SUMMARYIn this paper, we propose an Adaptation Decision-Taking Engine (ADTE) that targets the delivery of scalable video content in mobile usage environments. Our ADTE design relies on an objective perceptual quality metric in order to achieve video adaptation according to human visual perception, thus allowing to maximize the Quality of Service (QoS). To describe the characteristics of a particular usage environment, as well as the properties of the scalable video content, MPEG-21 Digital Item Adaptation (DIA) is used. Our experimental results show that the proposed ADTE design provides video content with a higher subjective quality than an ADTE using the conventional maximum-bit-allocation method.