|
Variable bitrate (VBR), or less commonly variable bit rate, is a term used in telecommunications and computing that relates to the bitrate used in sound or video encoding. As opposed to constant bitrate (CBR), VBR files vary the amount of output data per time segment. VBR allows a higher bitrate (and therefore more storage space) to be allocated to the more complex segments of media files while less space is allocated to less complex segments. The average of these rates is calculated to produce an average bitrate for the file that will represent its overall sound quality. MP3, WMA, Vorbis, and AAC files can optionally be encoded in VBR.
Pros and cons The basic argument for using VBR streams is quite simple and compelling — it produces a better quality-to-space ratio compared to an equivalent CBR algorithm. However, there are some disadvantages: | ||||||||
|
| |||||||||
 |
|
| |