Overview and performance evaluation of the ITU-T draft H.26L video coding standard

We give a brief tour of the emerging ITU-T H.26L videocoding standard. Like its predecessors, H.26L is being designed partly for videoconferencing applications; however, many other applications are considered to be within the scope of the design effort and tests indicate that H.26L is fully suitable for a very broad range of applications. Starting from a clean slate, H.26L is a powerful new design that is forward-looking in its performance and scope of applications. We compare H.26L to the highest capabilities of the most complex and newest versions of prior standards such as H.263 and MPEG-4, and provide benchmarks for its performance. Our analysis indicates that the draft H.26L standard offers compelling advantages over all existing video coding standards. It has the potential to redraw the landscape of consumer and enterprise video applications.