An HLS streaming API with signed links that play anywhere

What you get

On Pro and Scale, each finished video has HTTP Live Streaming (CMAF) copies in addition to the downloadable MP4. The worker renders an adaptive quality ladder, with segments at each quality and a master playlist that lists them, so each viewer's player picks the level that suits their connection. The levels follow the quality you asked for with maxHeight, up to 4K, and never exceed the source. If you ask for captions, the stream also carries a subtitle track, so standard players show a CC button automatically.

The status response includes the link:

"streamUrl": "https://…/stream/3f1c…/1790925000/9b2e…/master.m3u8",
"streamExpiresAt": 1790925000

Signed links, checked at the edge

A streaming link is a signed URL. The API signs it with HMAC-SHA256 and a function at the CDN edge verifies the signature and the expiry before serving anything from private storage, so there is no public bucket and nothing to guess. Relative paths inside the playlists carry the same signed prefix, so segments, posters and caption files all work without extra CORS configuration.

• Lifetime: twice the video's length, from 30 minutes to 24 hours, or the number of seconds in ?linkTtl=. A late starter still finishes the video.
• Refreshing: there's no separate endpoint. Fetching the status again returns a fresh link; the <video-piper> component does this for you before the old one expires, keeping the viewer's place.
• Caching: your API key allows 5 requests per second, so cache each video's links on your server and fetch new ones when about a fifth of their lifetime is left.

Allowed domains

Under Allowed domains in your account (or PUT /account/allowed-domains with {"domains": ["example.com", "*.example.com"]}) you list the sites that may play your videos, up to 20. Playback and streaming links made afterwards are locked to them, and the CDN checks the request's Origin or Referer hostname before serving. *.example.com covers subdomains; add example.com too for the bare domain. Links made before a change keep their old list until they expire. Requests with no Origin or Referer, as from some native apps, are refused for locked links, so leave the list empty if you play videos in an app. This stops casual hotlinking; it is not DRM.

Play it with hls.js

Your server fetches GET /videos/{id} with its API key and hands the page the link. In the page, Safari plays the playlist natively and other browsers use hls.js:

<video id="player" controls playsinline></video>
<script src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/hls.js@1"></script>
<script>
  const video = document.getElementById("player"), url = STREAM_URL;  // from GET /videos/{id}
  if (video.canPlayType("application/vnd.apple.mpegurl")) video.src = url;
  else { const hls = new Hls(); hls.loadSource(url); hls.attachMedia(video); }
</script>

To skip the player code, use the embeddable <video-piper> player: it prefers the stream when present, loads hls.js only where the browser needs it, shows captions and refreshes its links.

Storage and delivery

Streaming copies count toward your plan's storage, and the bytes sent to viewers count as delivery, whether they come from a download, the MP4 playback link or the stream. Pro includes 150 GB of delivery and Scale 400 GB per month; beyond that, paid plans bill $0.55 per GB, with an email at 80% and 100% of each allowance and an optional monthly overage cap.

Which plans include HLS streaming

Adaptive streaming links (HLS) are a Pro and Scale feature. Every plan still gets a signed, seekable MP4 playback link, so Free and Starter videos play on the web too, just without the adaptive quality ladder.

Usage beyond a paid plan is billed at $0.09 per processing minute, $0.15 per GB-month of storage and $0.55 per GB of delivery. Full details are on the pricing page.

In the documentation

• Streaming (Pro and Scale)
• Allowed domains
• Build your own player
• The video-piper web component
• Status and download

Frequently asked questions