The developers of open-source video converter Handbrake have released Handbrake 1.6, a new version for 64-bit versions of Windows 10 and Windows 11, as well as Mac and Linux devices.

Handbrake 1.6 introduces support for AV1 video encoding to convert existing media to the new format using custom settings or new presets:

• Add AV1 video encoding
• Added high bit depth and color depth support for various encoders and filters
• Added 4K AV1 General, QSV (hardware) and MKV (Matroska) presets
• Added 4K HEVC general preset and updated related presets to use similar encoder settings
• Modified Web presets and renamed Creator, Email, and Social
• Removed VP8 preset
  • The VP8 video encoder is now deprecated and will be removed in a future release
  • The associated Theora encoder is long deprecated and will be removed in a future release

Other video encoder/decoder changes:

• Added SVT-AV1 (software) and Intel QSV AV1 (hardware) video encoders
• Added VP9 10-bit encoder
• Added NVENC HEVC 10-bit encoder
• Added VCN HEVC 10-bit encoder
• Added H.264 levels 6, 6.1 and 6.2 for x264 encoder
• Added H.264/H.265 4:2:2 and 4:4:4 profiles for x264 and x265 encoders
• Added H.265 4:2:2 profile for VideoToolbox encoder on Apple Silicon
• Added support for Intel Deep Link Hyper Encode (leverages multiple QSV media engines to improve performance)
• Fixed long-standing issue with slowest NVENC encoder preset causing encoding to fail
• Removed support for Intel CPUs prior to 6th generation (Skylake) when using Intel Quick Sync Video

For more information, please check the update announcement: https://github.com/HandBrake/HandBrake/releases