# HEVC support and CPU load in brave or vivaldi browser **URL:** \ **Category:** Applications\ **Created:** [June 27, 2025, 7:45am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984 "2025-06-27T07:45:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 7:45am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/1 "2025-06-27T07:45:02Z")
Hi, I am currently testing brave and vivaldi browser to eventually replace firefox in the future. But neither brave nor vivaldi play HEVC encoded videos. Example video: [https://test-videos.co.uk/vids/bigbuckbunny/mp4/h265/1080/Big\_Buck\_Bunny\_1080\_10s\_1MB.mp4](https://test-videos.co.uk/vids/bigbuckbunny/mp4/h265/1080/Big_Buck_Bunny_1080_10s_1MB.mp4) ```auto ffprobe Big_Buck_Bunny_1080_10s_1MB.mp4 Stream #0:0[0x1](und): Video: hevc (Main) (hev1 / 0x31766568), yuv420p(tv, progressive), 1920x1080 [SAR 1:1 DAR 16:9], 834 kb/s, 30 fps, 30 tbr, 15360 tbn (default) ``` This video plays fine in firefox, but is not playing in brave or vivaldi. Is that a misconfiguration on my side or is this a real problem in both browsers? And other than that I realize a huge CPU load with vivaldi and brave when playing youtube videos fullscreen. Example: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/LXb3EKWsInQ/maxresdefault.jpg "COSTA RICA IN 4K 60fps HDR (ULTRA HD)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXb3EKWsInQ) **approx. CPU load over all browser processes:** ```auto brave 35 % vivaldi 25 % firefox 10 % ``` Is that correct? Does somebody see the same differences? Watching videos is one of my main use cases in a browser. This would be quite a push back for me using brave or vivaldi. ---
**Author:** ![xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/xircon/32/9124_2.png) [@xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/xircon)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 8:51am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/2 "2025-06-27T08:51:07Z")
Video 1 - is the link correct? Just seeing a black rectangle. Video 2 - Plays fine. Vivaldi browser. Let me try Firefox. BRB. Video 1 - plays OK in firefox. Weird. Not noticing any CPU spikes though. ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 8:56am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/3 "2025-06-27T08:56:34Z")
The link to video #1 is correct. It just does not work with vivaldi or brave. The CPU load is about playing the video #2 in full screen, which in my case is: 2560x1440 CPU load monitored with “`top`” ---
**Author:** ![xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/xircon/32/9124_2.png) [@xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/xircon)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 9:01am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/4 "2025-06-27T09:01:58Z")
It appears it is not possible (at least for vivaldi), it is turned off - licensing issue? Who knows! ---
**Author:** ![xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/xircon/32/9124_2.png) [@xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/xircon)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 9:05am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/5 "2025-06-27T09:05:48Z")
Don’t have Brave, but seeing 25% and around 8% for firefox. ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 9:09am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/6 "2025-06-27T09:09:48Z")
> [@xircon](#): > > It appears it is not possible (at least for vivaldi), it is turned off - licensing issue? Who knows! From what I have read so far it seems to be a limitation of all chromium based browsers. And it seems to be a license issue from google. ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 9:11am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/7 "2025-06-27T09:11:26Z")
> [@xircon](#): > > Don’t have Brave, but seeing 25% and around 8% for firefox. And that is not a license issue. It seems vivaldi and brave are not as good in hardware acceleration as firefox. ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 9:52am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/8 "2025-06-27T09:52:10Z")
And the performance differences are even more severe then I thought. When watching video #2 with youtube I can select max quality “2160p60 (4K)”. If I do so brave and vivaldi have a CPU load of 230-280 % while firefox stays below 50 %. Thats significant and a total surprise for me. ---
**Author:** ![xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/xircon/32/9124_2.png) [@xircon](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/xircon)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 10:38am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/9 "2025-06-27T10:38:27Z")
First video doesn’t play in google-chrome either!! ![image](https://forum.endeavouros.com/uploads/default/original/3X/e/b/eb3eefe24114a8b9f51e9622d8e1aaefc095ec1f.png) ---
**Author:** ![Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/schlaefer/32/11917_2.png) [@Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Schlaefer)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 10:57am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/10 "2025-06-27T10:57:50Z")
You have to figure out hardware video acceleration for these browsers. That’s the reason why the first isn’t playing (no browser software decoding on Linux) or that they require a lot of CPU (software decoding). ---
**Author:** ![Bink](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/bink/32/87216_2.png) [@Bink](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Bink)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 11:39am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/11 "2025-06-27T11:39:06Z")
Launch your **Chromium** based browser from the command line with this added argument ([sourced from here](https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=304003)): ```auto --enable-features=DefaultANGLEVulkan,VaapiIgnoreDriverChecks,Vulkan,VulkanFromANGLE ``` The HEVC video should play now. I’m not sure how to make that permanent, but that’s a start at least. ---
**Author:** ![Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/schlaefer/32/11917_2.png) [@Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Schlaefer)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 11:48am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/12 "2025-06-27T11:48:16Z")
Yes, that works for Chromium. You can make it permanent by putting it into `~/.config/chromium-flags.conf`. But no clue about vivaldi or brave. ---
**Author:** ![MyNameIsRichard](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mynameisrichard/32/111876_2.png) [@MyNameIsRichard](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/MyNameIsRichard)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 11:50am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/13 "2025-06-27T11:50:48Z")
It doesn’t seem to work for Vivaldi ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/schlaefer/32/11917_2.png) [@Schlaefer](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Schlaefer)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 11:53am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/14 "2025-06-27T11:53:08Z")
I assume a working answer is on the Arch wiki page: [https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Vivaldi](https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Vivaldi) * * * OK, f it, quick test, puting it into `~/.config/vivaldi-stable.conf` and everthing works fine. ---
**Author:** ![Bink](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/bink/32/87216_2.png) [@Bink](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Bink)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 11:58am UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/15 "2025-06-27T11:58:42Z")
> [@Schlaefer](#): > > But no clue about vivaldi or brave. I can confirm, it works for Brave. ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 2:05pm UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/16 "2025-06-27T14:05:42Z")
> [@Bink](#): > > I can confirm, it works for Brave. it does not work for me. Neither in `~/.config/chromium-flags.conf` nor `~/.config/brave-flags.conf` nor directly on the commandline `brave --enable-features=DefaultANGLEVulkan,VaapiIgnoreDriverChecks,Vulkan,VulkanFromANGLE` video #1 does not play and video #2 consumes 250 % CPU **EDIT:** It works. I had manually tweaked some brave flags which I had to put back to default before it works. I have it now in `~/.config/brave-flags.conf`. video #1 is playing and video #2 has now less than 50 % CPU, similar to firefox. Thanks a lot, @Bink . I will mark your post as the solution. ---
**Author:** ![Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/moonbase59/32/112659_2.png) [@Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Moonbase59)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 3:36pm UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/17 "2025-06-27T15:36:00Z")
This might turn out being important info for many that try alternative browsers. Thanks all for finding out! ---
**Author:** ![mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/mbod/32/16833_2.png) [@mbod](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/mbod)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 3:44pm UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/18 "2025-06-27T15:44:47Z")
I have learned one more thing during this whole investigation that I want to share: You can check the hardware acceleration status in vivaldi and brave by using the internal browser url: `vivaldi://gpu` or `brave://gpu`. This displays the GPU internals. At the bottom of the page you see “`Video Acceleration Information`”. In my case this is: ![image](https://forum.endeavouros.com/uploads/default/original/3X/6/0/60d37dd8dfe9cda73e10e7e2e7c71c94d97ebff1.png) Without the settings in `~/.config/brave-flags.conf` this section is empty ---
**Author:** ![Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/moonbase59/32/112659_2.png) [@Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Moonbase59)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 3:55pm UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/19 "2025-06-27T15:55:05Z")
For Chromium, this is under `chrome://gpu`. For Firefox, go to `about:support` and scroll _far_ down, to the **Media** section: ![Auswahl_028](https://forum.endeavouros.com/uploads/default/original/3X/d/4/d42cff7e4e529a16e0d9f3d882bf2aac8a8443eb.png) (Yes, this is an old laptop from 2017, only H.264… And I didn’t know we could have _audio hardware acceleration_… Hm… 🤔) ---
**Author:** ![Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/user_avatar/forum.endeavouros.com/moonbase59/32/112659_2.png) [@Moonbase59](https://forum.endeavouros.com/u/Moonbase59)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2025, 4:33pm UTC](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984/20 "2025-06-27T16:33:30Z")
For Chromium, as an example, It indeed pays reading [https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Chromium#Hardware\_video\_acceleration](https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Chromium#Hardware_video_acceleration). Didn’t know Chromium-based browsers came with an “acceleration disabled” default (as opposed to Firefox). Making my Chromium work at least with H.264 on my i915 graphics, I had to put this into my `~/.config/chromium-flags.conf`: ```auto --enable-features=AcceleratedVideoDecodeLinuxGL,AcceleratedVideoDecodeLinuxZeroCopyGL,AcceleratedVideoEncoder ``` ![Auswahl_030](https://forum.endeavouros.com/uploads/default/original/3X/6/5/65190c5a63b598c427825769bd4790ffe6055eb4.png) [Next page](https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/hevc-support-and-cpu-load-in-brave-or-vivaldi-browser/72984.md?page=2)