From being the forte of broadcasters to becoming a pastime of mobile users, live streaming has fast forwarded quite a bit
Since 2015, live video streaming technology has come to be a way of living. Twitter’s Periscope, Facebook Live, YouTube Live Streaming, Live.ly, Tumblr Live Streaming, many are the options for live streaming today.
In fact, the video streaming trends 2017 itself hinted the rise of mainstream Virtual Reality Streaming and 360-degree video. They will gain more prominence in 2018 and beyond. Not to miss mentioning that GoPro, the world’s most popular adventure camera is releasing its drone camera — Karma — that can live stream videos from a bird’s eye view. All these online video streaming trends give a 30,000 feet high view of how the future of video will be like in our daily life.
There is a whole lot happening in the real-time video streaming technology arena. Like any other trend that evolves with time and according to user persona, live video streaming technology is also set out for massive overhauls in the near future. We mean, 2018.
Here are some top live video streaming trends 2018 you must have your eyes and ear open for.
1. HQ And 4K As The Way Forward
Nobody likes to see pixelated and blurry videos of 360p and 480p anymore. The world is moving towards to 720p and 1080p HQ videos or videos with 4K resolution. Even communication tool Skype is rolling out new video streaming technology based 4K products Skype TX with 4K streaming capabilities. The way forward for mobile video streaming technology will be high-res videos that can play glitch-free on all platforms without any hindrances.
2. Live Streaming in Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing has laid new inroads in online marketing. Tomoson estimates a US$6.50 return for every single US$1 invested in influencer marketing. Influencer marketing relies heavily on interactive content including videos for spreading word-of-mouth publicity on a massive scale. These live video streaming trends hint how live video will indeed become a powerful weapon in the hands of influencer marketing who want to reach their loyal audience in-the-moment, on-the-spot with interactive communication.
3. Mobile as a Broadcast Station
Periscope, Facebook Live, Instagram Live, Meerkat, and many other live streaming apps have turned mobile users into instant broadcasters. comScore Inc. has predicted a 600% jump in mobile live streaming.
Cisco, the networking giant also forecasts mobile video streaming trends where live video to grow by 39 times in volume!
Mobile will play a pivotal role in pushing live streaming as a way of live with innovative everyday applications. Online video streaming technology will evolve systematically to become more accommodative for live video streaming.
Also read: AR and VR are divergent realities, and this infographic helps us tell them apart
4. VR Streaming Will Become Commonplace
Facebook rolled out Virtual Reality Live Streaming in July 2017. That has marked the beginning of an era where live streaming will teleport viewers to high-interactive virtual locations with a lively ambience of their own. The sudden surge in sales of virtual reality headsets also supports this fact.
Along with VR, 360-degree live streaming will also catch up as a trend. At least 20,000+ 360-degree videos are uploaded to Facebook on a daily basis (Bold Content Video). The viewership for these videos are also beating regular videos with a high margin. Marketers are also debating whether they should move to the 360-degree video format to gain more traction for their business.
5. Flash will bow out to HTML
Flash Players have faced the heat in video streaming for several reasons. First and foremost, Flash video player updates have been often used as a shield for drive-by virus downloads. Secondly, flash players consume too much of battery resource on mobile devices. Above all, Google Chrome, which enjoys a substantial size of the market share dropped support for Flash. Many CDNs are also discontinuing support for Flash players. These two reasons combined with the sub-par user experience has led to the growing adoption of HTML for video streaming.
HTML5 video players offer a quick and scalable option to streaming HQ videos without heavy consumption of resources. They also enable broadcasters to stream videos to multiple screens including mobiles, desktops, TVs and other screen sizes making them the obvious future choice for live streaming. Hence, HTML will become a steady contender for flash players eventually replacing once and for all.
6. Powerful and efficient video formats
As need for high-res video streaming shoots through the roof, broadcasters will have to look out for advanced video compression and streaming formats that consume less data and also render a superior user experience. Next-gen video formats like H.265 and H.264 will become commonplace.
The icing on the cake is that, these video formats are royalty-free giving broadcasters all the power they need for efficient video streaming. Live video streaming solutions are also integrating these formats to lessen the burden of encoders. H.264, H.265 and similar video formats will also fuel the widespread adoption of 4K and HQ video streaming.
Looking Forward
These video streaming trends for 2018 show how far latest video streaming technology has evolved in the recent days. From being the forte of broadcasters to becoming a pastime of mobile users, live streaming has fast forwarded quite a bit.
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