GStreamer over RTP

Streaming a GStreamer pipeline over RTP means payloading an encoded (or raw) elementary stream into RTP packets on the sender, and depayloading + decoding on the receiver. See gstreamer for pipeline basics and gstreamer-python for driving pipelines from Python.

H.264 over RTP

rtph264pay/rtph264depay wrap/unwrap Annex-B H.264 into RTP packets. The receiver’s caps on udpsrc must match the sender’s clock rate/payload type since RTP itself carries no codec metadata.

Raw Video/Audio over RTP

rtpvrawpay/rtpvrawdepay carry uncompressed video frames directly (no encoding step) — expensive on bandwidth, useful for LAN low-latency setups. rtpL16pay/rtpL16depay do the same for uncompressed 16-bit PCM audio.

Cheatsheet

Send H.264 (gst-launch)

gst-launch-1.0 videotestsrc is-live=true pattern=smpte ! \
    video/x-raw,framerate=30/1,width=640,height=480 ! \
    x264enc ! rtph264pay config-interval=1 pt=96 ! \
    udpsink host=<host> port=<port>

Send H.264 (Python)

import gi
 
gi.require_version('Gst', '1.0')
from gi.repository import Gst, GLib
 
Gst.init(None)
 
 
class RTPServer:
 
    def __init__(self):
        self.pipeline = Gst.parse_launch(
            "videotestsrc is-live=true pattern=smpte ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1,width=640,height=480 ! "
            "x264enc ! rtph264pay config-interval=1 pt=96 ! "
            "udpsink host=127.0.0.1 port=5000")
 
    def start(self):
        self.pipeline.set_state(Gst.State.PLAYING)
 
    def stop(self):
        self.pipeline.set_state(Gst.State.NULL)
 
 
if __name__ == '__main__':
    server = RTPServer()
    server.start()
    try:
        GLib.MainLoop().run()
    except KeyboardInterrupt:
        pass
    finally:
        server.stop()

Receive H.264

gst-launch-1.0 udpsrc port=<port> caps="application/x-rtp, media=(string)video, clock-rate=(int)90000, encoding-name=(string)H264, payload=(int)96" ! \
    rtph264depay ! avdec_h264 ! videoconvert ! autovideosink

Send Raw Video

gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=<file> ! decodebin name=decoder decoder. ! \
    videoconvert ! video/x-raw, format=RGB, frame-rate=30/1 ! rtpvrawpay ! \
    udpsink host=<host> port=<port>

Receive Raw Video

gst-launch-1.0 udpsrc port=<port> caps="application/x-rtp, width=(string)<width>, height=(string)<height>, sampling=(string)RGB" ! \
    rtpvrawdepay ! videoconvert ! autovideosink

Send Raw Audio

gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=<file> ! decodebin name=decoder decoder. ! \
    audioconvert ! audio/x-raw ! rtpL16pay ! "application/x-rtp" ! \
    udpsink host=<host> port=<port>

Receive Raw Audio

gst-launch-1.0 udpsrc port=<port> ! "application/x-rtp,clock-rate=44100,payload=10" ! \
    rtpL16depay ! audioconvert ! queue ! autoaudiosink

Knowledge Base