FLV vs. MP4: Video File Comparison

FLV and MP4 are two of the most common video file formats you may see, use, and interact with regularly. This guide will help you understand the pros and cons of each format to pick the right one for your needs, and you can use Movavi's video converter to convert between them.

FLV vs. MP4: what are the main differences? No one following the discussions and comparisons of these two file formats can miss the fact that MP4 usually comes out on top. It appears to be the favorite of both equipment and software technicians as well as enthusiastic video users who have frequent cause to convert videos from one format to another and want to do so with ease and no loss of quality.

That does not decide the issue once and for all, of course. And it is worth noting that even the fans of MP4 usually nod to some contexts in which FLV works well and may well be preferable, such as web pages and YouTube. So, you can convert MP4 to FLV and vice versa if you need to.

FLV is a video file format developed by Adobe Systems. Its full name is Flash Video, and it can appear with the extensions .flv or .f4v, along with some other rarer variants. It was created in 2002 and is primarily used to play digital video content in web browsers online, featured on sites like YouTube.

MP4 is a video file format created by the Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG). It can have the extensions .mp4, .m4a, or .m4v, as well as certain others, which are less commonly seen. It was developed in the early 2000s and can be used to store video, audio, and image data. In terms of usage, MP4 is one of the most widely-used video file formats, compatible with many devices, platforms, and programs.

MP4 reportedly stores both video and audio digital coding in good quality. Opinion on this is less definite on FLV, but the pros and cons of FLV usually do not focus on the quality of the file format. MP4 is notable for less loss of quality with higher degrees of compression. It can store data types other than video and audio, such as object descriptors, scene descriptors, and other object-oriented file structures.

In terms of MP4 vs. FLV for size and compression, MP4 files tend to be smaller than FLV files. This allows MP4 files to be transferred between devices or downloaded/uploaded more quickly, which can make them easier to work with. MP4 also responds better to compression and is able to preserve its video quality, while FLV files can noticeably lose some quality when compressed.

On this issue, there is almost no debate. MP4 can be used on almost all platforms, devices, applications, and file drivers. Most platforms not only support MP4 use but have dedicated MP4 decoding hardware. FLV seems to be favored for streaming video on the web. It is compatible with most web browsers, but not with mobile browsers – obviously, an increasingly serious limitation as smartphones and a host of other mobile devices are coming to dominate internet connectivity, especially – but far from exclusively – among younger generations.

Because most platforms have dedicated MP4 decoding hardware, MP4 seems to play back smoothly on almost any platform, including mobile devices. As mentioned, FLV works best for streaming videos on the internet and does not play at all on most mobile devices. FLV works well for sharing videos online and for uploading, for example to YouTube. In this context, the single biggest advantage of FLV format is commonly reported to be that it can play inside a webpage (but using the Flash browser plug-in). And FLV files are usually very small and can be easily downloaded by web surfers who want to copy the video.

A notable and increasingly criticized aspect of FLV is that a Flash Player plug-in is needed to play the FLV video files, which is why they won't work on mobile devices, among other platforms. A plug-in is not usually required for playing back video in the MP4 file format. For playback, FLV files are not always hardware accelerated, either.

It is often mentioned, though hardly as the headline, that the MP4 files tend to use less battery than many other video file formats. That certainly can be an edge when it comes to its use on mobile devices, where MP4 is used while FLV is not.