Video to GIF

How to use the video to gif

1. Open a video and choose a start point and length.
2. Set the frame rate and width — smaller is dramatically smaller.
3. Convert, then download the GIF.

About this tool

Frames are captured by seeking, quantised to a 256-colour palette and written into a GIF, all in the page.

It is worth saying plainly that GIF is a poor format for video. It carries at most 256 colours per frame and has no compression across frames, so a few seconds can easily outweigh the MP4 it came from. Where the destination accepts video — most sites, chat apps and messengers now do — an MP4 or WebM will look better and be far smaller. GIF earns its place only where nothing else plays.

Given that, the controls are aimed at keeping files usable: shorter clips, 10 frames per second, and a width of 480 or less. A separate palette is computed per frame, which tracks colour changes better than one shared palette at a small cost in size.

There is no FFmpeg here. Browsers already decode the video formats they can play, so reading frames, metadata and audio needs no extra codec — which keeps these tools a few kilobytes instead of a thirty-megabyte download. The trade-off is honest: anything requiring a full re-encode is not offered rather than done badly.

Common uses

• Making a short looping clip for a chat or issue tracker.
• Turning a screen recording into an embeddable animation.
• Sharing a moment where video is not supported.

Frequently asked questions

Why is my GIF larger than the video?

GIF has no compression between frames, so every frame is stored almost independently. That is normal, and it is why video formats exist.

How do I make the file smaller?

Shorten the clip, lower the frame rate, and reduce the width. Width has the largest effect, since it reduces every frame.

Why only 256 colours?

That is the GIF format's limit. Gradients and video noise are what suffer most, which is why photographs of the real world often band.