ApsaraVideo Live is a PaaS solution for live streaming. It leverages advanced stream ingestion and distribution capabilities and supports distributed real-time transcoding. With ApsaraVideo Live, you can quickly upload your live content to the cloud and distribute it to a large audience at ultra-low latency, ensuring a high-quality and smooth viewing experience.
Architecture
The server of ApsaraVideo Live can ingest, process, and distribute live streams in real time.
A streamer collects live content with a video capture device and pushes the live stream using the Push SDK. The live stream is initially pushed to the Alibaba Cloud CDN point of presence (POP) nearest to the streamer. Then, ApsaraVideo Live uses edge ingest to ingest the live stream from POP to its live center. This enhances the speed and stability of data transfer from the streamer to the live center.
After the live stream is pushed to the live center, you can process the stream based on your business requirements. For example, you can transcode the stream, configure time shifting, record the live content, or capture snapshots.
The processed stream is distributed to CDN POPs, which then deliver the stream to viewers' devices for playback. You can integrate ApsaraVideo Player SDK into your mobile app used by viewers to play the stream.
You can also use the Live-to-VOD feature to store the recorded stream as a video-on-demand asset in ApsaraVideo VOD. Then, you can edit the recorded live content to produce short videos and deliver the VOD content to your target audience in a convenient manner.
Features
ApsaraVideo Live provides various streaming features tailored to different scenarios based on requirements for latency, interactivity, and content enrichment.
Feature | Scenario | Billing |
Low interactivity scenarios: The audience mainly watches the live content without interaction, such as broadcast media and live streams of shows or commercial events. In these cases, viewers may experience slight desynchronization of the video content due to varying network conditions. | ||
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High interactivity scenarios: The viewers can actively engage in the live streams. Ideal for live chat, co-streaming, and Real-time Conversational AI. | ||
Innovative streaming: The production studio integrates various capabilities, such as Video AI, video translation, ad replacement, and interactive streaming to enrich your live content. Ideal for organizing media content in live esports, live shopping, online classes, and live events. |
In addition, ApsaraVideo Live provides media processing features such as transcoding, recording, time shifting, snapshot, and content moderation. It also supports interactive messaging and face retouching. For more information, see Functions and features.
Feature comparison
Item | RTS | Standard streaming | |
RTS 2.0 | RTS 1.0 | ||
Streaming protocol | ARTC (based on WebRTC) | ARTC (based on WebRTC) | RTMP, FLV, and HLS |
End-to-end latency | 200 to 400 ms | 500 to 1,000 ms |
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Resistance to poor networks | Smooth playback even at an end-to-end packet loss rate of 30% | Smooth playback even at a playback-side packet loss rate of 30% | Limited performance under poor network conditions |
Compatibility |
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Coverage | Global | Global | Global |
Best practices | |||
SDK compatibility
Android | iOS | Web | WeChat mini programs | Windows | Flutter | HarmonyOS | Uni-app | |
✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | |
✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | |
✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ✅ | |
✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ | ❌ | ✅ | ❌ | |
✅ | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ | ❌ |
Billing
You are charged fees for data transfer, media processing, and other services when you use ApsaraVideo Live. For more information, see Billing overview.
For pricing information, visit the ApsaraVideo Live pricing page.
References
To activate ApsaraVideo Live, see Activate ApsaraVideo Live and purchase resource plans.
To learn how to use the basic features of ApsaraVideo Live, see Get started with ApsaraVideo Live.