H.264 is a high compression digital video codec standard written by the ITU-T Video Coding Experts Group (VCEG) together with the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) as the product of a collective partnership effort known as the Joint Video Team (JVT). This standard is identical to ISO MPEG-4 part 10, and is also known as AVC, for Advanced Video Coding. The final drafting work on the first version of the standard was completed in May of 2003. The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) has approved the inclusion of H.264/AVC as an optional feature in release 6 of its mobile multimedia telephony services specifications. The Digital Video Broadcast (DVB) standards body in Europe approved the use of H.264/AVC for broadcast television in Europe in late 2004.

Evolution of H.264:

H.264 is a name related to the ITU-T line of H.26x video standards, while AVC relates to its ISO/IEC MPEG roots. It is usual to call the standard as H.264/AVC, or AVC/H.264 to emphasize the common heritage. The name H.26L, also related to its ITU-T history, is far less common, but still used. Occasionally, it has also been referred to as "the JVT codec", in reference to the JVT organization that developed it. (Such partnership and multiple naming is not unprecedented, as MPEG-2 video also arose from a partnership between MPEG and the ITU-T, and MPEG-2 video is also known in the ITU-T community as H.262.)

Rate Saving Compare To Other Standards:

The emerging H.264 standard has a number of advantages that distinguish it from existing standards
while sharing common features with other standards. The following are some of the key advantages
of H.264:

• Up to 50% in bit rate savings: Compared to H.263v2 (H.263+) or MPEG-4 Simple Profile, H.264 permits a reduction in bit rate by up to 50% for a similar degree of encoder optimization at most bit rates.
• High quality video: H.264 offers consistently good video quality at high and low bit rates.
• Error resilience: H.264 provides the tools necessary to deal with packet loss in packet networks and bit errors in error-prone wireless networks.
• Network friendliness: Through the Network Adaptation Layer, H.264 bit streams can be easily transported over different networks.