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Playback of an HLS adaptive stream on Android KitKat is stuttering after you seek

There is an issue on Android KitaKat with HLS playback - when I seek with the progress bar, the video is stuttering. I know that KitKat introduced serious problems related to HLS, but I checked the same HLS with MX Player, on the same device, and seeking works fine, it doesn't cause any stuttering.

Could take a look into this, and perhaps provide some additional info about the cause of this?

Here is the HLS stream:

http://stv-cloudio-stage.rsslabs.net/v1/files/streamer/65727473-6d61-7265-8ec2-ef6881b59e2e/output/b3039a39-8cee-437e-9680-7295064d8321/The+Colbert(JW-Player)_x_hls.m3u8

5 Community Answers

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Andrew

JW Player Support Agent  
0 rated :

If this stream is embedded with a normal video tag, are you seeing the same issues when seeking?

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ion.buzu

User  
0 rated :

Thanks for your fast reply.

I created an HTML page in which I embedded this stream with the normal video tag, and the issue occurs there too.

However, I see another issue (it's intermittent), the JW Player gives "Error loading media. File could not be played." Sometimes it happens when starting playback, other times during the playback.

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Andrew

JW Player Support Agent  
0 rated :

Hi,

Just making sure, but are you setting androidhls: true within the embed for all instances?

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ion.buzu

User  
0 rated :

Yes, it is set to true.

Actually, the issue also occurs on your HLS test page:
http://demo.jwplayer.com/hls-tester/


Other than this, I have a question: what is the recommended maximum resolution and/or bitrate of the stream for the playback to work fine on mobile devices (especially Android), with no stuttering and no 'error loading media', considering the Internet connection is steady?

Thanks.

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Andrew

JW Player Support Agent  
0 rated :

There are many different bandwidth scenarios and phone types, so there unfortunately isn’t a one-size solution regarding this. It really depends on your audience and content. Personally, I wouldn’t go above 720p for mobile devices, but that’s just personal preference.

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