Comment by defrost

Sure, there are many use cases and Netflix generally has streams with high quality and few artifacts.

Real time video communications are going to go for fast low bitrates and that's more or less expected.

In other cases where encoders have no real time constraint, eg pirate torrents and youtube alternate versions, there are multiple tiers of quality - for a given resolution (say 720p) and bit rate rate | file size the offerings can be split by time spent encoding, quick and shitty to slow and few visible quirks.