Alibaba Cloud Conducted the World’s First 8K Internet Live Streaming

Alibaba Cloud conducted the world’s first 8K Internet live streaming at The Computing Conference – Shenzhen Summit on March 28, 2018. The audience at the summit enjoyed the immersive visual experience of watching the crystal-clear demonstration video transmitted live from Alibaba’s Xixi Campus in Hangzhou, located 1,300 kilometers from the venue.

It was a milestone three minutes in the history of technology as it was the first time an 8K video has been live-streamed over the Internet. With a definition of 33 million pixels per frame, which is about 16 times better than a high definition video, 8K videos provide audiences with an unprecedented viewing experience, but at the same time pose challenges for transmission and computing systems.

Alibaba Cloud is now the world’s first cloud provider with the transmission capability for end-to-end 8K live streaming. This is made possible by using Alibaba Cloud’s software for video playback and live streaming. Real Time Messaging Protocol (RTMP) streams are pushed to Alibaba Cloud’s live broadcast center and high-speed video channels.

To support smooth end-to-end 8K streaming, Alibaba Cloud leverages its self-developed supercomputing capabilities of the Elastic Compute Service (ECS) Bare Metal Servers for its live broadcast center. Through Alibaba Cloud’s expansive Content Distribution Network (CDN), which consists of over 1,300 nodes distributed around the world, 8K videos have the potential to reach a global audience.

Zhaoyuan Zhu, Head of Alibaba Cloud CDN Business said, “Alibaba Cloud’s 8K Internet live streaming heralds a new era for high-resolution video cloud solutions, just as 4K resolution did in 2013. Our video streaming solutions are supported by our robust CDN, storage and cloud computing facilities as well as our advanced transcoding technology.”

“Our 8K Internet video streaming solutions further enhance audiences’ viewing experiences in games and entertainment. They also open up new possibilities through applications in multiple areas, such as high-precision video telemedicine. We will continue to develop our services to support these different applications.” Zhu added.