JVET-U0021 Deployment status of the VVC standard [G. J. Sullivan (Co-chair)]

This information contribution contains an initial survey of deployed products and services, publicly available software source code, and related tools supporting the VVC standard (Rec. ITU-T H.266 | ISO/IEC 23090-3). This included the following reported developments.

Publicly available software source code:

1. JVET has developed the VVC Test Model (VTM) as its reference software encoder and decoder codebase. It is intended primarily to demonstrate coding efficiency capability and proper interpretation of the syntax and decoding process specified in the standard (but not as a speed-optimized implementation), and is intended to be usable as a starting basis for product implementations. The software is available under a BSD copyright licence.
2. InterDigital developed a multi-threaded VTM decoder, and reported 6–10× speed-up relative to the single-threaded reference software. It is intended to support all features of the VTM. The software was later placed in an accessible repository, and it is available under the same BSD copyright licence as the VTM software.
3. Fraunhofer HHI announced the VVenC encoder and VVdeC decoder open-source software (release 0.1) in September 2020. It includes support for multithreading operation, single-pass rate control, perceptual QP adaptation, and motion-compensated temporal filtering (MCTF). The software has four defined presets for quality/speed traedoff (called slow, medium, fast, and faster). Subjective testing reported in October 2020 indicated that the VVenC encoder had about the same or better subjective compression performance as the VTM encoder when operating in its “medium” speed configuration (operating with MCTF and QP adaptation disabled in the VTM and enabled in VVenC and with rate control disabled in both) with encoding speed more than 100× that of the VTM, for 4K UHD SDR video content. As of December 2020, a “slower” preset was added, along with an improved single-pass rate control and a new two-pass rate control. The “slower” preset mode reportedly achieves approximately the same BD-rate coding efficiency as the VTM while providing a speedup of more than 8.6x for UHD and 5.2x for HD sequences relative to the VTM. As of December 2020, with release 0.2, the software is available under a BSD copyright licence.
4. Friedrich–Alexander University Erlangen–Nürnberg released an open-source bitstream analyser as an add-on for the VTM decoder. The analyser counts the occurrence of coding tools and coding modes used in a decoded bitstream and can be used for evaluating the decoding energy and time demands of VVC features. The software is available under a BSD copyright licence.

Software decoders:

1. Sharp announced a real-time software decoder in June 2020, and issued a corresponding press release in December 2020. As of June 2020, it was reportedly capable of decoding 4K CTC UHD bitstreams at up to 40 Mbps at more than 60 fps.
2. Tencent announced its O266dec software decoder with SIMD and multithreading support and an associated FFmpeg/VLC-based video player in October 2020. As of December 2020, it is reportedly more than 3× the speed of the VTM reference software decoder when tested under VVC common test conditions (CTC) in single-threaded operation and about 20× the VTM decoder speed in 8-thread operation. It could reportedly decode UHD video at more than 60 fps at up to 40 Mbps and decode full HD video at more than 200 fps. In December 2020, a version with mobile platform support based on Arm Neon technology was reported. On an Apple A14 processor (iPhone 12pro) in single-threaded operation, it could reportedly decode 8-bit 1080p CTC bitstreams at more than 50 fps, and in multi-threaded operation it could decode such bitstreams at more than 100 fps and could decode 8-bit 4K UHD bitstreams at more than 30 fps in the RA configuration. Although 8-bit operation was more optimized, the decoder also supports 10-bit operation.
3. Alibaba announced its Ali266 decoder for mobile devices (e.g., Android and iPhone) in December 2020. It includes optimizations for multi-threading, ARM assembly, cache efficiency, and memory usage, particularly for 8 bit video content. Real-time speed is reported for 8 bit 720p, 1080p (using 2–4 threads for up to 60 fps) and 4K (up to 7 Mbps) video content with the ALF feature disabled.

Bitstream analyser products:

1. Elecard announced support for VVC in its StreamEye and StreamAnalyzer products in April 2020.
2. ViCueSoft supports VVC in its VQ Analyzer bitstream analysis product, as of late 2020.

Conformance test sets:

1. A conformance test set is under development by JVET. It reached the CD stage of the ISO/IEC approval process in October 2020.
2. Allegro DVT began offering a conformance test set for VVC as early as January 2020 (i.e., initially in preliminary form before the finalization of the standard)

Encoding products and services

1. Ateme launched support for VVC in its Titan family of products, and demonstrated the technology in an OTT channel launched in November 2020
2. Bitmovin, in partnership with Fraunhofer HHI based on VVencC as described in item 3), announced support of VVC in its video encoding platform in November 2020.

Experts are encouraged to send information about other public announcements of products and services based on VVC to Gary Sullivan for inclusion in future similar reports.