Update: JW7 is now available. Check it out here.
In January 2012, we announced the launch of our online resource, The State of HTML5 Video Report. Since its launch, we have had a tremendous response from our community. The page itself has been tweeted over 3,000 times, received 30,000 visits the day of its launch, and is still actively circulating the digital sphere.
Three months after its initial launch, we have updated the report with some very interesting findings. First, you will find a new JavaScript section, dedicated to video scripting using the video tag. Common use cases for this are the rendering of custom controls (like JW Player does) or page interaction with the video timeline (like Popcorn.js does). Second, you will find all existing tests updated with results from the latest browsers and mobile platforms. We highlight some interesting findings below.
Market Share
Compared with our statistics from last quarter, we already see shifts in market share. By market share, we mean the portion of the online market that is controlled by a particular browser / device:
IE 6/7/8 are declining quickly; their market share has gone from approximately 28% to 22% in the last few months. IE9, however, is growing (up to 11% market share from 9%). Chrome & Firefox are growing as well. Both have surpassed the share of IE 6/7/8.
Additionally, Android now has surpassed Opera. In terms of the mobile market, iOS still controls roughly 2x (4%) more than the other platforms, due to its dominance over the tablet market & recent success with the iPhone 4S. Other mobile platforms are virtually nonexistent.
Android 4.0
While Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) was released last year, not every device-maker has updated their devices to the latest operating system. Still, some devices (like the Galaxy S2) now run ICS, so we have included it in our test results. Unfortunately, we found Android 4.0 to exist as a mixed bag of new features and new bugs. Some of the more interesting findings were:
- Support for WebM video decoding. It is in software though, so larger or longer videos do not play.
- Support for Apple HLS streaming. Unfortunately, quality switching has not yet been implemented.
- The video tag controls are still buggy. It is still difficult to start a video in HTML5.
- The scripting API is still a bit buggy – no metadata, no errors & no buffering. API for playback and seeking have improved though.
- Videos play inline on mobile phones, which creates an awkward UX. A fullscreen button is available, but it is as equally hard to click as the play button (e.g. they are both tiny).
Fullscreen API
There have been several updates on the state of Fullscreen playback in HTML5, which is pretty exciting for online video. While Chrome & Safari already supported the Fullscreen API, Firefox recently introduced support for it too (view our test page here). Thus, between these three browsers, the majority of the browser market supports fullscreen playback in HTML5. Opera is actively working on fullscreen support; presumably IE10 will introduce beta support as well.
Other interesting developments that you should stay tuned for more information on include Firefox’s drop in support for the fullscreen button, and the discussion around fullscreen support in mobile devices, which becomes more relevant now that Android 4.0 plays the video inline.
We hope you take a look at the most recent version of our published report, share with your community, and send us your feedback! Feel free to post your comments directly to this blogpost, or join the discussion on our Facebook page.