Videos files can be very large—and that can be a problem for uploading and hosting.
Unless you need the highest resolution possible, making video files smaller is better for everyone. They reduce bandwidth usage and upload time, and there’s less buffering on your viewer’s end.
Moreover, this will drastically speed up your video creation and editing process as you don’t need to work with large video files.
But how do you easily compress a video, and reduce the file size?
We’ll take a look at six ways to make your video file smaller, both from your computer and online.
There are two reliable ways to reduce video size without quality loss. The first is to make your video shorter. If you can trim footage off of the beginning or end, that will reduce the size of the file.
The second method is by removing the audio from your video. Most videos will probably benefit from having audio and background music included, but if it’s unnecessary, you can remove it. That will decrease the file size without any loss of quality.
With that out of the way, let’s look at how to compress a video and make a video file smaller.
Video Compression & Understanding Video File Size
Before we get started, it’s important to understand what makes a video file larger or smaller. There are three main factors: resolution, bitrate, and encoding.
Resolution is the number of pixels presented in your video, and it is usually represented by a horizontal x vertical measurement (for example, native HD, also referred to as 1080p, is 1920 x 1080.) That provides high-definition quality.
The 16:9 aspect ratio is very common and includes a number of other resolutions. Here are the video resolutions that YouTube recommends for various measures of quality:
<aside> 👉 Recommended Video Quality Here at Fitune, for the best upload and video playback experience, we recommend following these video encoding and compression guidelines: ▶️ Video Format: MP4 (file extension .mp4) ▶️ Video Resolution: 1080p/2K or smaller ▶️ H.264 video codec – the most common codec and supported by the majority of devices and browsers ▶️ 20 fps – 60 fps (23.98 fps is a good option)
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Here’s a list of 6 free video compressor tools that are available today to help you reduce your video file sizes. You’ll learn about the features they offer, and how to use them to compress your videos.