JVET-AP0020 Deployment status of the HEVC standard [G. J. Sullivan]

This information contribution contains a survey of deployed products and services using the HEVC standard and the formal specifications in which it is supported, along with a brief introduction to the standard written for broad readership. Revision marking is included to show changes relative to JVET-AO0020-v1 of January 2026.

Updates included:

• The following statistics are reported by the “Can I use” website, which tracks feature support in web browsers: As of April 9, 2026, the reported support in browsers remained essentially unchanged in the range of 94%–97%, but the relative portion in the “Supported” category increased, as further detailed below:
  • 20% “Supported” for “all users”
  • 20% “Supported” for “all tracked”
  • 9% “Supported” for “tracked desktop”
  • 26% “Supported” for “tracked mobile”
• NETINT reported the following statistics in April 2026 from a survey of “286 video professionals”, conducted in Q4 of 2025:
  • 65% currently using HEVC
  • 20% planning or evaluating HEVC for future use
  • The total percentage of responses in these two categories exceeded that of any other video coding format (85% for HEVC described as approaching “saturation” versus 84% for AVC which was described as “universal”)
• NASA announced in March 2026 that its NASA+ streaming service was using HEVC, including on the Artemis II crewed mission beyond the lunar orbit.