🎞️ Video to HLS Converter

A Node.js script that converts any video file into an HLS (HTTP Live Streaming) format with separate audio, video, and subtitle segments. Hardware-accelerated encoding and decoding are supported using AMD, NVIDIA, and Intel GPU/CPU.

❔ Usage of HLS

• Only one set of streams (1 video, 1 audio, and 1 subtitle) is rendered at a time, reducing server load.
• Adaptive bitrate streaming allows the video resolution to adjust automatically based on the user's internet connection.
• Streams are broken into small, time-based segments, so only the current and nearby chunks are loaded, minimizing bandwidth usage and server stress.
• Commonly used by streaming services to provide smooth and scalable content delivery.
• HLS content can be served via static servers or CDNs, ensuring fast and efficient video playback.

✨ Features

• Converts any video to HLS stream format
• Generates separate segments for:
  • Video
  • Audio
  • Subtitles
• Hardware acceleration support (AMD, NVIDIA, Intel)
• External support for Mac M CPUs via Brew
• Uses FFmpeg under the hood
• Simple commands to generate metadata, convert, or run both steps in sequence

🔧 Requirements

• FFmpeg installed and accessible from your system's PATH
  Make sure FFmpeg is compiled with support for:

  • vaapi or qsv (Intel)
  • nvenc (NVIDIA)
  • amf (AMD)
  • videotoolbox (MAC - M series)

Mac M cpus only support externally via brew

• Install brew if not already
  • /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
• FFMPEG install via bew
  • brew install ffmpeg

You can check support via ffmpeg -hwaccels and ffmpeg -encoders

• Node.js v20 or later
• npm or yarn

📦 Installation

Clone the repository and checkout:

git clone https://github.com/Sanjiv39/hls-generator.git
cd hls-generator

Install dependencies

npm i

🕹️ Process

Create a config.js similar to config.example.js

1. Generate metadata.json from input file

npm run input

2. Generate HLS chunks from metadata.json to given output folder

npm run output

OR

3. Process above processes sequentially

npm run convert

📗 References

• Config Examples
• Codecs
• Hardware Accelerators
• Encoder Presets