Why iPhone Videos Silently Fail as Telegram Video Avatars

Short summary

iPhones record video in HEVC by default, but Telegram's video avatar pipeline only accepts H.264 and silently fails with no error message. The author reverse-engineered Telegram's undocumented requirements (H.264, yuv420p, 800x800, <10s, <2MB, no audio) and built @LiveAvaBot using ffmpeg for codec conversion. The production bot handles intelligent cropping, audio stripping, and CRF-based size optimization, now serving 207 users on a single VPS.

• •iPhones record in HEVC but Telegram avatar API silently rejects anything that isn't H.264
• •Author reverse-engineered specs: H.264, yuv420p, 800x800, 10s max, <2MB, no audio track
• •Built @LiveAvaBot using ffmpeg for codec conversion, cropping, and CRF-based optimization; serving 207 users

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