Avatar Communications covers real-time conversational avatar systems in 5G contexts, targeting the MPEG Avatar Representation Format (ARF) and its use for avatar-based communications. Avatars are synthesised digital representations of participants, animated in real time from audio and video input, enabling immersive video calls and virtual presence experiences.
5G-MAG's work looks at the tools needed to encode, render, and stream avatars over 5G networks: the avatar representation itself, its animation, and the media transport that carries it.
This project is based on technology developed by:
The Problem It Solves
Before ARF, an avatar-based call needed the sender's capture/tracking system and the receiver's rendering engine to come from the same vendor's proprietary avatar format: there was no common way to describe the avatar asset itself or the animation stream driving it. ARF standardises both once: the base avatar (stored and exchanged as an ISOBMFF or Zip-based asset) and the animation stream (a sequence of compact Avatar Animation Units) are separate, interoperable formats, so a conforming client can load an avatar from one vendor and drive it with animation produced by a different vendor's tracking system, over an ordinary 5G call.
Latest updates and roadmap
Status on 4 November 2026
brought to study
- Avatar calls phase 2
- Body animation support in the avatar call client
on-going
- Gaussian splatting avatars
- Animation generation on Android XR
- Base Avatar Repository
- Android Avatar Call Client Application with enhanced UX
outcomes
- Initial Avatar Call Client
- Initial implementation of SWAP protocol
- Avatar content for the call client
The project at a glance
What it is, how it works, and where the Reference Tools stand, in one deck you can share.
Download the deck (Conversational Avatar Communication with MPEG ARF)From idea to running code
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Specifications
The specifications this technology is built on.
Software Accelerator
The open-source software that implements it.
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Repositories of This Project
The real, running software for this technology: what each repository is, what it implements, its latest release and where to find it.
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