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ffprobe - Bitrate

The bit rate of a video influences both the video quality and file size.

Understanding the bit rate of a video is critical for encoding decisions, ensuring compatibility with bandwidth limits, or addressing quality issues caused by insufficient bit rates.
It also helps when re-encoding videos for specific distribution channels.

# For MP4
ffprobe -v quiet -select_streams v:0 -show_entries stream=bit_rate -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 input.mp4
 
# For MKV
ffprobe -v quiet -select_streams v:0 -show_entries format=bit_rate -of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1 input.mkv

returns:

NOTE:

-v error: Limits output to errors to avoid any unnecessary information display.
-select_streams v:0: Directs the command to focus on the first video stream.
-show_entries stream=bit_rate: Extracts the average bit rate information from the specified stream (for MP4 files).
-show_entries format=bit_rate: Extracts the average bit rate information from the specified stream (for MKV files).
-of default=noprint_wrappers=1:nokey=1: Formats output to ensure only the core bit rate value is shown.
input.mp4: The file under examination.

ffprobe -v quiet -select_streams v -show_entries packet=size -of compact=p=0:nk=1 input.mp4 | awk '{s+=$1} END {print s}'
1772586389
 
ffprobe -v quiet -select_streams v -show_entries stream=duration -of compact=p=0:nk=1 video.mp4  # format=duration if MKV
3592.544000
 
echo 1772586389/3592.544000 | bc   # B/s
493407
 
echo '1772586389/3592.544000/1024' | bc   # kB/s
481