How to Compress Video on Mac Without Third Party Apps?

How to Compress Video on Mac Without Third Party Apps? If you’ve ever shot a 4K video, you can imagine how much it weighs. One minute of 4K 60fps video on an iPhone will cost you nearly 500MB of free space. On other devices, I’m sure a video of this quality will take up just as much memory.

It is clear that if you are filming for yourself you can leave the video in this format, but if you want to send the video via messenger, big problems can arise. Today we will talk about how to reduce video size on Mac using native applications and discuss all the nuances of this procedure.

We tell you how to compress video on Mac without using third-party programs.

The other day I needed to record and send a short video. It seems nothing could be easier. Turn on your iPhone camera, shoot whatever you need, and send via Telegram. Also, Mail allows you to transfer files up to 2 GB, which should be more than enough.

Everything turned out to be much more complicated because when recording a video, I did not pay attention to the inscription 4K 60 frames per second at all. Suddenly, the 8-minute video took me almost 4 GB. But if I remembered it, I would be smarter.

Save the video smartly. Go up at least once in the camera settings and adjust all the parameters according to your needs.

Those who work with video editing will immediately say that there is Final Cut Pro X, where everything can be done without problems in minutes. Yes, but not everyone has professional software on their computer. And yes, there are a lot of bugs there. Until you understand with all the necessary tools, a hundred years will pass. I decided to use the apps installed on the Mac from the factory.

How to Reduce Video Size on Mac?

First, I decided to go with the built-in iMovie app. Before that, I had worked with him on both iPhone and iPad before, so there shouldn’t be any problems. Moreover, the program was originally designed as a tool for ordinary users. Say, video editing on any device from Apple to the masses. In fact, he had to tinker.

How to Compress Video on Mac Without Third Party Apps?

  • Open the iMovie application on your computer.
  • Go to the Projects tab in the top menu of the application.
  • Then click the Create New button, and select Movie.

Select the Projects tab and create a movie.

  • From the macOS top bar, select File, Import Media Files.

This is how you can import media files into iMovie.

  • Select the desired file in the Finder, and click Import Selected.

Select a folder at the top of the application, select a file and import it into the program.

  • You will then need to drag and drop the file onto the video stream below.
  • After that, again click on File in the top menu.
  • Select Export, then File.

The Export button is on the top menu here.

  • Specify format, resolution, video quality, and compression quality.

Edit the required settings, and click Next.

  • Then click Next, select the download path, and click Save.

Never before have I had so many problems running native apps on a Mac. First, let’s describe the preliminary calculation of time. iMovie said the whole procedure would take about 8 minutes. In fact, we had to wait over 30 minutes.

Second, the video compression progress was not displayed anywhere. That is, a window with a loading bar was not highlighted anywhere. In the end, I measured everything using coolers. Noisy means compression is in progress. If you know how to add download progress, be sure to unsubscribe in the comments below. I’m sure it will be useful to others. Also, unsubscribe from Mac behavior on the M1. I think everything should go much faster there.

How to Reduce Video Size on Mac?

Taught by bitter experience with iMovie (no other way to call it), for the sake of experimentation, I decided to turn to another built-in program on Mac – QuickTime Player. At first glance, it is a simple video player application. In fact, it’s a good tool for working with videos on Mac. Working with QuickTime Player turned out to be much easier and faster, which I didn’t expect at all.

To compress the video on mac follow the simple instructions:

  • Open QuickTime Player on your Mac.
  • Select the desired video in Finder, and click Open.

Choose the video you want.

  • From the macOS top menu, choose File, Export As.
  • Specify the quality you need, then specify the file name and path.

Select the desired video quality.

  • Click Save and wait for the video to finish exporting.

The exported video was just over 12 minutes long. They didn’t lie.

Yes, there may be fewer editing tools here, but in terms of export speed and convenience for ordinary users, QuickTime Player will definitely be more interesting.