Glossary

In a coded video stream there are different frame types, according to their level of dependency.

An Intra Frame (known also as an I-Frame) is a frame that is independent. As it is not dependent on any other frame in the stream, it can be decoded with no need of any additional information. It is also known as a "key frame", as it can be used to allow random access within a stream, serving as a key.

Intra frames usually require a large amount of bits to encode. This means that when encoding video, especially for interactive communications, Intra Frames are avoided as much as possible.

See also Inter Frame.