The VIDEO survey is a 30 sq. degree, Z,Y,J,H,K survey that is specifically designed to enable exploration of the main issues in observational cosmology. It allows galaxy and cluster/structure evolution to be traced as a function of both epoch and environment from the present day out to z=4 and AGN/QSO evolution up to and into the epoch of reionization at z > 6. The multi-band nature of the survey ensures many key science drivers can be tackled using the survey alone, without recourse to data from other wavebands.