Inter-frame compression, compression method that involves more than one frame.

The content of adjacent frames is compared to eliminate common elements and keep only the differences.

Especially significant images (Type I frames) are used in the image frame as an orientation for new calculations.

MPEG-2 operates with two types of inter-frame frames; the P frame (predictive) and the B frame (bidirectional). These frames alone contain information relative to the adjacent image, do not contain complete information of an image.

The P frames depend on the I frames; B frames depend on I frames and P frames. This implies that these frames cannot be processed separately