3GP (3GPP file format) is a

digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Businesses *Digital bank, a form of financial institution *Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) or Digital, a computer company *Digital Research (DR or DRI), a software ...

multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms, such as Text (literary theory), writing, Sound, audio, images, animations, or video, into a single presentation. T ...

container format A container format (informally, sometimes called a wrapper) or metafile is a file format that allows multiple data streams to be embedded into a single file, usually along with metadata for identifying and further detailing those streams. Nota ...

defined by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) for 3G

UMTS The Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) is a 3G mobile cellular system for networks based on the GSM standard. UMTS uses Wideband Code Division Multiple Access, wideband code-division multiple access (W-CDMA) radio access technolog ...

multimedia services, largely based on

MPEG-4 Part 12 The ISO base media file format (ISOBMFF) is a container file format that defines a general structure for files that contain time-based multimedia data such as video and audio. It is standardized in ISO/ IEC 14496-12, a.k.a. MPEG-4 Part 12, and w ...

. A 3GP container may consist of H.263 or H.264 video codecs or AMR or AAC-LC audio codecs. 3G2 (3GPP2 file format) is a multimedia container format defined by the

3GPP2 The 3rd Generation Partnership Project 2 (3GPP2) was a collaboration between telecommunications associations to make a globally applicable third generation (3G) mobile phone system specification within the scope of the ITU's IMT-2000 project. ...

for 3G

CDMA2000 CDMA2000 (also known as C2K or IMT Multi‑Carrier (IMT‑MC)) is a family of 3G mobile technology standards for sending voice, data, and signaling data between mobile phones and cell sites. It is developed by 3GPP2 as a backwards-compatib ...

multimedia services. It is very similar to the 3GP file format but consumes less space and bandwidth, and has some extensions and limitations in comparison to 3GP.

Specifications

3GP is defined in the

ETSI The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) is an independent, not-for-profit, standardization organization operating in the field of Information and communications technology, information and communications. ETSI supports the de ...

3GPP The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) is an umbrella term for a number of standards organizations which develop protocols for mobile telecommunications. Its best known work is the development and maintenance of: * GSM and related 2G and ...

technical specification.ETSI 3GP
3GPP TS 26.244; Transparent end-to-end packet switched streaming service (PSS); 3GPP file format (3GP)
Retrieved on 2009-06-02. 3GP is a required file format for video and associated speech/audio media types and timed text in ETSI 3GPP technical specifications for

IP Multimedia Subsystem The IP Multimedia Subsystem or IP Multimedia Core Network Subsystem (IMS) is a standardised architectural framework for delivering IP multimedia services. Historically, mobile phones have provided voice call services over a circuit-switched-sty ...

(IMS),

Multimedia Messaging Service Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) is a standard way to send messages that include multimedia content to and from a mobile phone over a cellular network. Users and providers may refer to such a message as a PXT, a picture message, or a multimedia ...

(MMS), Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Service (MBMS) and Transparent end-to-end Packet-switched Streaming Service ( PSS).ETSI (2009-01
ETSI TS 126 141 V8.0.0 (2009-01); 3GPP TS 26.141; IP Multimedia System (IMS) Messaging and Presence; Media formats and codecs
Page 10. Retrieved on 2009-06-02. 3G2 is defined in the

technical specification.

Technical details

The 3GP and 3G2 file formats are both structurally based on the

ISO base media file format The ISO base media file format (ISOBMFF) is a container file format that defines a general structure for files that contain time-based multimedia data such as video and audio. It is standardized in ISO/ IEC 14496-12, a.k.a. MPEG-4 Part 12, and w ...

defined in ISO/

IEC The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC; ) is an international standards organization that prepares and publishes international standards for all electrical, electronic and related technologies. IEC standards cover a vast range of ...

14496-12 –

MPEG-4 MPEG-4 is a group of international standards for the compression of digital audio and visual data, multimedia systems, and file storage formats. It was originally introduced in late 1998 as a group of audio and video coding formats and related ...

Part 12, but older versions of the 3GP file format did not use some of its features. 3GP and 3G2 are container formats similar to

MPEG-4 Part 14 MP4 (formally MPEG-4 Part 14), is a digital multimedia container format most commonly used to store video and audio, but it can also be used to store other data such as subtitles and still images. Like most modern container formats, it allows ...

(MP4), which is also based on MPEG-4 Part 12. The 3GP and 3G2 file format were designed to decrease storage and bandwidth requirements to accommodate

mobile phone A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones ( landline phones). This rad ...

s. They are good for lower end smartphones for faster streaming & download. 3GP and 3G2 are similar standards, but with some differences: *

file format was designed for

GSM The Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) is a family of standards to describe the protocols for second-generation (2G) digital cellular networks, as used by mobile devices such as mobile phones and Mobile broadband modem, mobile broadba ...

-based phones and may have the filename extension .3gp *

file format was designed for

CDMA Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communicatio ...

-based phones and may have the filename extension .3g2 Some cell phones use the .mp4 extension for 3GP video.

3GP

The 3GP file format stores video streams as

MPEG-4 Part 2 MPEG-4 Part 2, MPEG-4 Visual (formally International Organization for Standardization, ISO/International Electrotechnical Commission, IEC 14496-2) is a video encoding specification designed by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG). It belongs to ...

, H.263, or MPEG-4 Part 10 (AVC/H.264), and audio streams as AMR-NB,

AMR-WB Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband (AMR-WB) is a patented Wideband audio, wideband speech coding, speech audio coding standard developed based on Adaptive Multi-Rate audio codec, Adaptive Multi-Rate encoding, using a similar methodology to algebraic cod ...

, AMR-WB+, AAC-LC,

HE-AAC High-Efficiency Advanced Audio Coding (HE-AAC) is an audio coding format for lossy data compression of digital audio as part of the MPEG-4 standards. It is an extension of Low Complexity AAC (AAC-LC) optimized for low- bitrate applicati ...

v1 or Enhanced aacPlus (HE-AAC v2). 3GPP allowed use of AMR and H.263 codecs in the ISO base media file format (MPEG-4 Part 12), because 3GPP specified the usage of the Sample Entry and template fields in the ISO base media file format as well as defining new boxes to which codecs refer. These extensions were registered by the registration authority for code-points in ISO base media file format ("MP4 Family" files). For the storage of MPEG-4 media specific information in 3GP files, the 3GP specification refers to MP4 and the AVC file format, which are also based on the ISO base media file format. The MP4 and the AVC file format specifications described usage of MPEG-4 content in the ISO base media file format. A 3GP file is always

big-endian '' Jonathan_Swift.html" ;"title="Gulliver's Travels'' by Jonathan Swift">Gulliver's Travels'' by Jonathan Swift, the novel from which the term was coined In computing, endianness is the order in which bytes within a word (data type), word of d ...

, storing and transferring the most significant bytes first.

3G2

The 3G2 file format can store the same video streams and most of the audio streams used in the 2007 3GP file format. In addition, 3G2 stores audio streams as

EVRC Enhanced Variable Rate CODEC (EVRC) is a speech codec used in CDMA networks. It was developed in 1995 to replace the QCELP vocoder which used more bandwidth on the carrier's network, thus EVRC's primary goal was to offer the mobile carriers more ...

EVRC-B Enhanced Variable Rate Codec B (EVRC-B) is a speech codec used by CDMA networks. EVRC-B is an enhancement to EVRC and compresses each 20 milliseconds of 8000 Hz, 16-bit sampled speech input into output frames of one of the four different sizes ...

, EVRC-WB, 13K (

QCELP Qualcomm code-excited linear prediction (QCELP), also known as Qualcomm PureVoice, is a speech codec developed in 1994 by Qualcomm to increase the speech quality of the IS-96A codec earlier used in code-division multiple access, CDMA networks. It ...

), SMV or VMR-WB, which was specified by 3GPP2 for use in ISO base media file format. The 3G2 specification also defined some enhancements to 3GPP Timed Text. 3G2 file format does not store Enhanced aacPlus (HE-AAC v2) and AMR-WB+ audio streams. For the storage of MPEG-4 media (AAC audio, MPEG-4 Part 2 video, MPEG-4 Part 10 – H.264/AVC) in 3G2 files, the 3G2 specification refers to the MP4 file format and the AVC file format specification, which described usage of this content in the ISO base media file format. For the storage of H.263 and AMR content 3G2 specification refers to the 3GP file format specification.

Device support

*Most 3G capable mobile phones support the playback and recording of video in 3GP format (memory, maximum filesize for playback and recording, and resolution limits exist and vary). *Some newer/higher-end phones without 3G capabilities may also playback and record in this format (again, with said limitations). *Audio

imported An importer is the receiving country in an export from the sending country. Importation and exportation are the defining financial transactions of international trade. Import is part of the International Trade which involves buying and receivin ...

from CD onto a

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE). It is the successor to the PlayStation 2, and both are part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. The PS3 was first released on ...

when it is set to encode to the MPEG-4 AAC format copies onto USB devices in the 3GP format. *The

Nintendo 3DS The is a foldable dual-screen handheld game console produced by Nintendo. Announced in March 2010 as the successor to the Nintendo DS, the console was released originally on February 26, 2011 and went through various revisions in its lifetime, ...

used 3GP technology to play

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

videos. *Apple

iDevice The iPhone, developed by Apple Inc., is a line of smartphones that combine a mobile phone, digital camera, personal computer, and Portable media player, music player into one device. Introduced by then-CEO Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, the iPh ...

s used to support files for playback only as passthrough files, hence no editing ability, but since

iOS 9 iOS 9 is the ninth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc., being the successor to iOS 8. It was announced at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference on June 8, 2015, and was released on September 16, ...

this has been deprecated meaning files of this format have to be manually converted to H.264.

Software support

When transferred to a computer, 3GP movies can be viewed on

Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

Apple An apple is a round, edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus'' spp.). Fruit trees of the orchard or domestic apple (''Malus domestica''), the most widely grown in the genus, are agriculture, cultivated worldwide. The tree originated ...

macOS macOS, previously OS X and originally Mac OS X, is a Unix, Unix-based operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 2001. It is the current operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. With ...

, and the various

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

-based operating systems; on the former two with

Windows Media Player Windows Media Player (WMP, officially referred to as Windows Media Player Legacy to retronym, distinguish it from Windows Media Player (2022), the new Windows Media Player introduced with Windows 11) is the first media player (application soft ...

and Apple

QuickTime QuickTime (or QuickTime Player) is an extensible multimedia architecture created by Apple, which supports playing, streaming, encoding, and transcoding a variety of digital media formats. The term ''QuickTime'' also refers to the QuickTime Pla ...

respectively (their built-in media players), and on all three with

VLC media player VLC media player (previously the VideoLAN Client) is a free and open-source software, free and open-source, software portability, portable, cross-platform media player software and streaming media Server (computing), server developed by the Vide ...

. Programs such as Media Player Classic, K-Multimedia Player,

Totem A totem (from or ''doodem'') is a spirit being, sacred object, or symbol that serves as an emblem of a group of people, such as a family, clan, lineage (anthropology), lineage, or tribe, such as in the Anishinaabe clan system. While the word ...

RealPlayer RealPlayer, formerly RealAudio Player, RealOne Player and RealPlayer G2, is a cross-platform media player (software), media player app, developed by RealNetworks. The media player is compatible with numerous container file formats of the multimed ...

MPlayer MPlayer is a free and open-source media player software application. It is available for Linux, OS X and Microsoft Windows. Versions for OS/2, Syllable Desktop, Syllable, AmigaOS, MorphOS and AROS Research Operating System are also available. A ...

, and GOM Player can also be used. 3GP and 3G2 files can be encoded and decoded with open source software

FFmpeg FFmpeg is a free and open-source software project consisting of a suite of libraries and programs for handling video, audio, and other multimedia files and streams. At its core is the command-line ffmpeg tool itself, designed for processing vide ...

. Media tags can be read and written on Linux, macOS and Windows using the open source AtomicParsley command-line utility.

References

External links

3GPP codecs specifications; 3G and beyond / GSM, 26 series

* ttp://www.3gpp2.org/Public_html/Specs/index.cfm 3GPP2 specifications
3GPP2 File Formats for Multimedia Services; 3GPP2 C.S0050-B Version 1.0 - specification
* , MIME Type Registrations for 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Multimedia files * , MIME Type Registrations for 3GPP2 Multimedia Files * , The Codecs Parameter for "Bucket" Media Types
3GP & 3G2 File Formats
{{DEFAULTSORT:3gp Computer file formats Digital container formats