FLV file format

File extension

.flv

File category

video

Description

This flash video format is defined by the Adobe systems. There are multiple users of the flash video format such as YouTube, Hulu, VEVO, Yahoo! and many others as well. One can access the flash video on various operating systems by enabling the Adobe Flash Player along with web browser plugin or on other third-party programs except for iOS.

Technical details

FLV files use the H.263 standard under the Sorenson Spark (FourCCFLV1) codec and there are various reasons for it such as;

These are the first codec files which are supported by Flash Player.
The heavy usage throughout other versions being able to support this very codec

The audio can be recorded over the video using a microphone and Nellymoser Asao codec. By using the bitmap tile and lossy compression while taking care of the reducing color depth the screenshare is possible. But the basic difference is that the screenschare done by the 2nd way is only compatible with Flash Player 8.

Programs

Microsoft Windows Photo Gallery Viewer

VideoLAN VLC Media Player

Windows Media Player

Main program

FFDShow

Developer

Adobe Systems Incorporated

MIME type

video/x-flv

flv converter

flv converter