HLS (HTTP Live Streaming) is a streaming protocol proposed by Apple. M3U8 is its playlist file format. It supports encryption, slicing and other features, suitable for online playback and live streaming.

An M3U8 file is a plain text file that records indexes. When opening it, the player software does not play it directly, but finds the corresponding audio and video files on the server based on its indexes for online playback. Video websites can automatically match an appropriate bitrate file for the client based on the user's network bandwidth, thereby ensuring video fluency.

M3U8 was originally designed for playing audio files, such as MP3, but more and more software is now using it to play video file lists. M3U8 can also specify online streaming audio sources. Many players and software support the M3U8 file format.

M3U8 video content can be encrypted based on AES. This player supports decryption and playback of M3U8 file videos with common encryption methods.

The HLS protocol uses M3U8 files to inform the client of the video file playlist. After the client obtains the M3U8 file, it can directly play the video. To prevent the TS video files used by the HLS protocol from being accessed by unauthorized clients, the TS video files used by the HLS protocol need to be encrypted. After encrypting the TS video files, the decryption method needs to be informed to the client. This can be done by configuring the M3U8 standard encryption rewriting function, and informing the client of the encryption algorithm, key URI and authentication key through the #EXT-X-KEY tag.

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