Guide
How to compress a video for WhatsApp
WhatsApp re-compresses every video you send, and it is not gentle about it. A crisp phone recording often arrives as a blurry mess, and large files get rejected or sent as documents. The fix is to compress the video yourself, to a sensible size and resolution, before it goes into the chat. WhatsApp then has much less to squeeze and the result looks far better.
Steps
- 1Open Compress video and drop your file (MP4, MOV, WebM, MKV or AVI).
- 2Choose a target: the 16 MB · WhatsApp size preset, or a quality level if you do not care about the exact size.
- 3If the video is 4K or 1080p and will mostly be watched on phones, set the resolution to 720p. It halves the size with little visible loss on a phone screen.
- 4Check the estimated new size shown before you start.
- 5Press Compress, wait for the progress bar, then save the MP4.
- 6Send it in WhatsApp as a video. If it is still large, send it as a document to skip WhatsApp’s own re-compression.
What size should a WhatsApp video be?
WhatsApp allows fairly large media files, but anything much over about 16 MB is slow to send and more likely to be downgraded on the receiving phone. For a short clip, aim for 10 to 16 MB. For a longer video, send it as a document so WhatsApp leaves the file untouched; documents can be considerably larger than media messages. Check WhatsApp’s current limits if you are sending something unusually big.
Resolution matters more than bitrate
Phones record in 4K or 1080p, which is wasted on a chat that plays on a 6-inch screen. Dropping to 720p keeps the picture sharp on a phone and cuts the file to roughly a third. If the video is for watching on a TV later, keep 1080p and lower the quality slightly instead.
Keep the original
Compression is lossy. bruhgrow never modifies your source file; it writes a new MP4. Keep the original in your camera roll and send the compressed copy.
Why do this in the browser?
Compress video uses a WebAssembly build of FFmpeg, the same encoder many desktop apps use, running inside your browser. Every tool runs in your browser, so your files never leave your computer. There is nothing to install and no account to create to try it.
Questions
- Why does WhatsApp make my video blurry?
- WhatsApp re-encodes videos to save data, using an aggressive setting. Sending a video that is already modest in size and resolution gives it less to compress, so it keeps more detail.
- Can I compress a video on my phone?
- Yes. The web app works in a mobile browser for short clips. Long or 4K videos are faster on a laptop.
- Will the sound be compressed too?
- The audio is re-encoded at a normal bitrate for speech and music. It should sound the same in a chat.
Tools for this
More guides
- How to compress a video for emailGmail and Outlook cap attachments at around 20 to 25 MB. Here is how to compress a video to fit, and when a link is the better choice.
- How to add subtitles to a videoGenerate subtitles with on-device speech recognition, correct them, then burn them into the video or save an SRT file. Step by step.
- How to remove silence from a videoCut pauses, dead air and gaps out of a recording automatically, by loudness, with natural padding. Works for video and audio, on your device.
- How to extract audio from a videoPull the soundtrack out of an MP4, MOV, WebM or MKV as MP3, M4A or WAV, in your browser, without uploading the video.