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What is VP9?

Definition

VP9 is an open, royalty-free video codec from Google. It compresses video roughly as efficiently as H.265/HEVC - far smaller than H.264 at the same quality - and is widely used by YouTube and inside WebM files, usually paired with Opus audio.

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VP9 shrinks video by analyzing each frame and storing mainly the changes between frames, using larger and more flexible block sizes (superblocks up to 64x64) than its predecessor VP8. Because Google released it royalty-free, anyone can encode or decode VP9 without paying license fees, which is a key reason YouTube adopted it. At the same visual quality, a VP9 file is typically 30-50% smaller than an equivalent H.264 file.

In practice you find VP9 video inside .webm container files, almost always alongside Opus audio. Browser support is strong: Chrome, Firefox, and Edge decode it natively, and many Android devices have hardware decoders. Its main weaknesses are slower encoding than H.264 and patchier support on Apple devices and some older or low-power hardware.

People often treat VP9 and WebM as the same thing, but WebM is the container (the file wrapper) while VP9 is the codec (the compression method) stored inside it. VP9 is also frequently compared to H.265/HEVC: efficiency is similar, but VP9 is royalty-free whereas H.265 requires patent licensing. Its successor is AV1, which compresses even better.

Quick facts

  • Open, royalty-free video codec made by Google
  • Roughly comparable in efficiency to H.265/HEVC
  • Typically 30-50% smaller than H.264 at the same quality
  • Used by YouTube and stored in WebM files, usually with Opus audio
  • Decodes natively in Chrome, Firefox, and Edge; encoding is slower than H.264

Frequently asked questions

Is VP9 better than H.264?
For compression efficiency, yes - VP9 produces files roughly 30-50% smaller than H.264 at the same quality. The trade-offs are that VP9 encodes more slowly and has slightly less universal device support than H.264, which remains the most broadly compatible codec.
Is VP9 the same as WebM?
No. WebM is a container format (the file wrapper, with a .webm extension), while VP9 is the video codec stored inside it. A WebM file usually contains VP9 video and Opus audio, but the container and the codec are separate things.
Does VP9 work in all browsers?
VP9 plays natively in Chrome, Firefox, and Edge, and on many Android devices with hardware support. Safari added VP9 support more recently, and on some older or low-power hardware playback can fall back to slower software decoding.
VP9 vs AV1 - what's the difference?
AV1 is the successor to VP9 and compresses video even more efficiently, typically producing smaller files at the same quality. Both are open and royalty-free, but AV1 is more demanding to encode and has newer, less universal hardware support.

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Related terms

AV1H.265 (HEVC)Opus (audio codec)