gwutilz/gwencoder/docs/reference/DEFAULT_TRANSCODE_BEHAVIOR.md

Default Transcoding Behavior

Overview

GWEncoder now has updated default behavior for transcoding files:

✅ Transcode by Default

• H.264/x264 files → Transcode to AV1
• HEVC/H.265 files → Transcode to AV1 (changed from skip)
• VP8/VP9 files → Transcode to AV1
• All other codecs → Transcode to AV1

⏭️ Skip by Default

• AV1 files → Skipped (already in target format)

Force Transcoding

To force transcoding of AV1 files (or any file), use the --force or --force-transcode flag:

# Force transcode an AV1 file
./gwencoder --fast --force input.av1.mkv

# Force transcode with full flag name
./gwencoder --fast --force-transcode input.av1.mkv

Changes Made

1. Default Parameters (encoding/av1.go)

• SkipHEVC: Changed from true to false
  • HEVC files are now transcoded by default
• ForceTranscode: Remains false (default)
  • AV1 files are skipped unless --force is used

2. Skip Logic (encoding/av1.go)

• Only AV1 files are skipped by default
• HEVC files are transcoded (unless SkipHEVC is explicitly set to true)
• All other codecs are transcoded

3. CLI Flags (main.go)

• Added --force as a shorter alias for --force-transcode
• Both flags now work: --force and --force-transcode

4. Help Text (main.go)

• Added "DEFAULT BEHAVIOR" section to help output
• Clarified that AV1 files are skipped by default
• Updated flag description for --force

Examples

Default Behavior (No Flags)

# H.264 file → Will transcode to AV1
./gwencoder --fast input.h264.mkv

# HEVC file → Will transcode to AV1
./gwencoder --fast input.hevc.mkv

# AV1 file → Will be skipped
./gwencoder --fast input.av1.mkv

Force Transcoding

# AV1 file → Will transcode (forced)
./gwencoder --fast --force input.av1.mkv

# Any file → Will transcode (forced)
./gwencoder --fast --force input.any.mkv

Rationale

This behavior provides:

1. Efficiency: Skips files already in the target format (AV1)
2. Completeness: Transcodes all other codecs to AV1 for consistency
3. Flexibility: --force flag allows re-encoding when needed (e.g., quality adjustments)

Comparison with Tdarr

Behavior	Tdarr	GWEncoder
AV1 files	Skip (unless force)	Skip (unless --force) ✅
HEVC files	Skip (default)	Transcode (default) ⚠️
H.264 files	Transcode	Transcode ✅
Other codecs	Transcode	Transcode ✅

Note: GWEncoder's default behavior is more aggressive in transcoding HEVC files compared to Tdarr, which skips them by default.