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GivenTool

Convert a video to GIF

Turn a clip of an MP4, MOV or WebM into a looping GIF with an optimised colour palette.

Drop a file here or click to browse

Accepts MP4, MOV, M4V, WEBM, MKV, AVI, 3GP. Up to 500.0 MB per file.

GIFs autoplay and loop everywhere, from chat apps and forums to README files and email, which is why short clips are still shared as GIFs even though the format is 35 years old. This converter cuts the part of a video you choose and turns it into an animated GIF using FFmpeg compiled to WebAssembly, so the processing happens in your browser.

GIF can only hold 256 colours per frame. Instead of a generic palette, the tool first analyses your clip (palettegen) and then maps every frame to that palette with ordered dithering (paletteuse), which avoids most of the banding and blotchy skin tones of quick converters. The trade-off is size: GIF compresses poorly, so keep clips short, around 480 px wide and at 10-15 fps. Anything over 10 MB gets a warning, because many platforms reject larger GIFs.

How to use it

  1. Drop the video (MP4, MOV, WebM, MKV, AVI or 3GP). The player loads it and the end time is filled in.
  2. Use the player to find the moment you want and type the start and end times in seconds. Up to 30 seconds are converted.
  3. Choose the frame rate and width. 10 fps at 480 px is a good balance of smoothness and size.
  4. Click Make GIF, check the preview, then download it. The result card shows the final size.

Frequently asked questions

Why is my GIF so much bigger than the video?

Video codecs such as H.264 only store what changes between frames and use millions of colours efficiently. GIF compresses each frame on its own with a simple algorithm, so a GIF is often 5-20 times larger than the same clip as MP4. Lower the width or frame rate, or shorten the clip, to make it smaller.

Does the GIF include sound?

No. The GIF format has no audio track. If you need sound, share the trimmed MP4 instead (use the Video Trimmer).

Why is there a 30-second limit?

A 30-second GIF at 480 px is already tens of megabytes, and building it takes a lot of memory in the browser. For longer clips an MP4 is the better format.

Is my video uploaded?

No. FFmpeg runs inside your browser in a Web Worker, and the video and GIF stay on your device. The first conversion downloads the 32 MB FFmpeg engine from this site, which the browser then caches.

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