The Dolby Vision profiles provide a rich feature set to support various ecosystems. Certain Dolby Vision profiles use a base layer video signal whose color characteristics are compatible with video standards such as HDR10 (BT.2100 PQ), HLG (ARIB STD-B67, BT.2100 HLG) or SDR (BT.709).

Such bitstreams:

• can be decoded by any standard HEVC, AVC or AV1 decoder compatible with the base layer codec, and
• can be played on devices and TVs that don't support Dolby Vision but do support HDR10, HLG or SDR, and
• allow streaming services to encode and deliver a single set of HDR video assets that can play back on both Dolby Vision and non-Dolby Vision devices.

More information about Dolby Vision profiles and their cross-compatibility can be found in the article What are Dolby Vision profiles and levels?.

At the media delivery level, cross compatibility for specified Dolby Vision profiles is indicated within playlist/manifest file, whether using HTTP Live Streaming (HLS) or Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (MPEG-DASH). The SUPPLEMENTAL-CODECS tag is utilized in HLS to signal this information, whereas in DASH, it is covered by scte214:supplementalCodecs and scte214:supplementalProfiles tags. 

To learn more about supplemental codecs signalization, refer to the articles linked below.

How to signal Dolby Vision in HLS?

How to signal Dolby Vision in MPEG-DASH?

Does ExoPlayer/Media3 support supplemental codecs?

Support for supplemental codecs is available in Media3 v1.6.0 (and later versions).

You can also check these pull requests for details on the modifications related to supplemental codecs support: 

1. Add SUPPLEMENTAL-CODECS support in both DASH and HLS #1785
2. Update Dolby Vision format handling #2023

What happens for Dolby Vision playback if supplemental codecs are not supported?

If your player application relies on ExoPlayer/Media3 without support for supplemental codecs (i.e. Media3 v1.5.1 and earlier), you may encounter playback issues when switching between different video resolutions. This result is due to the fact that when ExoPlayer checks whether the currently utilized decoder can be reused, the video formats (more precisely, the MIME types) being compared come from different sources. The current playback video format is taken via MediaExtractor, which is based on MP4, while the target video format comes from the HLS/DASH parsers. If the parsers do not recognize supplemental codecs, the current and target video formats appear different, triggering a decoder reinitialization.

This is often seen as a black screen popping up for a moment, especially under inconsistent network conditions. It's clear that this scenario can create a frustrating viewing experience for end users, which is why we encourage implementing supplemental codecs support in your application. 

NOTE: The issue only affects Dolby Vision cross compatible profiles, such as Dolby Vision profile 8.1 (cross compatible with HDR10).

How to enable supplemental codecs support in Media3 1.5.1 (and earlier)?

If you’re using Media3 version 1.5.1 or earlier, you can enable supplemental codec support by creating a patch with the changes from the commits listed below and applying it to your Media3-based player app.

1. Merge pull request #1785 from DolbyLaboratories:dlb/dovi-supplemental-codecs/dev
2. Merge pull request #2023 from DolbyLaboratories:dlb/dovi-format/dev

How to enable supplemental codecs support in ExoPlayer 2.x?

If your app is built on ExoPlayer 2.x, supplemental codec support can be added by applying a patch containing the changes detailed in the commits below. 

1. Merge pull request #1785 from DolbyLaboratories:dlb/dovi-supplemental-codecs/dev
2. Merge pull request #2023 from DolbyLaboratories:dlb/dovi-format/dev

In general, Android Studio should automatically handle the path differences between Media3 and ExoPlayer. However, if you’re using a slightly older version (e.g., before ExoPlayer 2.16), you might need to manually merge the changes.

NOTE: If your application uses ExoPlayer version 2.x, we recommend updating it to at least version 2.18. However, keep in mind that ExoPlayer is continuously evolving along with Dolby Vision advancements, so plan an update to the latest version of Media3 to ensure the best user experience for your app. If you’re curious about how to do it, here’s the ExoPlayer Media3 migration guide from Google.