WebM is a digital container format which provides royalty-free and open video compression which is compatible with HTML5 video.
This type of file supports a fairly limited range of input file formats but has the benefits of providing an extremely high quality video/audio output with a comparatively small file size. Native support for this type of file was announced in 2010 for Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Opera. When released it supported VP8 video and Vorbis audio types, which were appropriate for displaying content within a web page at standard quality – in 2013 VP9 and Opus file types were added, greatly improving the quality.
Digital Container Format
A digital container format, or wrapper format, is a type of metafile (a format which can contain data of multiple types) that explains how different types of data interact with each other within one specific file. In relation to WebM file types this refers to the method of identifying the relationship between multiple audio and video streams within one file.
HTML5 Video
HTML5 video originally intended to become the new operating standard for displaying video and audio content within a web page, disagreement regarding the most appropriate and effective video format has caused significant issues with the progression of the project.
Using HTML5, the following section of code will embed a video of that format:
<video src="movie.webm" poster="movie.jpg" controls> This content will display if the browser does not support the element. </video>
GIF
GIFs are currently one of the most commonly used file types to show short looping video animations, typically these contain very few frames and are relatively low quality compared to most video and image formats. However, GIF file sizes are smaller than the images it is comprised of and significantly smaller than a video of the same size and length.
One of the most limiting aspects of the GIF format is the lack of audio associated with files. This is rectified by various websites offering services to add audio to a specific gif using alternative services such as YouTube and Vimeo to play audio alongside – however, WebM incorporates audio within the file itself.
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