TS to HEVC Converter

How to Convert TS to HEVC Online

1. Upload Your TS File: Drag and drop, or click "+ Add Files" to pick MPEG transport stream recordings from your DVR, capture card, or IPTV dump. Batch uploads are supported — every file uses the same settings.
2. Pick the HEVC Encoding Mode: Default is Quality Preset → Very High, which targets visually-lossless re-encodes at CRF 18-20. Switch to Constant Quality and dial the CRF slider (18 = near-lossless, 23 = balanced, 28 = small file) for archival vs. streaming. Pick Specific file size to hit an exact MB target, or Constant / Variable Bitrate to nail a Mbps cap for streaming servers.
3. Set Resolution and Trim (Optional): Use Video resolution to keep the original, scale by percentage, choose a preset (4K, 1080p, 720p, 480p), or set a custom width × height with aspect-ratio lock. Open Trim → Time Range to chop a commercial break or grab a single scene before re-encoding.
4. Convert and Download: Click Convert. Files process on our servers and the output is delivered as a .hevc file — a Matroska (MKV) container carrying the new H.265 stream plus your audio — no sign-up, no watermark, no email required.

Why Convert TS to HEVC?

MPEG-TS (.ts) is the container ATSC over-the-air TV and most DVB satellite/cable systems use for broadcast — and in the United States, ATSC 1.0 still ships the video as MPEG-2, a codec finalized in 1995. A one-hour 720p MPEG-2 capture at ~5 Mbps lands around 2.6 GB on disk. Re-encoding the same hour to HEVC (H.265) typically drops the file to 600-700 MB with no perceptible quality loss, because HEVC delivers 25-50% better compression than H.264 at matched quality and roughly half the bitrate of MPEG-2 at matched quality. The output here is a .hevc file that is actually a Matroska (MKV) container — H.265 video with the broadcast audio carried over — ready to play in MKV-capable players or remux losslessly to MP4 later.

• Shrink an HDHomeRun or Plex DVR library — A season of one-hour 1080i broadcast TS recordings can occupy 50-100 GB. Re-encoding to HEVC commonly cuts that 60-70% while remaining visually identical on a 4K TV.
• Free up space on capture-card workflows — OBS, Elgato, and AVerMedia capture utilities often write .ts files because the format is resilient to mid-recording crashes. HEVC re-encode is the standard archival step once a session is done.
• Prepare clips for editing on Apple Silicon and modern PCs — Macs since 2017 (with Apple T2 / M-series chips) and Intel CPUs since 7th-gen Kaby Lake have full hardware HEVC decode, so HEVC scrubs smoothly in Final Cut, Premiere, and DaVinci Resolve.
• Get a clean Matroska file for remuxing — The .hevc output is an ordinary MKV carrying the H.265 track plus the audio, with none of the TS multiplex clutter (no PMT, no PCR). Tools like MP4Box or ffmpeg can remux it losslessly (-c copy) into MP4 or fragmented MP4 (fMP4) later.
• Reduce IPTV recording archives — Set-top boxes and IPTV recorders dump straight to TS. Converting to HEVC after the fact preserves the recording while shrinking it for cold storage or NAS backup.
• Future-proof an SD/HD broadcast archive — Old MPEG-2 captures will keep getting larger relative to modern codecs. A one-time HEVC re-encode locks in 2-3× the storage capacity on the same drive.

TS (MPEG-2) vs HEVC Output — What Actually Changes

HEVC Quality Mode Cheat Sheet

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the .hevc output keep my audio?

Yes. Although HEVC (H.265) itself is just a video codec, the .hevc file this page produces is a Matroska (MKV) container, so the broadcast audio (AC-3 / AAC / MP2) is carried over — re-encoded to AAC by default, with AC3, MP3, and Opus selectable under Audio Codec. If you want a container that stock phone and TV apps open directly, use Convert TS to MP4 or Convert TS to MKV for the standard extensions.

Will my TV or phone play a .hevc file directly?

Software that plays Matroska will. VLC, MPV, MPC-HC, and ffplay open the .hevc file fine — it is an ordinary MKV, audio and seeking included — and renaming it to .mkv helps apps that go by extension. iOS Photos, Apple TV, and most Smart TV apps don't support Matroska, though, so for those targets remux to MP4 (ffmpeg -i in.hevc -c copy out.mp4). If your goal is universal compatibility, Convert TS to MP4 is the friendlier choice.

How much smaller will my TS file get after HEVC re-encoding?

For ATSC over-the-air 1080i recordings the typical reduction is 60-75% at visually-identical quality (a 5 GB hour becomes 1.3-2 GB). For DVB SD recordings already using H.264 in TS, expect 30-50% reduction. Live-event broadcasts with lots of motion compress less than talking-head studio shows, so a sports recording will land at the smaller end of those savings.

Should I pick CRF 18, 23, or 28?

CRF 18 produces near-lossless HEVC — visually indistinguishable from the source at normal viewing distance, file size around 2× CRF 23. CRF 23 is the standard "balanced" archival setting most ffmpeg pipelines use. CRF 28 is the x265 default and is fine for casual streaming on phones, but you'll see softness on TV-sized screens with broadcast content. For archiving a broadcast TS library, CRF 20-22 is the sweet spot.

Why not just use H.264 since everything plays it?

H.264 hardware decode is universal, but at matched quality HEVC files run roughly half the size — for a multi-terabyte DVR library, that's the difference between one drive and two. If broad device support is more important than disk space, encode to MP4 with H.264 instead. If you specifically need that compression win, HEVC is the right call.

My broadcast TS is interlaced (1080i / 480i). Will HEVC handle that?

It will encode, but the fields are carried through as they are — no deinterlacing is applied during the re-encode, so 1080i combing on fast motion carries into the HEVC and shows on modern progressive displays. If you need clean progressive output, deinterlace the TS in a desktop editor first, then convert the result; progressive material is also what HEVC encoders and players handle best.

Will trimming during conversion cause a re-encode of the whole file?

Yes — because we're already re-encoding from MPEG-2/H.264 to HEVC, the trim is applied during that encode pass, so there's no extra cost. If you only need to chop a TS file rather than re-encode it to HEVC, the Video Cutter trims it to a time range instead.

What about HEVC in a TS container — can I keep .ts as the extension?

HEVC-in-TS is technically valid (used by ATSC 3.0 and some IPTV setups) but is not supported by major streaming specifications — Apple's HLS spec, for instance, requires HEVC to be carried in fragmented MP4 (fMP4) rather than .ts, while H.264 is allowed in either. For most workflows you want HEVC in MP4 or MKV; the .hevc file this page produces is already a Matroska container, and ffmpeg -i in.hevc -c copy out.mp4 rewraps it losslessly if a workflow demands fMP4.

Is there a file size limit?

No registration is required and there's no hard cap on individual file size for typical broadcast recordings. Very large multi-hour captures (>2 GB) will take longer to upload and encode — for a 4-hour 1080i ATSC recording, expect upload + encode time in the range of 10-30 minutes depending on your connection.