As one of the video formats developed by Apple, M4V is mainly used to encode video files in its iTunes store. Because Apple has a very strict copyright protection system, the M4V videos in iTunes store are usually protected by Apple's DRM, which prevents you from playing the video content on devices that are not authorized by your iTunes account. This copyright protecting system has been giving us nothing but inconvenience by making it almost impossible for us to transfer the M4V movie to other devices, convert the M4V to other formats or play the movie on other platforms or programs. However, because the need for converting M4V to other formats like MKV is extremely high, there are multiple programs on the market that allow you to remove the DRM from the M4V video files and convert M4V to MKV. In today's article, we will introduce some of these programs and show you how to easily convert M4V to MKV.

Part 1: Remove iTunes M4V DRM to DRM-Free Video with Leawo Prof. DRM.

As mentioned in the beginning, most M4V video files from iTunes are protected by Apple's DRM. To convert M4V to MKV, the first thing you need to do is removing the DRM protection from your M4V video file. In order to do that, you need a decent DRM removal tool like Leawo Prof. DRM.

Leawo Prof. DRM is a professional and powerful DRM removal program. It can not only remove DRM from iTunes M4V videos, but also remove DRM from iTunes music, Spotify music, Audible Audiobooks, eBooks and more. When removing DRM, Lawo Prof, DRM can guarantee a 50 times higher speed for the task, and a true 1: 1 quality in the final output result. Furthermore, if you are removing DRM from a high-quality iTunes media file, Leawo Prof. DRM can Keep the AC3 Dolby 5.1 surround sound when removing DRM so that you can play AC3 files won't miss any detail for the ultimate enjoyment. Also, the DRM removal program features a very intuitive user interface, making it possible for you to convert your M4V video to DRM-free video with only several minutes. Now let's see how to remove the DRM protection on your M4V video with Leawo Prof. DRM.

Step 1: Launch Leawo Prof. DRM and go to the "Video& Music Converter" function module. After that, click "Add Files" to add one or more DRM protected M4V videos into the program.

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Step 2: If you want to do some customizations about the subtitle and audio track, you can click the "Edit" button on the imported video to select audio tracks and subtitles for the output video file.

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Step 3: Finally, click the "…" button at the bottom of program interface to designate an output directory for your output DRM-free M4V video file. You can also click the dropdown button to choose a directory from history settings. After that, just click the blue "Convert" button and the converting task will be started immediately.

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Part 2: Convert M4V to MKV with Leawo Video Converter

After making the M4V video DRM-free, you can start converting it to MKV with M4V to MKV converter programs. Among all the media converter programs on the market, Leawo Video Converter is definitely one of the most suitable one for the M4V to MKV converting task.

Leawo Video Converter has a great ease of use and high efficiency. The program is capable of converting videos and audios between more than 180 formats with a 6 times higher speed, and also can retain the original quality for the output file. What's more, Leawo Video Converter also has a powerful video and audio editor module built in, allowing you to do editing operations like trimming, cropping, adjusting parameters, adding watermark to video, converting 2D video to 3D and removing noise. Besides, the program is really easy to use. Take a quick look at the guide below and you will be able to convert M4V to MKV with Leawo Video Converter by yourself.

Step 1: Launch Leawo Video Converter and click on the "Add Video" button at the upper left corner to import your M4V file. You can also drag and drop the file onto the main interface directly.

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Step 2: Leawo Video Converter has the "MP4 Video" set as the default output video format. To change the output format to MKV, simply click on the "MP4 Video" area, choose "Change", and find "MKV Video" form the pop-out format selection window. Click the "MKV Video" button to select.

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Step 3: To edit the video, just the "Edit" icon next to your imported video. On the video editing panel, you can do various kind of editing to the video. When you are done editing, just click "OK" to confirm the changes and go back to the main interface.

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Step 4: Finally, click the green "Convert" button to call out the convert settings panel. On the panel, designate an output directory, and then click the "Convert" icon to start converting your M4V video to MKV.

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Part 3: Convert M4V to MKV with Free Audio Video Pack

Free Audio Video Pack is another program that can be used to convert M4V to MKV. In the program pack, there is a collection of portable audio and video converters which helps you to convert your files between all most popular audio and video formats. The program provides a simple user interface so that it's pretty easy to operate for even beginners. As the program keeps getting updated, more function would be added and the program would become more powerful to deal with more media files. Here is how to use Free Audio Video Pack to convert M4V to MKV.

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Step 1: Launch Free Audio Video Pack. Under "Video Converters", choose the converting mode that you need. There are submenus under each category. You can also choose "Portable devices" to directly convert the video for your device.
Step 2: Drag your M4V video and drop it onto the interface of the program to import it.
Step 3: After importing your M4V video, click the "Start" button to let the converting task begin.

Part 4: Convert M4V to MKV with Oxelon Media Converter

Oxelon Media Converter features a user-friendly interface design and can provide an incredibly high conversion speed. With the high Windows Explorer compatibility of Oxelon Media Converter, you can directly right click on your M4V video file and choose a format to convert without even launching the program in advance, which is very convenient. However, the program opens up the developer website upon exit which could be a little annoying. If you are okay with this and want to convert M4V to MKV with Oxelon Media Converter, here is a simple guide that might help.

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Step 1: Install and launch Oxelon Media Converter. To import your M4V video file, simply drag the video file from its original folder to the program interface. You can also click the "Add Files" button to add the video.
Step 2: Set "MKV" as the output format in the "Media Format" drop down box. You can also specify the video and audio codec with the corresponding dropdown buttons.
Step 3: Finally, set a target output folder by clicking the "Browse" next to the "Select the path for saving" box. And then click the "Conversion" button to start the M4T to MKV converting task.

Part 5: Convert M4V to MKV with HandBrake

Although HandBrake was initially designed as one of the best free DVD ripper programs, it can also convert M4V to MKV and deliver a pretty good converting result. The advantage of Handbrake is that the program provides many advanced video processing functions. But at the same time, Handbrake doesn't have an excellent graphical user interface to keep everything in order. So if you are a new user to the program, you might have to take some time to learn and adjust yourself to the program. However, the powerful video converting ability still make HandBrake worth trying. If you want to convert your M4V video to MKV with Handbrake but don't know how, just take a look at the guide below.

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Step 1: Download, install and launch Handbrake. 
Step 2: Click the "Open Source" button to import your source M4V into the program.
Step 3: After importing the video, you can designate an output folder in the "Destination" box. Click "Browse" to browse and select a folder. The output format can be set in the "Output Settings" area. Click the dropdown button next to "Container" to see all of the available output formats.
Step 4: When the output format is set, you can do some further editing in the area below. Or you can directly start the conversion by clicking the "Start Encode" button next to the "Open Source" button. When you click the "Start Encode" button, the conversion process will start immediately.

Part 6: Convert M4V to MKV with Free Online Converter

Besides all the professional converter programs introduced in the above, you can also use a free online converter tool to convert M4V to MKV. With online converter tools, you don't need to download and install any extra program on your computer. As long as you have a stable internet connection, the conversion should be going pretty smooth. Of course, most free online converter tools have disadvantages. Usually you can't convert big video files, and the output quality is not very optimized. If you want to convert M4V to MKV with a free online converter tool, here is what you need to do.

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Step 1: Visit the website of the free online converter.
Step 2: Click the "CHOOSE FILE" button to choose a local M4V video file for uploading.
Step 3: After the file is chosen, click the dropdown menu next to the "to", and choose "MKV" as the output video format.
Step 4: Finally, click the "CONVERT" button to start the online conversion.