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WebRTC Player Telemetry

Overview

The Netsocs WebRTC player includes a real-time telemetry panel (OSD - On-Screen Display) that shows stream quality metrics at three levels: viewer (browser), relay (DriversHub), and driver (source device). It lets you diagnose connectivity, video quality, and network performance issues without external tools.

Telemetry panel

Requirements: - Player in V2 mode (WebRTC/WHEP) - Version 3.3.0 or later

Enabling and disabling the telemetry panel

Info icon

  1. Hover over the player to reveal the zoom controls (bottom-right corner).
  2. Click the info icon (circle with an i).
  3. The OSD panel appears in the top-right corner of the player.
  4. Click the same icon again to hide it.

The panel state does not persist between sessions; it resets on page reload.

Telemetry panel sections

The OSD refreshes every 10 seconds and shows up to three sections depending on data availability.

Viewer section

Metrics collected directly from the browser's WebRTC connection via RTCPeerConnection.getStats().

Field Description Interpretation
Status (colored dot) Indicates whether the stream is flowing Green = LIVE (frames advancing), Yellow = STALLED (no progress but prior data exists), Red = NO DATA (no statistics available)
Resolution Video frame dimensions in pixels E.g. 1920x1080. Low resolution may indicate sub quality or encoder limitation
FPS Frames per second decoded in the viewer Typical range: 15–30 fps. Drops indicate packet loss or limited CPU
Bitrate (down arrow) Received bit rate calculated between two samples Shown in Kbps or Mbps. Sustained drops indicate network congestion
RTT Round-trip time of the nominated ICE candidate Round-trip time in milliseconds. Below 100 ms is optimal; above 300 ms may cause visible latency
Loss Percentage of lost packets 0% is ideal. Values above 1% degrade video quality
ICE ICE candidate type in use host = direct LAN connection, srflx = NAT traversal without relay, relay = TURN relay (higher latency)
Dec Average decoding time per frame In milliseconds. High values (>20 ms on modern hardware) indicate CPU overload or software decoding

Relay section

Metrics published by DriversHub from the server's WHIP/WHEP relay. Updated approximately every 10 seconds on the server and fetched via GET /whip/{streamId}/telemetry?source=relay&limit=1.

Field Description
Codec Video codec negotiated by the relay (e.g. H264, H265/HEVC)
Bitrate (down arrow) Bit rate observed at the relay in Kbps or Mbps
RTT Latency measured by the relay
Jit Relay jitter in milliseconds; variation in packet arrival times

This section only appears if the relay reports at least one telemetry data point.

Driver section

Metrics published by the device driver (e.g. Hikvision) directly to the telemetry endpoint. Updated every 5 seconds on the device and fetched via GET /whip/{streamId}/telemetry?source=publisher&limit=1.

Field Description Interpretation
RTP Total RTP packets sent by the driver Cumulative count; confirms the device is actively transmitting
IDR IDR frames (keyframes) sent Full reference frames. The player needs them to synchronize the stream. A very low count can cause delays when connecting
Err RTP errors on the driver (shown in red when > 0) Indicates failures in the device transport layer; may require restarting the channel

This section only appears if the driver reports telemetry data.

Data collection and submission

The useStreamTelemetry hook runs a cycle every 10 seconds per active viewer:

  1. Reads WebRTC statistics from the local RTCPeerConnection.
  2. Calculates bitrate, packet loss, and decoding time between consecutive samples.
  3. Detects whether the stream is flowing by comparing framesDecoded between samples.
  4. Sends a telemetry data point to the server via POST /whip/{streamId}/telemetry (fire-and-forget).
  5. Queries the latest relay and publisher data points in parallel to update the OSD.

Each viewer session generates a unique UUID viewer_id when the component mounts, allowing the backend to correlate multiple viewers of the same stream.

Diagnosing common problems

OSD symptom Possible cause Suggested action
Status STALLED (yellow) Network congestion or encoder stopped Check connectivity; review the channel status in the driver
Status NO DATA (red) PeerConnection has no statistics yet or stream not started Wait for the first 10-second cycle; if it persists, check the WHEP connection
Loss > 1% Packet loss on the network Review the network between the browser and the relay; consider switching to sub quality
ICE: relay Browser could not connect directly The TURN server is being used; this may increase latency
Err > 0 on Driver (red) RTP errors on the source device Restart the video channel in the device configuration
Relay section absent DriversHub received no relay data Verify that the DriversHub service is online and the WHIP stream is active
Driver section absent Driver does not send telemetry The device model may not support active telemetry

Privacy and performance considerations

  • Telemetry data includes stream and viewer identifiers but contains no video or audio.
  • Requests use keepalive: true to avoid blocking when the tab is closed.
  • Performance impact is minimal: one getStats() call and two HTTP requests every 10 seconds per viewer.
  • Disabling the player_webrtc_telemetry_info feature flag completely removes the OSD button and stops viewer data collection.