

I created a YouTube video info tool that gives readable details on the streams YouTube has available for a given video, and allows you to download the individual audio streams for analysis.

Learn more about WebM and Opus audio here. I have some 900-view videos that have WebM versions but other 1000-view ones that don't yet.

How popular a video needs to be before it gets a WebM version is difficult to say. So where does WebM and Opus come from? YouTube will automatically encode a WebM/Opus version of a video once it becomes popular, and stream that format during playback whenever a person's browser supports it. YouTube recommends that uploads be in the MP4 video format with AAC audio. Changing video resolution (360p, 720p, etc) in the video settings will probably not impact the audio stream, but it is likely that your connection performance will. The audio you hear during a YouTube video will usually be 126 kbps AAC in an MP4 container or anywhere from 50-165 kbps Opus in a WebM container. It can also adjust one during playback without affecting the other. Rather, YouTube can stream the video and audio it deems appropriate for a given device and connection. Due to this, the audio bitrate is not directly affected by video quality like in the past. YouTube streams video and audio separately and the web player/app combines them on the fly.
