Color depth, also known as
bit depth, is either the number of
bits used to indicate the
color of a single
pixel, in a
bitmapped image or video
frame buffer, or the number of bits used for each color component of a single pixel. For consumer video standards, such as
High Efficiency Video Coding (H.265), the bit depth specifies the number of bits used for each color component. When referring to a pixel the concept can be defined as
bits per pixel (bpp), which specifies the number of bits used. When referring to a color component the concept can be defined as
bits per channel (bpc),
bits per color (bpc), or
bits per sample (bps). Color depth is only one aspect of color representation, expressing how finely
levels of color can be expressed (a.k.a. color precision); the other aspect is how
broad a range of colors can be expressed (the
gamut). The definition of both color precision and gamut is accomplished with a color encoding specification which assigns a digital code value to a location in a color space.