WMV stands for Windows Media Video developed by Microsoft, used for both streaming and downloading content via the Internet and played on Windows Media Player. As a common sense, Mac OS X doesn’t support WMV format. You could not import WMV videos to iMovie, FCP, QuickTime, iTunes for editing or playback. So, if you want to edit WMV files in iMovie or organize them in iTunes, you need to convert WMV and make the WMV videos friendly with iMovie, FCP or iTunes. That’s to say, you need to convert WMV to MP4 or other Apple compatible video formats. This tutorial would tell you how to convert WMV to MP4 on Mac by using WMV to MP4 Converter for Mac. Inversely, you can convert MP4 to WMV on Mac.

Part 1: WMV vs MP4

WMV and MP4 are two popular video formats that can be applied to most media players, portable devices, and network platforms. However, many users cannot tell the differences clearly when it comes to WMV vs MP4. In this part, differences between WMV and MP4 will be listed.

What is WMV?

WMV is short for Windows Media Video. It is a video compression format developed by Microsoft for several proprietary codecs. Its main competitors are MPEG-4 AVC, AVS, RealVideo, and MPEG-4 ASP. WMV was originally designed for internet streaming applications. Through standardization by the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), WMV 9 has gained adoption for physical-delivery formats such as HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc.

What is MP4?

MP4 is short for MPEG-4 Part 14. It is a container format most commonly used to store videos and audios. Also, it can be used to store subtitles, images, etc. Like most container formats, it allows multimedia streaming over the internet. MP4 is the official filename extension for MP4 files; it is the most common format for smart phones, tablets, media players, and thousands of other devices. Other extensions include .m4p, and .m4a.

MP4

WMV

Developed by

Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG)

Microsoft

Video Formats Supported

MPEG-2 Part 2, MPEG-4 ASP, H.264/MPEG-4 AVC, H.263, VC-1, Dirac, others

MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4 Part 2, MPEG-4AVC/H.264, WMV-HD, WMV9

Audio Formats Supported

MPEG-2/4 (HE)-AAC, MPEG-1/2 Layers I, II, III (MP3), AC-3, Apple Lossless, ALS, SLS, Vorbis, others;

MP3, WMA, AAC, AC3, DTS, RealAudio, PCM, etc.

Media Players Supported

Almost all media players

Windows Media Player, Leawo Blu-ray Player, RealPlayer, MPlayer, Media Player Classic, VLC Media Player and K-Multimedia Player

Portable Devices Supported

All portable devices like Apple, Android, Microsoft devices and Sony game consoles

Microsoft devices, part of Android devices, and Sony game consoles; not work on Apple devices

File Size

Small

Even smaller than MP4 under same video quality

Pros

Better in video quality than WMV; Supported by almost all OS, players & mobile devices; Commonly used for sharing video files online

Smaller in file size than MP4; Compatible well with any Windows PC; The small size makes it easy for network transmission

Cons

Costs more system resources when editing MP4 videos

Needs plug-ins like Flip4Mac when playing WMV files on Mac; Video transmission has a delay

Since WMV is mainly playable on Windows media player but not readable by Mac QuickTime player or other Apple devices like iPhone iPad, you can rely on a video converter to convert WMV to MP4 Mac to have perfect compatibility with your iPhone 6s/6 (Plus), iPad (Air 2/Mini 4) and Apple TV 4.

Part 2: Convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with Leawo Video Converter for Mac

Leawo Video Converter for Mac is a professional Mac based video converter that could convert WMV videos to MP4 videos on Mac (Mavericks Included) in only a few clicks. It could easily convert your WMV videos to MP4 or other Mac compatible video formats like MOV so as to let you edit WMV videos in iMovie or FCP, play WMV videos in iTunes or QuickTime. Actually, many formats are supported by this video converter. To be more specific, the input and output video and audio formats supported by Leawo Video Converter for Mac include Common Video (MP4, H.265 MP4, MKV, H.265 MKV, MOV, etc.), Common Audio (AAC, AC3, WAV, MP3, WMA, FLAC, etc.), HD Video (HD MP4, HD AVI, HD TS, HD VOB, etc.), and 4K Video (4K MP4 and 4K MKV). This professional converter is able to convert video and audio files with 100% quality reserved and in 6X faster speed.

Download and install this Mac video converter. If you are using Windows OS, you should turn to its Windows counterpart – Leawo Video Converter. Check the below steps to know details on how to convert WMV to MP4 on Mac.

Step 1: Import Source WMV Video into the Converter
Launch the converter to enter the main interface, switch to “Convert” tab, and click “Add Video” button to browse and load source WMV video files into this Mac video converter

add-source-wmv-video-file-01

Step 2: Set MP4 as Output Format
Move mouse to the drop-down box right before the big green “Convert” button, click it and then select “Change” option to enter the “Profile” panel to select MP4 as output format from “Format” group.

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Tips: If you’re an advanced user, you could click the same drop-down box and choose “Edit” to enter “Profile Settings” panel where you could customize the video and audio parameters of output files, including: video codec, audio codec, bit rate, aspect ratio, frame rate, channel, etc.

Step 3: Start to Convert WMV to MP4 on Mac
After setting output profile, return to the main interface and then click the big green “Convert” button to call out the output directory setting panel, where you need to set output directory in the “Save to” box. Click the bottom “Convert” button on the sidebar to start to convert WMV to MP4 on Mac.

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Note: You could edit source WMV videos to get customized MP4 results by using the internal video editor, select and retain subtitles and audio tracks from source WMV videos, even add external subtitles as you like, convert 2D WMV videos to 3D MP4 videos, etc.

Part 3: Convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with HandBrake

HandBrake, favored as DVD ripping freeware, can also be regarded as WMV to MP4 converter, which allows you to convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with several mouse clicks. Read the following guide to learn how to convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with HandBrake.

Step 1. Import WMV into Handbrake
Launch Handbrake on your Mac or computer, and then click “Open Source” in the menu bar to choose and import source WMV video file into Handbrake.

Step 2: Set MP4 as Output Format
Open the "Format" drop-down menu and select MP4 as output format in order to convert WMV to MP4.

Step 3: Start to Convert WMV to MP4
Before WMV to MP4 conversion process, you can choose the output directory to contain converted video file. Click “Start Encode” button at the top of the window to convert the source WMV video into the selected MP4 format.

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Part 4: Convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with FFmpeg

FFmpeg is able to decode, decode, encode, transcode, mux, demux, stream, filter and play pretty much anything that humans and machines have created, which means it can convert WMV to MP4 on Mac, but the process might be a little bit different. The multi-functional FFmpeg can convert WMV videos to MP4 using command line technique. A command line specifies the file name and the destination path. It is typed in the command prompt window (or terminal window in case of Linux and Mac) of your computer.

Example of command line in FFmpeg:

ffmpeg -i original_video.wmv -ab 56 -ar 44100 -b 200 -r 15 -s 320x240 -f mp4 final_video.mp4

The open-source application supports video conversion on Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms. This method might be a little bit difficult. However, you can switch to other methods.

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Part 5: Convert WMV to MP4 on Mac with Files-Conversion

The last one I am to introduce here is an online video converter called Files-conversion, which allows user to convert video and audio files online. Files-conversion provides you a free service to convert any format. Here let’s take a tour to convert WMV to MP4 with Files-conversion.

Step 1. Add Source WMV File
Head to the official website of Files-conversion, and click “Select a File” to choose and add source WMV file.

Step 2. Choose MP4 as Output
Under the output format setting list, choose “MP4” as output. At the same time, you can choose the conversion quality from Low, Moderate, High, and Very High.

Step 3. Start to Convert WMV to MP4
Click “Convert” button to start to convert WMV to MP4. After the conversion process is complete, a downloading link will pop up for you to get your converted file in MP4 format.

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