SVT Play is the brand used for the video on demand

Video on demand

Video on Demand or Audio and Video On Demand are systems which allow users to select and watch/listen to video or audio content on demand...

 service offered by Sveriges Television

Sveriges Television

Sveriges Television AB , Sweden's Television, is a national television broadcaster based in Sweden, funded by a compulsory fee to be paid by all television owners...

, more specifically to the streaming services offered on the SVT website, svt.se, and its counterpart for mobile phones.

SVT claims that the service offer more than 2,000 hours of television. Most programmes produced for or by SVT are published on SVT Play after they have been broadcast and are then available for 30 days. In the summer of 2008, the German series KDD became the first foreign acquisition available on SVT Play. The streams are available in Windows Media

Windows Media

Windows Media is a multimedia framework for media creation and distribution for Microsoft Windows. It consists of a software development kit with several application programming interfaces and a number of prebuilt technologies, and is the replacement of NetShow technologies.The Windows Media SDK...

 and RealVideo

RealVideo

RealVideo is a suite of proprietary video compression formats developed by RealNetworks – the specific format changes with the version. It was first released in 1997 and is at version 10. RealVideo is supported on many platforms, including Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, and several mobile...

. Since 2007, SVT Play have also started using Flash Video for shorter clips. In September 2007, SVT launched a trial to provide streamed content in standard television resolution using Move Media Player.

SVT have also launched "channels" dedicated at different audiences under the "Play" name. The first such channel was Play Bolibompa which launched in late 2007. It was followed by the news service Play Rapport

Play Rapport

Play Rapport is a Swedish web based video news service created by Sveriges Television . The name comes from SVT Play, which is the general brand for video-on-demand services from SVT, and Rapport, which is SVT's main news programme....

 which launched in May 2008. During the 2008 Olympics, SVT made all Olympic broadcasts available on the web in three Play channels, on simulcasting with SVT1, one simulcasting with SVT24 and a special web channel called Peking+.

On September 22, 2008, SVT launched a service called "Play Prima" which provides drama series from SVT in high resolution (with bitrate of up to 2,4 Megabits per second). Since June 2010 SVT Play uses streaming with adaptive bitrate

Adaptive bit rate

Adaptive bitrate streaming is a technique used in streaming multimedia over computer networks. While in the past most video streaming technologies utilized streaming protocols such RTP with RTSP, today's adaptive streaming technologies are almost exclusively based on HTTP and designed to work...

 (between 320 and 2400 kilobits per second) and "Play Prima" was discontinued.

The brand was introduced in December 2006, when the existing web television service got a new name. In September 2007, SVT launched their own channel on Youtube

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....

. From late 2007 until end of 2008 SVT Play was also available as a channel on Joost

Joost

Joost is an Internet TV service, created by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis . During 2007-8 Joost used peer-to-peer TV technology to distribute content to their Mozilla-based desktop player; in late 2008 this was migrated to use a Flash-based Web player instead.Joost began development in 2006...

. In August 2008, SVT Play became available on an IPTV platform for the first time, as the service launched on Telia Digital-tv

Telia Digital-tv

Telia Digital-tv is an IPTV distribution platform in Sweden owned by TeliaSonera. It was launched in January 2005 from a few locations, soon expanding into other locations.In September 2007, Telia announced that the platform had 200,000 subscribers....

 with newscasts and Olympic broadcasts available.
In early 2009, SVT relaunched the SVT Play web application. A beta version of the new web player was launched on January 20, 2009.