MOV Compressor: How to Compress MOV to a Smaller Size on Windows/Mac?

MOV was originally developed by Apple as a file format for its QuickTime movie player, presenting a lot of advantages that are quite usable to everyday use. And I'm sure there must been some video files and movies in MOV on your computer or smartphone. Want to email these MOV videos to colleague or friends but the files are too large to send? Fail to upload MOV to YouTube, FaceBook for the video length or size? Eager to store much more MOV files but the space of your hard drive or smartphone is running out? In such cases, you might need to compress MOV files to a smaller size on your computer. But How to do? The following part will show you ways and tips to compress MOV on Windows/Mac quickly and easily.

Top Methods to Compress MOV File

Method 1: Compress MOV File to small sized MP4

Generally, we can compress MOV file to FLV to achieve smaller video size, especially when you need to upload MOV video to YouTube. What's more, you can also compress MOV to MP4 because with the same compression settings, the output size can be times larger in MOV compared with MP4.

Method 2: Change MOV profile parameters

The video file size largely depends on these profile parameters listed below. You can also shrink MOV file size by adjusting video profile parameters.

Video resolution: The higher the resolution, the clearer the picture. However, the higher the resolution, the larger the file size will be. Changing the original video to a smaller resolution will lead to a smaller file size.

Bit rate: As for the bit rate, lowering the bit rate will bring about the decrease of the video file size. But please keep in mind the image quality will be bad in case you make the bit rate too low.

Frame rate: The frame rate has a significant impact on the file size. Lowering the frame rate of your video to 15 or 10 fps can reduce the file size by as much as 1/2 or 2/3. However, reducing the frame rate may affect the smoothness of the playback. Acceptable frame rates vary depending on the specific video clip. You may have to experiment to find the lowest acceptable value.

Method 3: Trim/Crop/Split MOV files to remove unwanted parts or areas

Trimming, cropping or spliting MOV files is another simple but effective way to compress MOV files without quality loss. Trim your unwanted segments from the MOV video to leave only your desired parts. Crop the black bars around the MOV video frame to play the video with full screen. Split MOV file into several video clips by file count, time length, or file size.

Best MOV Compressor to Reduce MOV File Size

Pavtube Video Converter is a professional video converter that can help you convert MOV to any other smaller-sized format, e.g. MP4, FLV, 3GP, etc. With this MOV compressor, you also can reduce video resolution, bitrate, frame rate to shrink MOV video size. If you want lossless video quality, splitting feature is also supported. You can split MOV file by file count, time length, or file size. Other features like trim and crop are offered, too.

Of course, Pavtube Video Converter not only can compress MOV file, but also can compress WMV, VOB, MKV, AVI, MP4, etc. This software provides both Windows and Mac version, just download the right version on your computer and follow the next steps to finish MOV compression.

How to Reduce MOV File Size on Windows/Mac?

Step 1: Load MOV files

Click "File" drop-down option, then select "Add Video/Audio" or "Add from folder" to select the MOV file you want to compress. Or directly drag and drop the MOV file into the software. This video compressor supports batch conversion. So you can add multiple MOV files for saving time.

Step 2: Compress MOV file

Option 1: Change MOV to other video formats

You can choose to convert MOV to H.264 MP4 to reduce MOV file size. Pavtube video converter offers hundreds of video format, including both H.264 and H.265 MP4. If your device and media player support H.265 codec playback, "H.265 video (*.mp4)" from "Common Video" category will be a better choice, because H.265 MP4 takes up less space than H.264 MP4 when provides same video quality. After you choose the video format, you can preview the video size in "Settings".

Option 2: Change MOV video resolution and bitrate to shrink file size

Comparing to video format, video resolution and bitrate affects video size more. In general, a higher bitrate and resolution will accommodate higher image quality and video size in the video output, therefore, you can compress MOV video size by changing video resolution and bitrate. Adjusting frame rate is also an effective way to resize video. Just have a try.

Option 3: Trim / Crop / Split MOV Video

Click the "Edit" icon on the UI to open "Video Editor" window.

1. Trim Video File Length

Under the "Video Editor" window, switch to "Trim" tab, you can cut off the unwanted parts from a long MOV video to short ones. Just drag the slider bars to include the segment you want to remain, click the left square bracket to set start point, and click the right square bracket to set end point when previewing the video or directly input specific values to "Start" and "End" box. Finally, click "OK".

2. Crop WMV to shrink WMV size

To eliminate black bars and unwanted area of image, switch to the "Crop" tab, and follow the below methods to crop selected MOV video:

A. Crop MOV video by dragging and dropping the crop frame. Simply move your mouse cursor to drag and adjust the green frame to desired position.

B. Crop MOV video by setting values. There are "Simple Mode" and "Advanced Mode" under Crop feature.

3. Split MOV file into smaller ones

By clicking the "Split" button under the file displaying list, checking "Enable" to enable it, and then you can split MOV file by file count, time length, or file size according to your own needs.

Step 3: Start MOV compression

When the MOV size is meet your need after all settings are done, just click the big red "Convert" button and the rest will be finished automatically by this MOV compressor. After a while, you'll get your MOV video files in smaller size on your computer.

Best MOV Compression Settings for Youtube, Vimeo, Facebook & Instagram

If you want to compress MOV videos for Youtube, Vimeo, Facebook & Instagram, just follow the table to choose the settings.

Best MOV Compression Settings	Youtube	Vimeo	Facebook	Instagram
Container	MP4	MP4	MP4/ MOV	MP4
Codec	H.264	H.264	H.264	H.264
Frame rate	The same as the original video	24, 25, or 30 FPS	25-30 fps	29.96 fps
Bit rate	1000 kbps (360p), 2500 kbps (480p), 5000kbps (720p), 8000kbps (1080p), 10Mbps (1440p), 35-35kbps (2160p)	2,000 kbit/s for standard definition (SD) video; 5,000 kbit/s for 720p HD video; or 10,000 kbit/s for 1080p HD video.	There is no recommendation for Bitrate as it highly rests upon codec	3,500 kbps
Resolutions	426x240 (240p), 640x360 (360p), 854x480 (480p), 1280x720 (720p), 1920x1080 (1080p), 2560x1440 (1440p), 3840x2160 (2160P)	SD video include 640 x 480 px (4:3 aspect ratio) and 640 x 360 px (16:9 aspect ratio). HD video is usually formatted at 720p (1280 x 720 px) or 1080p (1920 x 1080 px).	1280px	maximum width 1080 pixels (any height)
Audio codec	AAC-LC	AAC-LC	AAC	AAC audio codec at 44.1 kHz mono
Audio bitrates	Mono (128 kbps), Stereo (384 kbps), 5.1 (512 kbps)	128 kbps	There is no recommendation for Audio Bitrate as it highly rests upon codec	5,500 kbps video bitrate (although Instagram may reduce this to 3,500kbps when we post it)