MoQ (Media over QUIC)

Media over QUIC (MoQ) is an emerging live streaming protocol built on QUIC and WebTransport. It delivers sub-second latency like WebRTC while scaling through a CDN relay like HLS—no plugins or native apps required.

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MoQ is still an evolving IETF standard. The AMS MoQ plugin is based on moq-lite, a deployable subset of the spec. Treat this as early access and keep an eye on updates.

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Requirements

• Ant Media Server 3.0.0 or later
• Linux x86_64
• sudo access
• Chromium-based browser (Chrome, Edge, Brave) for playback — Safari is not supported; Firefox is unstable

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Installation

1. Download and unzip the plugin

Download MoQPlugin-release.zip and upload it to your Ant Media Server, and then.

sudo unzip MoQPlugin-release.zip
cd MoQ-Plugin

2. Install the plugin and relay binaries

sudo chmod +x install-moq-plugin.sh
sudo ./install-moq-plugin.sh

3. Copy the MoQ player pages to your AMS application

sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/antmedia/webapps/live/moq
sudo cp -r moq-ams-player-build/* /usr/local/antmedia/webapps/live/moq

4. Restart AMS

sudo service antmedia restart

After the restart, the player and publisher pages are available at:

https://your-server:5443/live/moq/play.html
https://your-server:5443/live/moq/publish.html

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Before you open the pages:

• HTTPS is required on real servers. Browsers only allow WebTransport over HTTPS. Localhost is the only exception.
• Open port 4443 (UDP/TCP). The embedded MoQ relay listens on this port. Make sure it is open to inbound traffic.

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Publish Stream via MoQ

Option 1 — Browser Publisher (Built-in)

1. Open https://your-server:5443/live/moq/publish.html in a Chromium-based browser.
2. Enter a stream ID.
3. Select Camera or Screen as the source.
4. Click Start Publishing.

The stream is now live on the MoQ relay and fully available inside AMS—recording, REST API, and adaptive bitrate all work as normal.

Option 2 — Any MoQ-Compatible Client

Publish directly to the relay URL using any moq-lite-compatible tool:

moq://your-server:4443/moq/streamId/publish

AMS picks up the stream as a regular broadcast automatically.

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Play Stream via MoQ

1. Open https://your-server:5443/live/moq/play.html in a Chromium-based browser.
2. Enter your stream ID and connect.
3. Select a quality track:
   • source — original quality as published into AMS
   • 720p / 480p — if adaptive bitrate renditions are enabled and transcoded by AMS
   • publish — stream sent directly from the browser publisher, bypassing AMS entirely (lowest overhead, but no ABR, recording, or AMS pipeline features)

4. The stream is now playing live with MoQ.

Stream URLs follow this format:

moq://your-server:4443/streamId/source
moq://your-server:4443/streamId/720p

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Configuration (Optional)

The plugin works out of the box. To override defaults, go to Settings → Advanced in the AMS web panel and add the following under customSettings:

{
  "customSettings": {
    "plugin.moq": {
      "useEmbeddedRelay": true,
      "ingestEnabled": true,
      "externalRelayUrl": "https://relay.example.com:9000/moq",
      "ingestPollIntervalMs": 2000
    }
  }
}

Setting	Default	Description
useEmbeddedRelay	true	Use the bundled moq-relay on port 4443. Set to false to use an external relay.
ingestEnabled	true	Enable MoQ ingest via announce polling. Set to false if AMS is publish-only.
externalRelayUrl	localhost:4443	URL of the external relay. Only used when useEmbeddedRelay is false.
ingestPollIntervalMs	2000	How often (ms) to poll the relay's /announced endpoint for new streams.

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Supported Codecs

Type	Codecs
Video	H.264 (AVC), H.265 (HEVC)
Audio	AAC, Opus

Codecs outside this list (e.g., VP8, AV1) are not yet supported.

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What's Next

MoQ playback and publishing will be built directly into the main AMS web player in a future release. Full IETF moq-transport (moqtail.dev) support is on the roadmap.

Check the MoQ blog post to read more about MoQ implementation and more detailed insights.

For questions, visit the Ant Media community forum