QuickTime is a media player developed by Apple for both PC and Mac computers, which can also be used to record, convert and play media (images, audios and videos) from the supported formats. Apple describes it as a suite of files, applications and plug-ins. The first version of QuickTime was released back in December 1991 and has been rapidly growing since its launch into one of the biggest media players. After over 20 years, QuickTime still dominates among users on both the Mac and Windows. QuickTime is not only a media player, but also a file format that is utilized by Apple for video files. It employs the MOV and QT file extensions. Usually, QuickTime videos are larger in size, as compared to the other video file formats. As such, many people try to compress them for several reasons, and we will therefore show you how to compress QuickTime video in this guide.

Introduction to QuickTime Video

Basically, QuickTime videos utilize the MOV and QT file extensions although there is more to it. Specifically, QuickTime is an extensible multimedia framework that is capable of handling various formats of digital video, picture, sound, panoramic images, and interactivity. The QuickTime framework supports the following file types and codecs natively: Animated GIF, Animation, Apple ProRes, Apple Video, Audio Video Interleave (AVI), Cinepak, Component Video, DV, 3GP and 3G2, Graphics, H.261, H.262/MPEG-2 Part 2[11], H.263, H.264/MPEG-4 AVC, H.265/HEVC (since macOS 10.13), Microsoft Video 1, Motion, JPEG, MPEG-1, MPEG-4 Part 2, Pixlet, Planar RGB, Qtch, QuickTime Movie, QuickTime VR, and Sorenson Video.

Apple is best known as a company that prioritizes quality over anything else, and QuickTime videos are no exception. Generally, you are going to notice that QuickTime videos are larger in size, which is why many people want to find ways to compress them. For QuickTime video compression, refer to the segments below.

How to Compress Video with QuickTime Player Pro

Many people are not aware that there is QuickTime Pro, which was a version of QuickTime that was sold and distributed by Apple for Windows and OS X, until they stopped issuing licenses in mid 2016. It was stopped because most of its features became free in the standard version of QuickTime, while some of its other features migrated to Final Cut Pro. If you purchased a license of QuickTime Pro before Apple discontinued it, you can utilize it for compressing QuickTime videos by the following steps;

quicktime

Step 1: Launch Quicktime Pro on your computer, then click the "File" button followed by clicking the "Open File” button.

Step 2: Browse for your target video, then click the "Open" button. If the target videos are not QuickTime format, make sure that they are QuickTime compatible. Also check is the audio syncs with the video (which could be tested by playing back loaded video).

Step 3: Click the "File" menu, then choose the "Export" option. On the "Save exported file as" window, select "Movie to QuickTime Movie", and click “Options".

Step 4: When the options window opens, click "Settings" under "Video" tab and select H.264 for "Compression Type" then click “OK".

Step 5: To change the video dimensions and frame size, click the "Size" button and select one of the lower sizing options. Click "OK" to exit the settings, then click the "Save" button to start compressing the videos.

How to Compress QuickTime Video with Leawo Video Converter Ultimate

Generally, QuickTime Player or QuickTime Pro applications are not going to give you many options as other applications for video editing, conversion and in this case compression. As such, you are not going to get the best results when you use QuickTime Player or QuickTime Pro, which is why we will recommend you to try Leawo Video Converter Ultimate if you want to compress QuickTime Video on Windows, or if you want to compress QuickTime Video on Mac. You can trust this advanced software for all your video compression, conversion and other tasks because of the following reasons;

Leawo Video Converter Ultimate has a lot more features that you can learn about from the product page. With all that said, follow the steps below for compressing your QuickTime videos;

Step 1: Launch the Video Converter Ultimate

vcu-main-interface

Step 2: Import QuickTime video(s)

Click the “Add Video” button to open a dialogue box from where you can search for the videos, or simply drag them right into the application.

add-video

Step 3: Select the output format

Next to the green “Convert” button, there is a button labeled as “MP4 Video”. Click it, then click “Change” from the drop-down menu. Next, click “Format” to select desired output format.

set-output-format

Step 4: Start the conversion

Click the green “Convert” button. Please set a directory under the “Save to” box which is near the top of the sidebar which pops up. Click the “Convert” button at the bottom of the sidebar to start converting your video(s).

convert-the-video

How to Compress a QuickTime Video with Online Video Converter

Leawo Video Converter Ultimate is your best bet for all your video compression and conversion needs, which makes it the best tool to compress QuickTime video. However, you can also try online converters, as it is a method most suitable for people who do not want to install any softwares. Among all the online video compressors that can compress videos, AConvert is the most recommended for this task. It has operation steps that are easy and straightforward, which you can refer to down below.

Online conversion websites also have size limits, and sometimes your movie file cannot exceed the set limit. In the case of AConvert, you will have to upgrade your membership to exceed the quota. Moreover, this method is not as secure as offline methods, not to mention the slower compression and conversion speeds. To use Aconvert for compress QuickTime video, follow the steps below;

Aconvert

Step 1: Open the AConvert website then click the “Choose File” button to select the QuickTime video you wish to compress.

Step 2: Select the target format option from the droplist, and select the output format of your choice, for example MOV video which is one of the QuickTime formats.

Step 3: Click the option box next to Options, then select and adjust the size, bitrate or frame rate options.

Step 4: Change the parameters of Video size, Video bitrate, Frame Rate and Video aspect according to your needs.

Step 5: Click the Convert Now button to start the compression.

Step 6: When the compression is done, find the compressed QuickTime video from the “Conversion Results” list and click on the “Download” button to begin downloading the video back to your computer.

Another online video compressor that you could try is VideoSmaller by FileConverto. It also supports the QuickTime MOV format for compression, as well as AVI, MP4 and MPEG formats. VideoSmaller has a limit of 500MB per file, per day.