Convert CAVS to MPEG — Free Online Tool
Convert CAVS (Chinese Audio Video Standard) files to MPEG format, re-encoding the video stream to MPEG-2 and audio to MP2 — producing broadly compatible legacy video files suited for broadcast workflows, DVD authoring pipelines, and hardware players that predate modern codec support.
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FFmpeg Command
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Note: Browser-based encoding uses approximate quality targets. For precise CRF compression, copy the FFmpeg command above and run it on your desktop.
Estimated output:
Conversion Complete!
DownloadHow It Works
CAVS uses a proprietary Chinese national video codec (AVS/AVS+) that is largely unsupported outside of Chinese broadcast equipment and specialized software. During this conversion, FFmpeg fully decodes the CAVS video stream and re-encodes it as MPEG-2 video using the mpeg2video encoder, while the audio is transcoded to MP2 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer II), the standard audio format paired with MPEG-2 video in broadcast and DVD contexts. Because both codecs change completely — from AVS to MPEG-2 video, and from AAC to MP2 audio — this is a full transcode rather than a remux. The output is a standards-compliant MPEG program stream that can be read by virtually any media player, DVD authoring tool, or broadcast device from the last three decades.
What Each Flag Does
| Flag | What it does |
|---|---|
ffmpeg
|
Invokes the FFmpeg command-line tool. All subsequent arguments define the input, processing options, and output for this CAVS-to-MPEG conversion. |
-i input.cavs
|
Specifies the input file in CAVS format. FFmpeg will use its AVS/CAVS demuxer and decoder to read the proprietary Chinese video stream and associated audio track. |
-c:v mpeg2video
|
Sets the video encoder to MPEG-2, the codec used in DVD-Video and broadcast television standards. This fully re-encodes the AVS video stream from the CAVS source into MPEG-2, which is natively supported by virtually all legacy and modern playback devices. |
-c:a mp2
|
Transcodes the audio to MP2 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer II), the standard audio codec paired with MPEG-2 video in broadcast and DVD contexts. This replaces the AAC audio from the CAVS source with a format that is universally recognized by MPEG-compatible hardware and authoring tools. |
-q:v 2
|
Sets the MPEG-2 video quality using the quantizer scale, where 1 is the highest quality and 31 is the lowest. A value of 2 targets near-maximum MPEG-2 quality, producing a larger file but minimizing visual degradation introduced by re-encoding from the CAVS source. |
-b:a 192k
|
Sets the MP2 audio bitrate to 192 kilobits per second, which is the broadcast-standard bitrate for MPEG-2 audio and matches the DVD-Video audio specification. This provides clear stereo audio quality suitable for both archival and playback use. |
output.mpeg
|
Defines the output filename and container. The .mpeg extension tells FFmpeg to write an MPEG program stream, the standard single-program MPEG-2 container format used for broadcast delivery, DVD source preparation, and legacy media playback. |
Common Use Cases
- Making CAVS broadcast recordings from Chinese television archives playable on legacy hardware players and set-top boxes that only support MPEG-1/2
- Ingesting CAVS source footage into DVD authoring software like DVD Architect or Encore, which require MPEG-2 video and MP2 or AC3 audio
- Preparing CAVS content for editing in older non-linear editing systems (NLEs) that lack AVS codec support but handle MPEG-2 natively
- Converting CAVS files from Chinese broadcast archives for use in broadcasting workflows that mandate MPEG-2 as a delivery or intermediary format
- Archiving or migrating CAVS video content to a more universally readable container before long-term storage on systems with limited codec libraries
- Enabling playback of CAVS recordings on media servers or smart TVs that have no AVS decoder but reliably support MPEG streams
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes — this is a full transcode between two lossy formats, so some generation loss is unavoidable. The CAVS video is fully decoded and then re-encoded as MPEG-2, which is a less efficient codec than AVS or H.264. MPEG-2 at the default quality setting (-q:v 2, the highest quality end of the scale) produces very good results, but at comparable bitrates MPEG-2 will show more blocking artifacts than modern codecs, especially in high-motion scenes. If preserving quality is critical, keep the -q:v value as low as possible (1 or 2).
MPEG containers — particularly MPEG program streams (.mpeg) — are most broadly compatible when paired with MP2 (MPEG-1 Audio Layer II) audio, which is the standard defined alongside MPEG-2 video for broadcast and DVD use. While AAC audio technically can be muxed into some MPEG containers, MP2 is far better supported across legacy hardware players, DVD authoring tools, and broadcast systems. The conversion therefore transcodes the AAC audio track from the CAVS source into MP2 to maximize compatibility.
MPEG-2 video with MP2 audio is the foundational format for DVD video, so the encoded streams are codec-compatible. However, a raw .mpeg program stream file is not the same as a DVD-Video disc structure (which requires specific VOB files, IFO navigation files, and a particular directory layout). You would need to pass this MPEG output through DVD authoring software to create a playable DVD disc or ISO image.
No. Neither the CAVS input format nor the MPEG output format supports subtitles or chapter markers in this conversion pipeline, and the FFmpeg command does not include any subtitle or chapter mapping flags. Any subtitle or chapter data in the source file will be lost. If you need subtitles, consider converting to a format like MKV or MP4 that supports embedded subtitle tracks.
The video quality is controlled by the -q:v flag, which uses MPEG-2's built-in quantizer scale ranging from 1 (best quality, largest file) to 31 (lowest quality, smallest file). The default in this command is -q:v 2, which targets near-maximum quality. To reduce file size, increase this value — for example, -q:v 5 or -q:v 8 will produce noticeably smaller files at the cost of some visual quality. You can also adjust audio bitrate with -b:a, for example changing 192k to 128k to reduce the audio footprint.
Yes. On Linux or macOS, you can batch process with a shell loop: for f in *.cavs; do ffmpeg -i "$f" -c:v mpeg2video -c:a mp2 -q:v 2 -b:a 192k "${f%.cavs}.mpeg"; done. On Windows Command Prompt, use: for %f in (*.cavs) do ffmpeg -i "%f" -c:v mpeg2video -c:a mp2 -q:v 2 -b:a 192k "%~nf.mpeg". This applies the same quality settings to every file in the directory.
Technical Notes
CAVS (Chinese Audio Video Standard, also referred to as AVS or AVS+) uses a proprietary video codec developed by the Audio Video Coding Standard Workgroup of China. Outside of Chinese broadcast infrastructure and dedicated hardware decoders, AVS support in general-purpose software is limited, making CAVS files difficult to work with in international post-production or archival workflows. MPEG-2 video (-c:v mpeg2video), by contrast, is one of the most universally supported video codecs in existence, implemented in virtually every media player, hardware decoder, and editing system. The -q:v parameter for MPEG-2 is a variable quantizer scale — unlike CRF in H.264, lower values mean better quality, and the scale runs from 1 to 31. At -q:v 2, bitrates can be quite high depending on source complexity, so users processing lower-quality or lower-resolution CAVS material may want to increase this to 4–6 to avoid unnecessarily large output files. MP2 audio at 192k is the broadcast-standard pairing for MPEG-2 and is required by the DVD-Video specification (alongside AC3). Neither format supports transparency, embedded subtitles, chapter metadata, or multiple audio tracks, so none of these elements will survive the conversion. The output .mpeg file uses an MPEG program stream container, which is the standard for single-program delivery, as opposed to the MPEG transport stream (.ts) used for multi-program broadcast transmission.