Say you shot a video on your Android phone that came out to be 500 MB in size and want to share it with friends or family, but have only 150 MB left in your data plan. Now, how will you send it to them? One way is by compressing the video to reduce its size and then sharing it. There are many apps available on the Play Store that allow you to compress videos. Here are the best apps we found that allow you to compress videos on your Android phone. We shot a video that was close to 500 MB in size and tested it using every app below to see how low in size it was compressed while maintaining the quality of the video.
Note: Before we begin, know that compressing and decompressing a video are performance-hungry tasks and depend heavily on the processor of your Android phone. The time taken for compression to complete will vary depending on your Android phone and its performance capabilities.
Table of Contents
If you’re looking for a no-nonsense video compressor app with excellent compression at negligible quality reduction, FF Share by caydey is the app for you. It does what it says and does it efficiently. No ads were present in the app during our testing and the app supports multiple video codecs and formats. The best thing is that it is completely open-source and available to download at GitHub which is generally presumed safe to use.Â
Tip: FFShare does not save the compressed video to your Android phone by default but you can opt for Upload to Photos in the share menu to save the compressed video.
We tested the compression with a 1-minute long 4K 60fps video of size 466 MB and it was compressed to 196 MB while maintaining the 4K resolution. If you opt for Full HD resolution, then the size can be reduced to around 100 MB in size.
Pros
- No Ads
- Open-source and free-to-use
Cons
- Compression might take a bit of time depending on your Android phone.
- The app needs to be open at all times during the compression process, if you close it then compression will stop and you’d need to redo the process.
Download FFShare from GitHub.
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2. Video Converter
The app Video Converter comes with a host of options like changing fps, video and audio bitrate, adding or removing subtitles or audio, and changing the video codec among others. Though the app has ads, you can work your way around it or buy the premium for an ad-free experience.
We tested the free version of this app and it was fairly fast at doing the compression, though some options were locked for the pro version.
We tested the app using the same 4K 60fps video file of 466MB and it was compressed to about 281MB when opted for 4K resolution and 140MB in size while in Full HD resolution.
Pros
- Multiple video editing features are available like trim, merge, etc.
- Audio editing can also be done with this app.
Cons
- Banner and pop-up ads.
- Cannot compress the video to a custom resolution without buying the premium plan.
Download Video Converter.
3. Smart Video Compressor
Smart Video Compressor does all that a compressor app should do and does it at comparable speeds with other Android video compressing apps on the list. The differentiating point that we noticed is that it can run in the background. So, keeping the app open all the time is not required. You can minimize the app while compression is in progress and resume your other work. Options like changing resolution, and deciding on the compression speeds and quality are also present.
During our testing with the 4K 60fps video of 466MB, it was compressed to about 150MB in the Full HD resolution while the compressed file had enough sharpness and quality. But there was no option to compress in 4K resolution in the app.
Pros
- Can compress videos while in the background
- iOS version is also available.
Cons
- Banner and pop-up ads
- The app doesn’t show you the estimated file size after compression
- No option to compress the video to a custom resolution.
Download Smart Video Compressor.
4. Video Compressor
Video Compressor can also be your pick among these options since it does the compression of videos whilst also providing you with an easy-to-navigate UI within the app. We found that the app offers one-time access to all the options including the premium features like changing codec and video format by watching an ad every time you wish to use it.
When our test video was compressed while in 4K format, its size was reduced to 152MB and to 24MB when compressed in Full HD resolution.
Pro Tip: Opt for the compression quality as Good, since it offers less file size while keeping much of the video quality.
Pros
- Supports lossless audio compression
- Custom resolution is supported even in the free version.
- Premium features are also available in the free version by watching ads.
Cons
- Too many ads are present which may be a turn-off for some.
Download Video Compressor.
5. Reduce Video Size
A direct approach to reducing the video size as you may have noticed from the app name. It reduces the video file’s size to your custom sizes, custom resolution, and preset formats. The app has a minimal UI with not everything on your face. You can trim a video or compress it as per your needs.
In the process of compressing the size of our 466MB 4K 60fps video, the app reduced it to 145MB while maintaining 4K resolution and about 65MB for Full HD resolution.
Pros
- Offers compression to custom resolutions and custom sizes in the free version.
- To the point approach
Cons
- No option to adjust bitrate or fps in the free version.
- Banner and pop-up ads are present.
Download Reduce Video Size.
Compress Videos on Android
Now that you know how to compress a video, you can share videos with your friends as much as you like. During our testing, we found all the apps mentioned here work as intended and should not give you any trouble.
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