AVI vs. MKV
What is Difference between AVI and MKV Format? In video files used in computers or other devices with capabilities to play multimedia we can see the extensions mp4, m4v, avi, mkv, vob, among many others. MKV and AVI are commonly found among these types of files and in essence you could say that both function as wrappings that are used to weapons the contents, i.e. audio and video files, inside. The AVI format was developed in early 1990 by Microsoft, while the MKV format was introduced in the year 2002. Let’s see now what the difference between AVI and MKV Formats is.
Difference between AVI and MKV Format
AVI
For its acronym in English (Audio Video Interleave), it is a multimedia container format developed by Microsoft for the Windows operating system environment. AVI was developed from the resource sharing of the RIFF file format, which was owned by IBM and Microsoft. The AVI format compresses both audio and video data, so its quality will depend a lot on compression.
MKV
It is a multimedia container format with an open and free standard that can contain any number of data streams in a single file, such as a movie can be encoded in MKV to contain the audio tracks in two different languages in one same file. The required audio can be selected when played. Conceptually this format is very similar to MP4 or AVI and they share a very similar architecture. For this same reason it is easier to edit and store multimedia files in MKV format, in addition it allows storing a greater amount of data in a same file.
Key Differences between AVI and MKV Format:
- MKV is an open container format, whereas AVI is a closed container format whose owner is Microsoft.
- Both can use the most used codec’s, such as H.264 and A3C, but AVI has limitations for H.264 / AVC. Therefore, HD content may not be available.
- AVI can only store a single stream of video and a single stream of audio while MKV can store multiple streams of audio and video in the same file (container).
