What is streaming video?

Streaming media is multimedia such as audio or video (which is probably the most recognizable) that is continuously received by, and normally displayed to, the end-user while it is being delivered by the provider.
In other words, unlike a video that you download first to your hard drive on your computer and then open to view on your screen, You can usually start viewing or listening to your content as it is being delivered.
(ie it is "streamed" to you from a server on the web).
Hence the term "streaming media". (or in this case "streaming Video").
Live streaming video takes this one step further and allows the viewer to see content the moment it is created by the sender and is the online equivalent of live via satellite TV transmission.

in simple terms, it is a video which you can watch as it is being sent to your computer, without having to store it.

Without streaming, you would have to download the entire video THEN watch it, i.e. what is called "offline" (not (necessarily) connected to the source that it came from).

An example might be youtube, in which you can watch a video, and you can see from the progress bar that at the beginning only a tiny portion of the video has been downloaded.

If your connection is fast enough - in youtube specifically, it will send more of it down -- possibly all - so it can let your computer continue to play and not be using more internet resources to push it down to you.

First answer by Honestone. Last edit by Honestone. Contributor trust: 1 [recommend contributor]. Question popularity: 1 [recommend question]