As promised earlier, Microsoft today added support for Vorbis, Theora and Ogg codecs to Windows 10. A special package is available in the Microsoft Store.
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The package Web Media Extensions adds support for the mentioned codecs. Once installed, it will add the ability to play the appropriate audio tracks in Edge, Music and third-party apps like Spotify.
Codecs are available for the entire Windows 10 device family, including PCs, Mixed Reality, Xbox, and Mobile.
The package description in the Store is as follows.
The Web Media Extensions package extends Microsoft Edge and Windows 10 to support open source formats commonly encountered on the web. By installing this Media Extension package, users will be able to natively play content delivered in the OGG container or encoded using the Vorbis or Theora codecs. Once installed, this extension is automatically used by both web sites and apps with no user action required. Simply install and play new content in Microsoft Edge and apps today!
Included Technologies:
• OGG Container Parser
• Vorbis Decoder
• Theora Decoder
Windows 10 got support for Vorbis for a reason. As you may already know, the company has discontinued their Groove Music Pass subscription service and is going to transfer all the subscribers to Spotify instead. Spotify is actively using the OGG container and the Vorbis codec in their streaming service and in the desktop app. Having native Vorbis support in Windows 10 will allow Microsoft and third party developers to implement a number of UWP (Store) apps for use with the Spotify service and make the Microsoft Store platform more attractive for developers and users. This can be one of the reasons for the upcoming change.
So, what do you think about this change? Do you use these media formats? Tell us in the comments.
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That’s hilarious cause Theora is discontinued in 2011(!) as far as know. Was a terrible codec only supposed to hype open source projects