How to Fix HEVC and HEIF Extensions in Adobe Premiere Pro

Do you get a “missing codec” error when you edit iPhone videos or photos in Adobe Premiere Pro or Media Encoder on Windows? iPhones record video in HEVC (H.265) and save photos as HEIF, and Windows needs extra extensions to read them. In this video tutorial, I show you where to get both extensions, what Adobe recommends, and what really fixed the problem in my tests.

In this article

1. Here You Can Get the Extensions for Free
   1. Download the HEVC Video Extension
   2. Download the HEIF Image Extension
2. Adobe’s Solution for Using HEVC and HEIF Media on Windows
3. What Worked in My Test
4. What Is HEVC and Why Do I Need It?

Here You Can Get the Extensions for Free

Download the HEVC Video Extension

You can download the HEVC extension from free-codecs.com:

Download From Source

If you prefer to get it directly from the Microsoft Store, copy this link and paste it into your browser’s address bar. It opens the free HEVC Video Extensions from Device Manufacturer in the Store app:

ms-windows-store://pdp/?ProductId=9n4wgh0z6vhq

You can also open it on the web: HEVC Video Extensions from Device Manufacturer. The official paid version is HEVC Video Extensions ($0.99 in the US).

Download the HEIF Image Extension

Download From Source

The HEIF Image Extension is also free in the Microsoft Store.

Adobe’s Solution for Using HEVC and HEIF Media on Windows

Adobe’s help page lists the system requirements and links to both extensions in the Microsoft Store:

Adobe Solution Here

What Worked in My Test

In the video, I tested this with an iPhone video in Media Encoder and Premiere Pro:

1. I installed the free HEIF extension from the Microsoft Store.
2. I bought the official HEVC Video Extensions in the Microsoft Store (about one dollar, you need to sign in with a Microsoft account) and installed it.
3. With an NVIDIA graphics card (for example a Quadro), the codecs work after installing them, even in the older Premiere Pro 2021.
4. With an AMD graphics card, Premiere Pro 2021 still showed the same error after installing the codecs.
5. In Premiere Pro 2022, the latest version at the time, the same iPhone video exported without any problem on the AMD PC.

In short: with an NVIDIA graphics card, installing the codecs is enough. With an AMD graphics card, update to the latest version of Premiere Pro.

Want to know which video formats your graphics card can decode? See the video encode and decode GPU support matrix. To simply open HEIF and HEVC files in Windows 11, see how to open HEIF and HEVC files in Windows 11.

What Is HEVC and Why Do I Need It?

High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC), also known as H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2, is a video compression standard designed as part of the MPEG-H project as a successor to the widely used Advanced Video Coding (AVC, H.264, or MPEG-4 Part 10). Compared to AVC, HEVC offers 25% to 50% better data compression at the same level of video quality, or substantially better video quality at the same bit rate. It supports resolutions up to 8192×4320, including 8K UHD. Unlike AVC, which is mostly 8-bit, HEVC’s higher-fidelity Main 10 profile is supported by nearly all hardware that supports HEVC.

While AVC uses the integer discrete cosine transform (DCT) with 4×4 and 8×8 block sizes, HEVC uses integer DCT and DST transforms with block sizes between 4×4 and 32×32. The High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF), used for iPhone photos, is based on HEVC (source). As of 2019, HEVC was used by 43% of video developers, which made it the second most widely used video coding format after AVC (source).