Convert video to GIF

Turn MP4, WebM or MOV clips into animated GIFs right in your browser, no upload — pick the start, length, frame rate and size.

How to convert a video to GIF

  1. Drop or pick a video — MP4, WebM and MOV all work.
  2. Choose where the clip starts, how long it runs (up to 15 seconds), the frame rate and the width.
  3. Convert, watch the GIF play, and save it — everything runs on your device.

Why make GIFs with OptImg?

GIFs still rule chats, docs, issue trackers and anywhere autoplay video can't go. Online converters upload your clip to a server, queue it, and often watermark or cap the result; OptImg plays the video with your browser's own player and builds the GIF on your device — nothing is uploaded, there's no queue, and the result is free. The classic GIF trade-offs are yours to tune: fewer frames per second and a smaller width make dramatically smaller files.

Frequently asked questions

Is my video uploaded to a server?
No. The video is played and converted entirely in your browser: it never leaves your device, and there's no queue and no watermark.
How long can the GIF be?
Up to 15 seconds per GIF (at most 200 frames). Long GIFs get huge fast — short clips at 10 fps are what the format does best.
Which video formats work?
Anything your browser can play — MP4 and WebM everywhere, MOV in most browsers. If the video plays in a tab, it converts here.
Why is the GIF bigger than my video?
GIF is a 1987-era format: 256 colors per frame and no motion compression, so it can't match modern video codecs. Keep clips short and pick 10 fps and a smaller width for shareable sizes.
Does the GIF have sound?
No — GIFs are silent by design. The picture loops forever; the audio track is simply not part of the format.
How do I get the file size down?
Three levers, in order of effect. Length matters most, because every frame is stored almost independently: trimming a clip from ten seconds to four roughly cuts the file to 40%. Width is next, since halving it quarters the pixels per frame. Frame rate is last: dropping from 15 to 10 fps removes a third of the frames and usually still reads as motion. A clip that is short, around 480 pixels wide and at 10 fps is the shape that shares well; try those before assuming the format cannot do what you want.
Why does my GIF look grainy or banded?
Because a GIF frame can only hold 256 distinct colours. A photographic scene contains far more, so the palette has to be approximated, and the leftover error is scattered as fine dots (dithering) to avoid visible steps in gradients. Skies, skin tones, shadows and smooth colour fades are where this shows worst; sharp graphics, screen recordings, line art and cartoons have few enough colours that the limit never bites. If your clip is photographic and the grain bothers you, a shorter, smaller GIF hides it better than a large one.
Should this be a GIF at all?
Often, no — and it is worth saying so. A short video file is dramatically smaller and looks better at the same size, so if the destination accepts video, use video. GIF earns its place where video is awkward or blocked: chat and messaging apps, documentation and README files, email signatures, forum posts, and anywhere a clip needs to autoplay, loop silently and work with no player controls at all.
Why do 'GIFs' on big websites look so much better than mine?
Because most of them are not GIFs. Social networks and image-sharing sites accept a GIF upload and quietly transcode it to a modern video format behind the scenes, then keep calling it a GIF in the interface. You are comparing your true 256-colour file against their video, which is not a fair fight. On the platforms that do this, uploading a short video directly gets you the same quality without the detour.