OPEN-SOURCE · GRIB + VIDEO CODECS

Weather data.
Video-sized.

Keep the science. Rethink the transport.
Pack meteorological grids into MP4, then read them from a URL — with your command line or xarray.

START HERE · PYTHON 3.11–3.14

pip install avenc

ONE ARCHIVE. MANY WAYS IN.

01 / 08

terminal

Real URLs. Copy-ready commands. No dataset downloads until you run them. The animation illustrates the workflow; it is not a running decoder.

Start with the format your weather pipeline already uses. Reconstruct GRIB when that is what your next tool expects.

Related fields become video frames. Embedded reconstruction metadata retains grid geometry, field identities and masks.

Select a variable, frame range or spatial window. HTTP Range requests and lazy xarray access bring the archive to your workflow.

OPEN DATA. REPRODUCIBLE EXAMPLES.

Bring your own curiosity.

Three scientific cases, multiple compression profiles. These are measured complete-file sizes from the published archive, not accuracy guarantees.

Explore all published MP4 profiles & original GRIB files +

Zenodo record 23502851 · file inventory checked 20 October 2026 · decimal MB/GB
File	Size	Format

ERA5-Land: Copernicus Climate Change Service / ECMWF. Forecasts: ECMWF. See the archive’s attribution, licences and reproduction notes.

HAVE A GRIB? TAKE A LOOK.

Explore your GRIB files in the browser. A companion for inspecting the fields you start with — or reconstruct with AVENC.

A SMALL INSTALL. A FAMILIAR WORKFLOW.

AVENC’s Python wheels include the native tools and their ecCodes libraries. Install FFmpeg separately, with the encoders you want to use.

sudo apt install ffmpeg
pip install avenc

brew install ffmpeg-full
export PATH="$(brew --prefix ffmpeg-full)/bin:$PATH"
pip install avenc

Python 3.11–3.14 · Linux x86_64 / ARM64 (glibc ≥ 2.28) · macOS Intel / Apple Silicon (15+) · FFmpeg ≥ 5.1. On Windows, use WSL.