Overview

Dolby Audio and Dolby Atmos

Native support for Dolby Audio™ was introduced in iOS 9.3, back in March 2016. Audio formats like Dolby Digital Plus™ (also known as DD+ or E-AC-3) and Dolby Digital (aka DD or AC-3) are now supported on hundreds of millions of iOS devices, including both iPhone and iPad, providing essential support for enabling Dolby Audio experiences.

And starting with iOS 13 and iPadOS 13, Dolby Atmos is now supported on all recent devices (2018 and later), delivering immersive audio experiences through the devices' speakers.

These audio formats are natively supported data types in Core Audio—the foundational audio framework for all Apple platforms—, which means they are supported throughout the operating system and in all the high-level media frameworks such as AVFoundation or Audio Toolbox. All third-party applications can leverage the power of Dolby Audio and Dolby Atmos. Playback of Dolby content in AVPlayer, for example, is as simple as passing a file with a Dolby Digital Plus soundtrack, and the system handles everything from there.

See the list of iOS devices that support Dolby Audio and Dolby Atmos.

 

Dolby Vision

In September 2017, iPhone X was the first iOS device to introduce support for Dolby Vision HDR on its Super Retina OLED screen, enabling a new generation of video content that can make full use of the display’s capabilities, with stunning, accurate colors, true blacks, high brightness, and a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio.

Dolby Vision is supported on almost all iOS devices since 2017, including most recently on the iPhone 11 Pro.

Just like it is for Dolby Audio, support for playing back Dolby Vision content is integrated deeply into the OS, including native support in AVPlayer and the HTTP Live Streaming stack. This means that any developer can easily create an app that streams Dolby Vision HDR content.

See the list of iOS devices that support Dolby Vision.

 

HLS Streaming

If your application involves streaming of media content using HTTP Live Streaming (HLS), we collected a number of resources to help you prepare your media assets correctly and add support for advanced media features like:

  • Support for high-dynamic range video and wide color with Dolby Vision
  • Handling of high-frame rate content
  • I-frame playlists for trick-play operations
  • High-quality audio using Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby Digital Plus with Dolby Atmos (aka DD+ JOC)
  • Consistent audio loudness
  • Multichannel sound (5.1, 7.1) and immersive audio using Dolby Atmos
  • Multi-language delivery
  • Subtitling
  • Audio Description tracks

See the HLS in Dolby section to get started.

 

Next up: Device support