Skip to content

Common fix · Video

Turn a screen recording into a GIF

By Updated How we write these

1 min read

What you’ll end up with

A short, small GIF of the part of your screen recording that shows the thing.

Screen recordings are perfect for showing how something works, but as videos they don’t autoplay in many places: issue trackers, documentation, chat, email. A GIF does. The catch is size — GIFs have no real compression, so a long, tall recording becomes a huge file.

The trick is to keep it short, crop it to the part of the screen that matters, and make it narrower than the phone’s full resolution.

What to do

  1. Crop to the part of the screen that matters

    Screen recordings include the status bar and often a lot of empty screen. Crop to the area that shows the thing — it makes the GIF smaller and easier to read.

    Crop the recording

  2. Make the GIF from the few seconds you need

    Drop the recording into Video to GIF, set the start and end around the moment, and keep the width at 480 px or less. 10–12 frames per second is smooth for screen content.

    Make the GIF

Settings that work

Recommended settings
Length 3–8 seconds
Width 320–480 px
Frames per second 10–12

Worth knowing

  • If the GIF is still too big to post, an MP4 of the same clip is usually a tenth of the size and autoplays on most sites that accept video. GIF vs MP4 explains when each wins.

Questions

How do I screen record on an iPhone?

Add Screen Recording to Control Center (Settings → Control Center), then swipe down from the top-right corner and tap the record button. The recording is saved to Photos as a video.

Why is my GIF so big?

GIFs store every frame almost separately, with at most 256 colors. A tall phone recording at full resolution adds up fast. Crop it, shorten it, and make it narrower — each of those cuts the size several times over.

Can I make a GIF from an Android screen recording?

Yes, the same way: the recording is an ordinary MP4, so crop it and make the GIF here, in any browser.

More fixes like this

The reasoning behind it