HESP vs HLS vs MPEG-DASH: Comparing Live Streaming Protocols

If you are a regular live streamer, you are well aware of the menace of streaming protocol fragmentation. HLS and MPEG DASH (also known as MPD or simply DASH) are popular streaming protocols that are frequently used for on-demand and live video streaming. But with the entry of the new HESP streaming protocol, the contest has intensified. So, it is natural to get confused while picking one out of the three.

While all of them have their own strengths and weaknesses, choosing one should always depend on your specific business needs. We are here to help you out in this process!

In this blog, we will tell you everything about the new HESP protocol, compare and contrast it with HLS and DASH protocols, and help you decide which one would suit your business. So, let’s get started!

HESP stands for High-Efficiency Streaming Protocol. This streaming protocol is specially designed for HEVC video and uses a number of features to improve the performance of the HEVC Streaming Progressive, like adaptive bitrate streaming, error resilience, and ultra-low latency live streaming.

So, before understanding HESP, we will have to know about HEVC and HEVC Streaming Progressive. HEVC is an advanced standard for encoding video files. It is more efficient than the previous standard, AVC (Advanced Video Coding).

HEVC Streaming Progressive is a form of video streaming that uses the HEVC standard of video encoding. It can deliver high-quality video at lower bitrates. This makes it ideal for streaming video over slow or unstable networks.

And since HESP is made for HEVC codec, it clearly shows similar characteristics. If we have to define it technically, the HESP streaming protocol is an HTTP-based adaptive bitrate streaming protocol. It can stream videos at ultra-low latency with a maximum latency of 2 seconds and minimum latency of 0.4 seconds while showing good bitrate flexibility. Let’s understand it’s working in detail.

HESP is quite unique because it uses two video streams, instead of a single stream like the other two protocols. The first one is called the “Initialization Stream”, while the second is called the “Continuation Stream”. The Initialization stream is a collection of Key Frames, while the Continuation stream is like a normal encoded stream that all the other protocols use.

Now you must be thinking what is a Key Frame? Different forms of video frames are used during the video compression process of encoding, but there are four major types of video frames:

Now coming back to the HESP streams. Since the Initialization Stream contains only the Key Frames, it is used to start the stream. Also, when the viewer changes the position of the video playback, this stream is used, as it can instantly decode the frame and restart the playback.

When the video playback starts, the first frame is pulled from the Initialization Stream. But once it has been successfully decoded and played, the player automatically starts pulling the frames from the second stream, whic