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There is no universal price for an image-format licence. Whether you need one—and what it might cost—depends on the specific codec and patent rights, what your product does with the format, your position in the supply chain, the territories involved and the terms of the relevant licence. A published rate is meaningful only within that defined scope.
What is being licensed?
An image file format, a codec, a patent and a product are different things. A container can hold image data encoded in different ways, and a format name alone does not establish which patent rights apply to a particular implementation. For example, HEIF is a container format; HEVC is a video compression standard that may be used to encode image data in HEIF files. A reference to HEIF or HEIC by itself is therefore not enough to determine whether a specific product needs a licence.
Licensing questions usually concern patent rights covering a technical implementation, rather than a fee automatically charged to everyone who opens or saves a file with a particular extension. The relevant activity might include encoding, decoding, distributing encoded content, or implementing the technology in hardware, software, an operating system or a service. Which activities and parties a licence covers must be checked in its terms.
How are image-format royalties calculated?
There is no single pricing method. The UK Intellectual Property Office’s guidance on determining fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) royalties says, “There is no single methodology that fits all licensing situations.” It describes payment structures such as a per-unit royalty, a percentage of a product’s or component’s sales value, or a fixed lump sum.
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Those are broad mechanisms, not a price list. The amount and calculation base can depend on the licensed portfolio, the product or service definition, the licensee category, sales or revenue, territories and the licence term. Minimum payments, caps, reporting duties, exceptions and discounts may also matter, but must be confirmed in the actual agreement.
What determines the cost for a particular implementation?
- Codec and profile: Identify the precise standard, profile and implementation—not just the file extension or container.
- Technical activity: Establish whether the product encodes, decodes, distributes encoded content or implements the technology in another way.
- Place in the value chain: A component supplier, device maker, software vendor, platform and publisher may face different licensing terms. Licensing can be addressed at component or end-product level.
- Commercial scope: Clarify which products and services, markets, territories, units or revenues, and time period are covered.
- Patent coverage: Find out which patents and territories are included, which licensees qualify, and what exclusions apply.
- Royalty mechanics: Confirm the unit definition or revenue base, reporting period, minimums, caps and any conditions for discounts.
Do not multiply a quoted per-unit rate by every sale until the agreement defines the relevant unit, eligible territory, licensee category, exceptions, caps and reporting period. A rate may not apply to all products or markets, and a pool’s price does not necessarily represent the cost of rights outside that pool.
Do patent pools cover every relevant patent?
No. A patent pool can simplify access to rights contributed by participating holders, but its coverage has boundaries. Relevant rights may remain outside the pool, and separate pools may overlap. Before budgeting, check the pool’s patent and territorial coverage, eligibility rules and exclusions, and ask how overlapping rights are treated. Do not assume that paying one pool settles every patent question for an implementation.
For HEIF and HEVC, the Library of Congress describes a complex HEVC patent-pool landscape and discusses patent-related adoption concerns. That account does not establish that every HEIF or HEIC user needs a licence, nor does an older industry analysis summarized on its page provide a current quote for a particular product.
What do published examples tell you?
JPEG XL
MDN describes JPEG XL as royalty-free and says contributors committed to royalty-free release during standardization, with no known royalty-bearing patents. That is MDN’s characterization of the format; it is not legal clearance for every implementation or a guarantee against all possible third-party claims.
JPEG XS
The JPEG XS Patent Pool, administered by Vectis IP, offers a licensing route for standard-essential patents related to JPEG XS. Its stated application areas include professional cameras, medical imaging, surveillance, broadcast and AV-over-IP. The pool’s public overview does not state a general price, so its existence is not evidence of a particular rate.
HEIF and HEIC
The Library of Congress’s account of the HEVC pool landscape is useful context for why businesses may investigate patent coverage when implementing HEIF or HEIC workflows. It does not determine whether a particular encoder, decoder, device or service requires a licence, or what that licence would cost.
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What should a business request before budgeting?
- Document the implementation. Record the format, codec and profile, and whether the product encodes, decodes, distributes content or embeds the technology in hardware or software.
- Define the commercial scope. Identify the products or services, your role in the value chain, intended activities, markets, territories, volumes or revenues, and expected term.
- Request written licensing terms. Ask which patent portfolio and territories are covered, who qualifies as a licensee, and what exclusions apply.
- Confirm the payment basis. Get the royalty calculation, unit or revenue definition, reporting period, minimums, caps, discounts and other conditions in writing.
- Check what remains outside the offer. Ask about rights not included in the pool and how overlapping pools or separate licences are handled.
- Assess the stated basis for the rate. Where FRAND terms apply, ask what portfolio, comparable licences, market conditions, technology, standard maturity, and patent value and age were considered.
A FRAND assessment or a product-specific determination of patent coverage cannot be made from a format name or a public rate alone. For an actual implementation, the technical details, activities, value-chain position and territories all need to be assessed against current written terms.
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