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x265 Encoder is a free software library and application for encoding video streams into the H265/MPEG-H HEVC compression format, and is released under the terms of the GNU GPL. x265 CLI is a command line software. x265 is used in several free video converters like Handbrake, Xvid4PSP, StaxRip, RipBot264, MEGUI, Xmedia Recode, etc. Command line software.
Free software
OS:
File size: 1MB
Portable version
Other versions
Version history
Alternative software
OS:
File size: 1MB
Portable version
Other versions
Version history
Alternative software
Screenshots
Latest version
Download
Download x265 Encoder 4.2 Windows 1MB Win
Portable 
Download x265 Encoder 4.2 Mac Mac
Download x265 Encoder 4.2 Linux Linux
Software License
Supported operating systems
Mac OS Linux More information and other downloads
x265 Encoder GUIs/Frontends:
Handbrake, Xvid4PSP, StaxRip, RipBot264, VidCoder, MEGUI, Xmedia Recode.
Handbrake, Xvid4PSP, StaxRip, RipBot264, VidCoder, MEGUI, Xmedia Recode.
Version history / Release notes / Changelog / What's New
Version 4.2
Release date - 19th April, 2026.
New feature
Threaded Motion Estimation (Experimental feature)-It uses a dedicated threadpool to precompute Motion Estimation in parallel.Improves encoding speed upto 1.5x for 1080p & lower resolution on multi core machines with low frequency setting. On high frequency systems or on machines with low number of cores, the overhead of additional Motion estimation work may outweigh parallelism
Enhancements to existing features
1.Add new Levels 6.3 to 7.2 specified in ITU-T H.265 (V9) (09/2023) and above 2.Improve Slices feature with check zeroMv 3.Enable frame parallelism with MCSTF feature 4.Updated support to signal AOM FGM params 5.Improve quality with SBRC feature 6.Updated DolbyVision P5 VUI defaults
API changes
API Support to enable Threaded Motion Estimation(--threaded-me)
Optimizations
RISC V optimizations including SAD, SATD, DCT, IDCT, block copy, pixel utilities, SAO, loopfilter, transpose kernels resulting in 2x encoding speed.
ARM SIMD optimizations including the use of NEON and SVE instruction set extensions. The following algorithms now have optimized SIMD implementations: DST, IDCT, SSE, SSD ,intra_pred_planar, pelFilterLumaStrong, interpolation, planecopy, dequant_normal, blockcopy, pixel variance resulting in 8% faster encoding speed compared to v4.1
Bug fixes
Fix memory leaks (no command line option, SEI buffer, analysis save/load)
Fix chroma qp offset for non yuv444 inputs
Fix max supported input resolution
Fix bugs with ARM SIMD optimizations
Fix Alpha and Multiview feature flag support in x265_config
Fix test harness issues, CMake errors
Fix inconsistent output with aq-motion
Fix crash with hist-scenecut on high bit-depth builds
Fix lookahead concurrency bug
Fix shared link issue (R_X86_64_PC32), yuv recon output issue, rd-refine and dynamic-refine issue, inputs for Windows named pipe,weighted prediction delta_chroma_offset, crf and vbv issue in abr-ladder, psnr and ssim reported with MCSTF feature, internally overflowed VBV variables
Known issues
Output mismatch between analysis save & load with cutree with reuse level < 10
Inconsistent hash mismatch with abr-ladder feature
Performance regression observed with threaded-me feature on high frequency systems and for higher resolutions (4k)
Release date - 19th April, 2026.
New feature
Threaded Motion Estimation (Experimental feature)-It uses a dedicated threadpool to precompute Motion Estimation in parallel.Improves encoding speed upto 1.5x for 1080p & lower resolution on multi core machines with low frequency setting. On high frequency systems or on machines with low number of cores, the overhead of additional Motion estimation work may outweigh parallelism
Enhancements to existing features
1.Add new Levels 6.3 to 7.2 specified in ITU-T H.265 (V9) (09/2023) and above 2.Improve Slices feature with check zeroMv 3.Enable frame parallelism with MCSTF feature 4.Updated support to signal AOM FGM params 5.Improve quality with SBRC feature 6.Updated DolbyVision P5 VUI defaults
API changes
API Support to enable Threaded Motion Estimation(--threaded-me)
Optimizations
RISC V optimizations including SAD, SATD, DCT, IDCT, block copy, pixel utilities, SAO, loopfilter, transpose kernels resulting in 2x encoding speed.
ARM SIMD optimizations including the use of NEON and SVE instruction set extensions. The following algorithms now have optimized SIMD implementations: DST, IDCT, SSE, SSD ,intra_pred_planar, pelFilterLumaStrong, interpolation, planecopy, dequant_normal, blockcopy, pixel variance resulting in 8% faster encoding speed compared to v4.1
Bug fixes
Fix memory leaks (no command line option, SEI buffer, analysis save/load)
Fix chroma qp offset for non yuv444 inputs
Fix max supported input resolution
Fix bugs with ARM SIMD optimizations
Fix Alpha and Multiview feature flag support in x265_config
Fix test harness issues, CMake errors
Fix inconsistent output with aq-motion
Fix crash with hist-scenecut on high bit-depth builds
Fix lookahead concurrency bug
Fix shared link issue (R_X86_64_PC32), yuv recon output issue, rd-refine and dynamic-refine issue, inputs for Windows named pipe,weighted prediction delta_chroma_offset, crf and vbv issue in abr-ladder, psnr and ssim reported with MCSTF feature, internally overflowed VBV variables
Known issues
Output mismatch between analysis save & load with cutree with reuse level < 10
Inconsistent hash mismatch with abr-ladder feature
Performance regression observed with threaded-me feature on high frequency systems and for higher resolutions (4k)
View full changelog
All features
Encoder features
Full prediction and transform quad-tree recursion supported
Adaptive B-frame placement
B-frames as references / arbitrary frame order
CABAC entropy coding
Intra: all block types (32x32, 16x16, 8x8, 4x4, and PCM with all predictions)
Inter P: all partitions (from 64x64 down to 8x4)
Inter B: partitions from 64x64 down to 8x4 (including all merge modes
and biprediction)
Weighted prediction for P slices
Multiple reference frames
Ratecontrol: constant quantizer, constant quality, single pass ABR, optional VBV
Scenecut detection
Parallel encoding on multiple CPUs, both frame-level and wavefront parallelism
Full prediction and transform quad-tree recursion supported
Adaptive B-frame placement
B-frames as references / arbitrary frame order
CABAC entropy coding
Intra: all block types (32x32, 16x16, 8x8, 4x4, and PCM with all predictions)
Inter P: all partitions (from 64x64 down to 8x4)
Inter B: partitions from 64x64 down to 8x4 (including all merge modes
and biprediction)
Weighted prediction for P slices
Multiple reference frames
Ratecontrol: constant quantizer, constant quality, single pass ABR, optional VBV
Scenecut detection
Parallel encoding on multiple CPUs, both frame-level and wavefront parallelism
Sections/Browse similar tools
Alternative to x265 Encoder
(Latest version updated)DivX HEVC Encoder (Apr 17, 2015)
Guides and How to's
Notify me when software updated or report software
| 28 reviews, Showing 1 to 5 reviews |
Rating by f0ns02003 on
Aug 22, 2025 Version: 4.1.190
OS: Windows 11 64-bit Ease of use: 10/10
Functionality: 10/10
Value for money: 10/10
Overall: 10/10
Love the presets, implementations. H265 rules!
Review by Miss Sopho Pizza Girl on
Jan 2, 2023 Version: 3.5
OS: Windows 10 64-bit Ease of use: 10/10
Functionality: 10/10
Value for money: 10/10
Overall: 10/10
This is designed for lower bitrates(outclasses H264 easily) or streaming. H264 and H265 at high bitrates will give similar quality, with H264 holding a slight edge for archiving. Now what is classed at high bitrates? That said low bitrates will look better using hevc compared to other codecs, but may still look bloody awful visually, just less awful than the others. All down to what you deem as quality for your eyes. I prefer h264 for archiving at 1080p. 4k is a waste of time for my old eyes and I don't have the best hardware to utilize this h265 codec at the moment.
Review by Roger on
Nov 22, 2022 Version: 3.50
OS: Windows 10 64-bit Ease of use: 9/10
Functionality: 10/10
Value for money: 10/10
Overall: 10/10
To be fair there are genuine gripes about how 'slower' this codec is, but that depends on the user's rig and compatibility issues. I use very modern hardware and still notice choppy decoding and encoding of hevc needs some setting to maximize its benefits. I know dozen of folks who have had major issues with h265 in Win10 so whingers and fan boys aside(he winks!) let's not get to hung up on things.
We had moans when Xvid was phased out and now h264 is apparently facing the same chop depending on whom you listen to, but nonetheless a great codec and one which I prefer to still use for simplicity.
We had moans when Xvid was phased out and now h264 is apparently facing the same chop depending on whom you listen to, but nonetheless a great codec and one which I prefer to still use for simplicity.
Review by Peter on
Mar 9, 2021 Version: 3.5 RC1
OS: Windows 8 64-bit Ease of use: 6/10
Functionality: 8/10
Value for money: 10/10
Overall: 6/10
to Not Gaz:
You are totally right.
As long as there's always rippers use x265 and no av1/vp9 shit bdrips in my hard disk, I'm totally fine with it.
I'm never a "silly fanboy", just need to say something 'cause of some UNFAIR reviews here.
You are totally right.
As long as there's always rippers use x265 and no av1/vp9 shit bdrips in my hard disk, I'm totally fine with it.
I'm never a "silly fanboy", just need to say something 'cause of some UNFAIR reviews here.
Review by steve on
Mar 9, 2021 Version: 3.4
OS: Windows 10 Ease of use: 10/10
Functionality: 10/10
Value for money: 10/10
Overall: 10/10
| 28 reviews, Showing 1 to 5 reviews |
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Our hosted software are virus and malware scanned with several antivirus programs using www.virustotal.com. (NOTE! Just one virustotal warning is 99.9% a false positive. And some software might receive 2-6 warnings but it's if they are not all same virus/trojan then it's 99% false positives.)
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Version history available = Complete changelog on our site.
= Windows version available. = Mac OS version available. = Linux version available.Our hosted software are virus and malware scanned with several antivirus programs using www.virustotal.com. (NOTE! Just one virustotal warning is 99.9% a false positive. And some software might receive 2-6 warnings but it's if they are not all same virus/trojan then it's 99% false positives.)
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