Configure media quality levels
Learn how to select and configure media quality levels for your FastPix medias.
FastPix supports processing content with three different media quality levels. The quality level you choose affects the output quality, cost, and available platform features for your media.
Free encoding at all resolutions up to 4K. Standard quality is ideal for MVPs, user-generated content, internal tools, and experimentation where cost efficiency matters most.
Paid encoding with higher consistency and better control over processing. Pro quality is designed for branded video platforms, e-learning, and production workloads that require reliable playback quality.
Highest encoding optimized for 4K, HDR, sports, and cinematic content. Premium quality delivers maximum visual accuracy for mission-critical and high-end video experiences.
The standard quality level provides cost-efficient processing suitable for common use cases. It uses a reduced encoding ladder with optimized compression, making it ideal when bandwidth, storage, or delivery costs need to be minimized.
Best for:
Pricing: Standard quality is the most cost-effective option for encoding, storage, and delivery.
The pro quality level encodes your media at a consistent high-quality level with improved visual and audio fidelity. This balanced tier uses enhanced encoding settings that deliver better quality than standard while keeping resource usage reasonable.
Best for:
Pricing: Pro quality incurs a cost per media minute of encoding.
The premium quality level is optimized for premium media content where the highest quality is required. It uses extensive encoding ladders with the highest bitrates to ensure professional-grade output with maximum clarity and fidelity.
Best for:
Pricing: Premium quality incurs a higher cost per media minute of encoding, storage, and delivery.
You control the quality tier of a video by setting the mediaQuality field at the time you create a media. This applies to both on-demand (URL-based) uploads and direct uploads from your device.
Choose the quality level that best matches your use case, standard, pro, or premium and FastPix applies the appropriate encoding pipeline during ingest.
Direct uploads (from your device): Follow the dashboard or API steps in described in the Upload a video from your device guide.
On-demand uploads (from a URL): Follow the pull-based upload flow outlined in the Upload a video from a URL guide.
NOTE:
If you don’t specify amediaQualityvalue when creating a media, FastPix defaults to"standard".
Medias using different media quality levels have different features or limits available. Refer to the table below for details:
No, the media quality level is set when you create a media and cannot be changed afterward. If you need a different quality level, you’ll need to create a new media with your desired mediaQuality setting. This ensures consistent encoding and prevents quality mismatches.
If you don’t include the mediaQuality parameter in your API request, FastPix automatically defaults to "standard" quality. This ensures your content is processed even if you forget to specify a quality level, while keeping costs optimized for most use cases.
Pricing varies by quality level and affects three areas:
Contact FastPix sales for detailed pricing information specific to your usage volume.
Yes, you can mix quality levels within a single project or application. This is actually a recommended practice—use Standard for bulk content, Pro for important videos, and Premium for your highest-value media. Each media’s quality level is set independently when you create it.
Yes, higher quality levels typically require more processing time because they use more complex encoding ladders and higher bitrates. Premium quality takes the longest to process, followed by Pro, then Standard. However, actual processing time also depends on video length, resolution, and content complexity.