alike. 

Bad news is that there are a few media players out the market that can support this brand new video codec. Good news is that 5KPlayer is discovered as of this article to be an ideal AV1 player to play AV1 files on Windows 10. In 5KPlayer’s latest update, it adds support for decoding the newest AV1 video codec on both Mac and Windows 10 computer, which lets you enjoy AV1 images with crisp edges and high frame rates simultaneously. More specifically, it plays AV1 videos no matter in 720p/1080p HD or 4K 30fps/60fps very smoothly. 

AV1 is made for free, and 5KPlayer is also that kind of thing requiring no cost from you. You can feel free to download 5KPlayer from the official site to play AV1 videos on Windows 10 with ease of mind. BTW, 5KPlayer can also play HEVC, H.264, VP9, MP4, MKV, MP3, etc. files, and download AV1 videos from online sites like YouTube and stream AV1 videos from Windows 10 to smart TV wirelessly.

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