Convert any video to MP4

When As it is copies, and when it converts

An MP4 is a container: a wrapper around a picture stream and one or more sound streams. Converting to MP4 therefore does not always mean encoding the video again. If the streams inside your file are ones an MP4 can hold, Octoolo puts them into a new MP4 exactly as they are. That takes about as long as copying the file, and the picture stays identical to the bit.

If a copy fails, which can happen with damaged or unusual files, Octoolo tries again by converting. And when the MP4 has to play on an older TV or in an editing app, pick High rather than As it is: the picture is then made into H.264 every time, and the sound into AAC.

H.264, HEVC or AV1

Under More settings, Video codec decides what a converted picture becomes:

• Automatic (H.264) is the one nearly everything plays, from old laptops to smart TVs. Keep it when you do not know where the video will end up.
• H.265 (HEVC) looks the same in fewer bits: Octoolo gives it about two thirds of H.264's bit rate for the same picture. iPhones, Macs and newer TVs play it, but many Windows PCs need Microsoft's HEVC Video Extensions.
• AV1 is the newest and most compact, at a little over half of H.264's bit rate. Chrome, Edge and Firefox play it, as do many recent phones and TVs; older devices do not.
• MPEG-4 (Xvid) is there for players from the DivX era, though for those an AVI is usually the safer file.

Encoding goes to your graphics card's video encoder if it has one, from NVIDIA, AMD or Intel. If not, the work falls to Windows' own encoder, or failing that to the processor. Octoolo re-encodes one video at a time, since that keeps the card or processor fully busy, while copies run beside it, up to four jobs at once.

Size, frame rate and sound

The rest of More settings shapes the file:

• Size: As it is, or anything from 4K down to 240p. The number is the shorter side, so a vertical phone video at 1080p stays 1080 pixels wide. Octoolo never makes a video bigger than it was.
• Frames a second: As it is, or 60 down to 10. It can lower the rate, never raise it.
• Keep the sound: switch it off for silent MP4s, handy for background videos on web pages.
• Sound codec and Bit rate: AAC unless you pick MP3, AC-3 or Opus. High gives AAC 256 kbps, Balanced 192 and Small 128.

The quality choices are about size as much as looks. High is converted at high quality but is never needlessly bigger than the original, Balanced lands at about half the size, and Small is for email and chat. To shrink videos on purpose, the video compressor page explains the options.

Videos it takes, with a guide for each

Anything FFmpeg can read goes in, which is nearly every video format there is. These are the ones people turn into MP4 most often:

• Phones and Macs: MOV, HEVC to H.264, M4V and 3GP from older phones.
• Recorders and the web: MKV, WebM, FLV and TS.
• Older Windows files: AVI and WMV.
• Discs and cameras: MPG and MPEG, VOB, MTS and M2TS, MXF.
• Animations: GIF.

A folder of mixed formats is fine: each file gets what it needs, so the MKVs in it may be copied while the WMVs beside them are converted. Two kinds of file will not convert. Copy-protected ones, such as commercial DVDs and iTunes purchases, cannot be read by FFmpeg. Still pictures are turned away with a pointer to Convert image, the Photo Editor's image converter.