Video to GIF Converter

A video to GIF converter turns a short section of a video into an animated GIF that plays automatically almost everywhere: in emails, help articles, chat apps, slide decks and README files. Our free tool does it entirely in your browser. Choose your own MP4, WebM or MOV file, pick the start and end points, set the frame rate, width and number of colours, and download the GIF. Nothing is uploaded, so unreleased product demos and client recordings stay private. Clips are limited to 15 seconds and 640 pixels wide, because GIF is an old format that produces large files, and the tool works only with videos you made or have the right to use.

How to use the Video to GIF

1. 1 Choose your videoDrop a video file onto the tool or choose one from your device. MP4 (H.264) and WebM work in every current browser; MOV files from iPhones usually work in Safari, Chrome and Edge.
2. 2 Pick the start and endPlay or scrub the preview, pause where the GIF should begin and press Use current time under Start, then do the same for End. You can also type the times in seconds. The clip can be up to 15 seconds long.
3. 3 Set frame rate, width and coloursChoose 5 to 15 frames per second, a width from 240 to 640 pixels and 256, 128 or 64 colours per frame. The tool shows the output size and the number of frames.
4. 4 Create the GIFPress Create GIF. Each frame is captured from the video, reduced to a GIF colour palette and added to the animation. A progress bar shows how far it has got, and you can cancel at any time.
5. 5 Preview and downloadThe finished GIF plays in the preview with its file size. If it is too large, lower the width, frame rate or colours and try again, then download it.

How the converter works without uploading anything

Most online GIF makers upload your video to a server that runs a program such as FFmpeg and sends the result back. This tool takes a different approach that keeps the file on your device. Your browser already knows how to play video, so the tool loads your file into a hidden video player, jumps to each moment it needs and draws that frame onto an invisible canvas, scaled to the width you chose.

Each captured frame is then reduced to a palette of at most 256 colours, which is the limit of the GIF format, and every pixel is mapped to its nearest colour in that palette. The frames are written one after another into a GIF file using gifenc, a small open-source encoder written in JavaScript, with a delay between frames that matches the frame rate you picked. Because a separate palette is calculated for each frame, scenes that change colour keep their look instead of being forced into one shared set of colours.

Everything happens in your browser's memory. When you close the page, the video and the GIF are gone unless you have downloaded the result.

When a GIF is the right choice

GIFs are old, large and limited to 256 colours, yet they remain useful because they play automatically, loop and work in places where video does not. Good uses include:

• Showing a short how-to step in a help-centre article or onboarding email.
• Demonstrating a new feature or bug in a support ticket, pull request or project README.
• Adding a looping product animation to an email newsletter, where most email apps will not play video.
• Sharing a reaction or a short moment from your own footage in Slack, Teams or WhatsApp.
• Embedding a short animation in a slide deck without worrying about video playback settings.

Choosing frame rate, width and colours

Three settings decide how smooth, sharp and large your GIF is. The frame rate is how many pictures are shown each second. Video is usually 25 or 30 frames per second, but GIFs rarely need that many. Around 10 frames per second looks smooth for screen recordings, interface demos and most talking-head clips; 12 to 15 suits faster movement; and 5 to 8 is fine for slow changes or when file size matters most. Every extra frame adds to the file, so doubling the frame rate roughly doubles the size.

Width has an even bigger effect, because the number of pixels in each frame grows with the square of the width. A 640-pixel GIF has about four times as many pixels per frame as a 320-pixel one. For emails and chat, 320 to 480 pixels is usually plenty; use 640 pixels when fine detail, such as small text in a screen recording, has to stay readable.

The colours setting controls the size of each frame's palette. Screen recordings, logos and flat illustrations often look identical with 64 or 128 colours, and the GIF compresses better. Photographic footage with skies, skin tones and gradients looks best with the full 256 colours, though some banding is unavoidable in the GIF format.

Why GIFs are large, and the limits in this tool

GIF was designed in 1987. It compresses each frame on its own and cannot use the clever motion compression that makes modern video so small, so a few seconds of GIF are often many times larger than the same clip as an MP4. A GIF made from a long or wide video can easily run to tens of megabytes, which is too big for most email attachments and slow to load on a web page.

To keep the result practical and to stop the browser running out of memory, the tool converts at most 15 seconds of video and a maximum width of 640 pixels. If you enter a longer clip, only the first 15 seconds after the start time are used, and you are told so. If the finished GIF is larger than 10 MB, the tool suggests lowering the settings. Many chat apps and email providers have their own limits on attachment and GIF sizes, so check the destination before you send a large file.

If you are adding an animation to your own website, consider using a short, muted, looping MP4 or WebM video instead of a GIF. It will usually be far smaller and look better, and browsers can autoplay muted video. A GIF remains the safer choice for emails and older platforms.

Supported video formats and browsers

Because frames are captured by your browser's built-in video player, the tool can convert any video that your browser can play. MP4 files using the H.264 codec, which is what most phones, cameras, screen recorders and video editors produce by default, work in Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari. WebM files work in Chrome, Edge and Firefox and in recent versions of Safari. MOV files from iPhones and Macs usually play in Safari, Chrome and Edge, but newer iPhone videos recorded in HEVC may not play in every browser on Windows.

MKV, AVI and WMV files often use codecs that browsers cannot decode. If your video will not load or shows a black picture, try another browser or export it as an MP4 from the app that created it. The sound track is ignored, since GIFs cannot contain audio.

Your own videos only

This tool works with video files already on your computer or phone. It cannot download or convert videos from YouTube, TikTok, Instagram or any other website, and it is not intended for copying other people's work. Making a GIF from a film, TV programme or someone else's video and publishing it can infringe copyright, even when the clip is short. Stick to footage you recorded, videos your business owns, or material whose licence allows this kind of reuse.

Remember privacy too. If a screen recording shows customer names, email addresses or other personal data, crop or blur it in a video editor before turning it into a GIF and sharing it. Once a GIF has been posted in a public channel or embedded in an email, it can be saved and forwarded by anyone who sees it, so it is much harder to take back than a private link to a video.

Examples you can copy

Use                         Width   FPS   Colours
--------------------------  ------  ----  -------
Chat reaction or sticker    240     10    128
Email newsletter animation  480     10    128
Help article / UI demo      640     10    64-128
Product footage (photo)     480     12    256
Slow fade or slideshow      480     5     256

Pixels per frame (16:9 video)

240 x 136  =  32,640 pixels
320 x 180  =  57,600 pixels
480 x 270  = 129,600 pixels
640 x 360  = 230,400 pixels

Doubling the width gives about 4x the pixels in every frame.

Common mistakes to avoid

Frequently asked questions