How do WebM and AVIcompare? Here's everything you need to know to choose the right format — and how to convert between them.
Web Media
WebM is Google's open-source video format designed specifically for the web. It offers excellent compression and quality, especially with the VP9 and AV1 codecs, and is royalty-free.
Audio Video Interleave
AVI is one of the oldest and most recognized video formats. While it has been largely superseded by MP4 and MKV, AVI files are still commonly found in legacy video libraries and older applications.
| Specification | WebM | AVI |
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Web Media | Audio Video Interleave |
| Extension | .webm | .avi |
| MIME type | video/webm | video/x-msvideo |
| Category | Video | Video |
| Developer | Microsoft | |
| Year introduced | 2010 | 1992 |
WebM and AVI target different use cases. WebM is ideal for html5 web video, while AVI works best for legacy video archives.
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