After years of development, the open-source, royalty-free video codec AV2 is poised to make its formal debut next week, with the official release date now set for 29 May 2026. Initially expected by the end of 2025, the launch of AV2 has been eagerly anticipated by developers and industry stakeholders alike.
Recent developments have signaled the codec’s imminent arrival. VideoLAN, known for its work on open media technologies, recently released Dav2d—an open-source AV2 decoder in the same spirit as its widely-used Dav1d AV1 decoder. This move, along with the latest commits to the Alliance for Open Media’s (AOM) reference software implementation, AVM (AV2 Video Model), strongly suggest that the final version is ready for public release.
The AVM project’s version has been bumped to 1.0.0, and the changelog is dated 29 May 2026, marking the first official release of AV2. This timing aligns with the rollout of Dav2d and the upcoming Computex event in Taipei, where vendors are expected to showcase the latest AV2 technology.
What is AV2?
AV2 is the next-generation open, royalty-free video coding format developed by the Alliance for Open Media, a consortium dedicated to advancing open media technologies. As the successor to AV1, AV2 promises significant improvements in compression efficiency, broader support for emerging use cases such as augmented and virtual reality, and enhanced visual quality across a wider range of applications.
Since its inception in 2020—two years after AV1’s release—AV2 has evolved with innovations across its encoding framework. Key advancements include extended recursive partitioning, refined transform block partitioning, semi-decoupled luma and chroma handling, improved intra-frame prediction (including chroma from luma), and new inter-frame prediction modes.
While AV2 was originally slated for a late 2025 release, the codec remained in draft form until now. At CES 2026, early AV2 playback was demonstrated using VLC 4.0 on a MacBook Pro, hinting at its readiness for real-world use.
Market Position and Performance
AV2 is positioned to compete with the royalty-based VVC (Versatile Video Coding), much like the earlier rivalry between HEVC and AV1. Prototype implementations as of 2025 have demonstrated AV2’s ability to deliver around 30% lower bitrates than AV1 at comparable visual quality, with overall performance expected to rival VVC.
With its official release set for 29 May 2026, AV2 is poised to become a key player in the next wave of video compression technology, offering an open, accessible alternative to proprietary codecs.
