A bitstream format is the format of the data found in some stream of bits used in a digital communication or data storage

Data storage device

thumb|200px|right|A reel-to-reel tape recorder .The magnetic tape is a data storage medium. The recorder is data storage equipment using a portable medium to store the data....

 application. The term typically refers to the format of the output of an encoder

Encoder

An encoder is a device, circuit, transducer, software program, algorithm or person that converts information from one format or code to another, for the purposes of standardization, speed, secrecy, security, or saving space by shrinking size.-Media:...

 or the format of the input to a decoder when using data compression

Data compression

In computer science and information theory, data compression, source coding or bit-rate reduction is the process of encoding information using fewer bits than the original representation would use....

.

Standardized interoperability

Interoperability

Interoperability is a property referring to the ability of diverse systems and organizations to work together . The term is often used in a technical systems engineering sense, or alternatively in a broad sense, taking into account social, political, and organizational factors that impact system to...

 specifications such as the video coding standards produced by MPEG and the ITU-T

ITU-T

The ITU Telecommunication Standardization Sector is one of the three sectors of the International Telecommunication Union ; it coordinates standards for telecommunications....

 and the audio coding standards produced by MPEG often specify only the bitstream

Bitstream

A bitstream or bit stream is a time series of bits.A bytestream is a series of bytes, typically of 8 bits each, and can be regarded as a special case of a bitstream....

format and the decoding process, while allowing individual encoder implementations to be designed using any methods whatsoever that produce bitstreams that conform to the specified bitstream format.

Decoding of a bitstream can be initiated without having to start from the beginning of a 'file' or the beginning of the data transmission. Bitstreams are designed for this to occur.