Yes — “always” is the part to reject.

HEVC has a stronger compression toolbox: larger and more flexible coding-tree structures, richer prediction choices, larger transform options and other efficiency improvements. That gives a good HEVC encoder an advantage when both encoders are well tuned for the same target. Scientific comparisons during HEVC standardization found a large average bitrate reduction for equivalent subjective quality under the tested conditions.

But the standard does not force every encoder to make equally smart choices. Encoding preset, search depth, rate-control strategy, GOP structure, hardware encoder generation and implementation quality all matter. A very fast hardware HEVC encode can lose to a slow, carefully tuned software H.264 encode on some material.

So the defensible statement is: at the same bitrate, HEVC often has more potential to preserve quality. It is not a guarantee that any file labeled H.265 will beat any file labeled H.264.

Content type also changes how obvious the advantage is.

A talking head against a clean background is relatively easy to compress. Both codecs may look excellent at a generous bitrate, so the visual difference can be tiny. Dense action-camera scenes — water, foliage, gravel, snow, helmet motion, lots of fine texture — stress the encoder much more. That is where extra compression efficiency can become easier to see.

Noise is another big factor. Random sensor noise is difficult to predict because it changes from frame to frame. An encoder may spend many bits trying to preserve noise that the viewer does not actually value. If two encoders use different preprocessing or rate-control decisions, the “same bitrate” comparison can become a comparison of noise handling as much as codec design.

For a fair test, use the same source, same resolution, same frame rate, same bit depth if possible, and compare several difficult scenes rather than one static shot.

Also decide what “better” means before you compare.

If you freeze a frame and zoom to 400%, you may prefer the version that preserves more tiny texture. In motion, viewers may care more about whether edges pulse, gradients band, or fast movement turns into smearing. A codec can allocate bits differently and produce artifacts with a different character.

For practical delivery, I would compare at the target you actually need. If your goal is a 200 MB upload, encode both to roughly the same file size. If your goal is a fixed 20 Mb/s stream, use the same bitrate. If your goal is “visually transparent,” find the lowest bitrate where each version becomes hard to distinguish from the source.

That gives you a useful workflow answer instead of a benchmark number that does not match the job.

This is exactly why our comparison article avoids wording such as “H.265 is twice as good.” The better summary is that HEVC is generally more compression-efficient, while real output depends on encoder quality and settings.

If you want to understand why HEVC has that efficiency advantage, the two deep dives are useful together: how H.264 works and how H.265/HEVC works. The difference is easier to understand once you see that both codecs predict blocks and encode residual information, but HEVC gives the encoder more flexible structures and choices.

For an editor, the best test is still the real one: encode a difficult 20–30 second section using the exact export settings you plan to use, then compare quality, encode time, file size and playback compatibility.