HTML Media
HTML Multimedia
Multimedia on the web includes sound, music, video, movies, and animations. Modern web pages commonly combine multiple media types to create richer user experiences.
What Is Multimedia?
Multimedia refers to content that can be seen or heard, such as images, audio, video, films, and animations.
Web pages often include multimedia elements in different formats, depending on browser support and use cases.
Browser Support
Early web browsers supported only plain text.
Over time, browsers added support for colors, images, fonts, audio, and video, making multimedia a core part of the modern web.
Multimedia Formats
Multimedia content is stored in media files. The file type is usually identified by its extension.
Common multimedia file extensions include:
.mp3,.wav– audio.mp4,.webm,.ogg– video.avi,.wmv,.mov– legacy video formats
Common Video Formats
HTML supports a limited set of modern video formats that work consistently across browsers.
- MP4 (.mp4) – widely supported, recommended by YouTube
- WebM (.webm) – open format developed by Google and partners
- Ogg (.ogg) – open format developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation
Many older formats such as AVI, WMV, QuickTime, RealVideo, and Flash are no longer supported directly by web browsers.
Only MP4, WebM, and Ogg are part of the HTML standard for video.
Common Audio Formats
Audio formats vary in compression, quality, and browser support.
- MP3 (.mp3) – the most popular format for music, supported by all browsers
- WAV (.wav) – high-quality audio, larger file size
- Ogg (.ogg) – open audio format supported by HTML
- MP4 (.mp4) – can also contain audio tracks
Legacy audio formats such as MIDI, RealAudio, WMA, and AAC are not supported by the HTML standard.
Only MP3, WAV, and Ogg audio formats are officially supported by HTML.
Image Media