MP4 to GIF Converter
Turn any part of an MP4 into a smooth, sharp GIF, free and with no watermark.
- Free, no sign-up
- Runs in your browser
- Nothing uploaded or kept
Drop a video here
or choose one from your device: MP4, MOV, WebM or MKV
- Made on your device. Nothing is uploaded
- No watermark, no sign-up, no limits
- Fits a size limit, such as 10 MB, automatically
How to use it
Choose your video
Drop an MP4 on the box or tap Choose a video. MOV, WebM and MKV work too. Nothing is uploaded.
Pick the part
Set Start and End, play the selection, then choose the size, speed and an optional caption.
Make and save
Tap Make GIF, then download it or, on a phone, save it to your photos.
The video is read in your browser and never uploaded, so even a long or large file opens at once. Trim it to the hundredth of a second, crop it, add a caption, change the speed or play it backwards, and make it fit under 10 MB or any size you choose.
Why make your GIF here
Most online GIF makers upload your video to a server, cap how long or how big it can be, and put a watermark on the result unless you pay. This one does none of that, because the GIF is made by your own browser.
- Your video never leaves your device. It is read from your disk and made into a GIF on this page. Open the Network tab in your browser's developer tools while you make one to see for yourself: no request carries your video.
- No watermark, no sign-up, no limits. No daily cap and no limit on the size of the video. A GIF can be up to 3,000 frames long, over three minutes at 15 frames a second.
- Fits a size limit for you. Choose under 2, 5, 10, 15 or 25 MB and the GIF is made to fit, keeping your frame rate and length, ready for a chat app, a forum or an email.
- Colours that don't flicker. One palette is chosen for the whole clip, and parts of the picture that stay still keep their colours from frame to frame, so the GIF looks steady and stays small.
- See it before you make it. The preview loops your selection at the GIF's speed, with the crop and caption drawn exactly as they will come out.
- Exact timing. Trim to a hundredth of a second; the GIF plays at the video's own speed (or the speed you choose) with no drift on long clips.
- Phone videos come out right. Portrait videos stay upright, iPhone HEVC and HDR video is supported where your browser decodes it, and odd sizes and shapes keep their proportions.
Convert MP4 to GIF on Windows, Mac, iPhone and Android
The steps are the same everywhere, because the page runs in the browser you already have: Chrome, Edge, Safari or Firefox. There is nothing to install. On a computer, drag the MP4 onto the page; on a phone, tap Choose a video and pick it from your photos or files.
Make a GIF under 10 MB
Open More options, set File size to Under 10 MB and make the GIF. If the first try comes out bigger, it is made again at a slightly smaller size until it fits, with the same frame rate, length and colours, and the result says it was made smaller. A shorter part of the video or 10 to 12 frames a second leaves more room for a bigger picture.
What each setting does
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Size (longest side) | 240 to 1080 px. The longest side, so a portrait phone video stays narrow. 480 px is sharp on a phone; never larger than the video. |
| Frame rate | 5 to 50 frames a second. 15 is smooth for most clips; 10 or 12 for screen recordings; 20 to 30 for fast motion. |
| Speed | A quarter speed to four times as fast. Faster speeds skip frames rather than shortening each one, so the GIF stays small. |
| Direction | Forward, Reverse (backwards) or Boomerang (forwards, then backwards, in a seamless loop). |
| Caption | Bold white text with a black outline, at the top or bottom, wrapped onto up to three lines. |
| Crop | Original, Square, Portrait 4:5 or 3:4, Story 9:16, Widescreen 16:9 or Classic 4:3. Drag the frame on the preview to place it. |
| File size | No limit, or under 2, 5, 10, 15 or 25 MB. If the GIF comes out bigger, it is made again a little smaller until it fits. |
| Colours | 255, 127, 63 or 31 colours for the whole clip. Fewer colours make a smaller file with flatter shading. |
| Compression | Light, Medium or Strong: how much part of the picture may change before it is redrawn. On 12 real phone videos, Medium came out 9 to 29% smaller than Light and Strong 21 to 48% smaller, with a little less fine detail in motion. Cartoons and screen recordings with flat colours save less. |
| Dithering | Smooth (best for video), Pattern (steadier, smaller) or Off (flat colours, smallest, best for cartoons and screen recordings). |
| Loop | Loop forever, or play once and stop on the last frame. |
How it works
Your browser opens the video file where it is and decodes only the frames the GIF needs, using the same video decoder it uses to play videos. Browsers that can't decode frame by frame step a hidden video player through the clip instead, which is slower but works with anything the browser can play.
A GIF can hold at most 256 colours, so 48 frames spread over your selection are looked at first, and the best 255 colours for the whole clip are chosen from them. Every frame is then mapped to those colours with dithering, which spreads the small differences so gradients don't band. After the first frame, only the rectangle that changed is stored, and pixels inside it that didn't change are left see-through so the frame under them shows. Frames that are exactly the same are merged into one longer frame.
A GIF stores each frame's time in hundredths of a second. The times are rounded so that they add up exactly, which is why a 15 second clip plays for 15.00 seconds rather than drifting.
How we tested it
Before release, the GIF maker was run in Chrome on Windows against two sets of videos:
- Test videos with known content, made for the job: H.264, VP8, VP9 and AV1 video in MP4, MOV, WebM, MKV and MPEG-TS files; a phone video stored sideways with a rotation flag; an odd 202 × 118 size; a film-style letterbox and a pillarbox; a browser screen recording with no length written in it; a file with sound only; and a text file renamed .mp4.
- 12 real phone videos, from 0.3 to 14 seconds: iPhone HEVC MOVs at 1080 × 1920 and H.264 MP4s at 720 × 1280.
Every GIF was read back with a separate GIF reader, not the code that wrote it. Solid colour blocks came back within one level of the exact colour, a 4 second clip played for exactly 4.00 seconds, a sideways-stored video came out upright, black bars were gone from every edge, and reverse, boomerang, speed, trim, caption and play-once all did what they say. The sound-only file and the renamed text file each got a plain message instead of a broken GIF. With nothing to decode frames directly, as on some phones, every test video except the MPEG-TS one still converted through the slower route.
Not tested yet on real phones: Safari on iPhone, Chrome on Android, and Firefox. They use the same code; if something doesn't work for you, tell us which browser and what kind of video.
More free tools for videos and pictures
The same GIF maker, with help for other files: Video to GIF maker, MOV to GIF converter and WebM to GIF converter. For photos, HEIC to JPG converts iPhone photos and WebP to JPG converts WebP and AVIF pictures, both in your browser too.
Frequently asked questions
Is my video uploaded to a server?
No. The GIF is made inside your browser, on your own device: the video is read from your disk, turned into frames and written as a GIF without ever being sent anywhere. Nothing is stored on a server and nobody else can see it. You can check: open your browser's developer tools, go to the Network tab, and make a GIF; no request carries your video.
How do I convert an MP4 to a GIF?
Drop the MP4 on the box above or tap Choose a video. Set Start and End to the part you want (type exact seconds or drag the sliders) and tap Play selection to check it. Choose the size and frame rate, add a caption if you like, then tap Make GIF and Download GIF. The defaults (480 px, 15 frames a second) suit most clips.
Is there a watermark or a limit?
No. There is no watermark, no sign-up, no daily limit and no limit on how big the video you start from can be. A GIF can be up to 3,000 frames long, which is over three minutes at 15 frames a second. Because nothing is uploaded there is no upload wait: in our tests a 30 MB phone video opened in under a second.
How do I make a high-quality GIF?
Choose 640 or 800 px, 20 to 25 frames a second, 255 colours, Smooth dithering and Light compression, with no file size limit. A GIF can only hold 256 colours per frame, so the tool picks the best 255 for the whole clip at once, which keeps colours from flickering, and spreads the difference with dithering so gradients stay smooth. A larger size than the video itself is never used, because it would only add blur and bytes.
How do I make the GIF smaller?
Open More options and pick a file size: under 2, 5, 10, 15 or 25 MB. The GIF is made, and if it is too big it is made again a little smaller until it fits, keeping your frame rate, length and colours. Without a limit, these make it smaller: a smaller size (320 or 240 px), a lower frame rate (10 fps), a shorter part of the video, Medium or Strong compression (on real phone videos, Medium came out 9 to 29% smaller and Strong 21 to 48% smaller), or fewer colours. GIF is an old format, so a GIF is usually several times bigger than the video it came from.
How do I make a GIF that fits a chat app's or email's upload limit?
Pick the app's limit under More options, File size, before you make the GIF; it is then made to fit. Chat apps, forums and email each have their own limit and they change, so check the app's current one: under 10 MB suits most chat apps and email, and under 2 MB suits forums and profile pictures.
What frame rate should I use?
15 frames a second is smooth for most clips and keeps the file small. Use 20 to 30 for fast motion such as sport or gaming, or 10 and below for the smallest files. Browsers can't play a GIF faster than 50 frames a second, so that is the highest choice. The GIF keeps the video's real speed at any frame rate.
Can I add text to the GIF?
Yes. Type a caption and choose top or bottom. It is drawn in bold white letters with a black outline, sized to the GIF and wrapped onto up to three lines. The preview shows it exactly as it will look.
Can I crop the GIF or remove black bars?
Yes. Pick a shape (Square, Portrait 4:5 or 3:4, Story 9:16, Widescreen 16:9 or Classic 4:3) and drag the frame on the preview, or use the arrow keys, to choose what the GIF shows. If the video has black bars, as film clips and screen recordings often do, a Remove black bars option appears under the preview.
Can the GIF play backwards or as a boomerang?
Yes. Choose Reverse to play the clip backwards, or Boomerang to play it forwards then backwards in a seamless loop. Speed goes from a quarter speed to four times as fast, and you can choose to loop forever or play once.
Which video formats work?
MP4, MOV, M4V, WebM, MKV and MPEG-TS files, with H.264, HEVC (H.265), VP8, VP9 or AV1 video, whenever your browser can decode them. Chrome, Edge, Safari and Firefox decode H.264, VP9 and AV1. HEVC, the format iPhones record in, works in Safari, and in Chrome and Edge on computers whose graphics can decode it. If a video doesn't open, the page says which format it is and what to try.
Does the GIF keep the sound?
No. A GIF is pictures only, so the sound is left out. If you need the sound, keep the video: most apps that show GIFs also play short videos.
Does it work on iPhone and Android?
Yes, in Safari on iPhone and iPad and in Chrome on Android. Choose a video from your photos, make the GIF, and tap Save to Photos (iPhone) or Share to save it or send it straight to an app. Long or large GIFs need more memory, so on an older phone choose a smaller size or a shorter part.
A free tool from LetRelay: no sign-up, nothing stored on a server.