Compress Video for WhatsApp
WhatsApp caps a video sent in a chat at 16 MB, which is why a longer clip fails to send without much explanation. That target is filled in here. The alternative is sending it as a document, which carries any size but arrives as a file the other person has to download before they can watch it.
What to know about WhatsApp
16 MB in a chat, 2 GB as a document
The document route preserves your original file exactly and loses inline playback and the preview thumbnail along the way. For anything meant to be watched in the conversation rather than saved, hitting the 16 MB cap is what keeps it a video rather than an attachment.
WhatsApp re-encodes whatever you send
Its own compression runs on top of yours, so what you upload is the best case rather than the final result. Leaving a little headroom under the cap and letting the resolution ladder do its work gives that second pass something clean to start from.
Status has its own limit, and it is time
A status clip is capped at about thirty seconds rather than by file size, and a longer video is trimmed or split when you post it. Compressing a three-minute clip will get it into a chat, but it still will not post as a single status.
What fits in 16 MB
| Clip length | Video bitrate | Resolution it picks |
|---|---|---|
| 15 seconds | 8118 kbps | 1920×1080 |
| 30 seconds | 3995 kbps | 1440×810 |
| 1 minute | 1934 kbps | 960×540 |
| 3 minutes | 559 kbps | 480×270 |
| 5 minutes | 284 kbps | 480×270 |
These rows come from the same planner the tool runs, so they are what it would actually choose — not a rule of thumb. Your own clip has its own length, resolution and audio track, and the plan is recomputed against those before anything is encoded. Where a row says the target is out of reach, dropping the audio or trimming the clip changes the arithmetic in your favour; the bitrate calculator does the same sum for a target you type yourself.
Frequently asked questions
Why won't WhatsApp send my video?
Almost always because it is over the 16 MB cap for a video in a chat. WhatsApp is not especially clear about this — the send simply fails, or the app offers to trim the clip for you. Compressing to 16 MB gets it through as a normal video that plays inline in the conversation.
How long can a 16 MB WhatsApp video be?
That depends on the resolution the bitrate can carry, which is what the table on this page works out. A short clip fits comfortably at a good resolution; a few minutes fits at a lower one; and past a certain length the planner will tell you the target cannot be reached at a watchable bitrate at all.
Can I send a video without WhatsApp re-compressing it?
Send it as a document rather than as a video. That path takes files up to 2 GB and preserves your file exactly, at the cost of inline playback — the recipient sees an attachment they must download and open in a player instead of something they can tap in the conversation.
Does this tool have any access to my WhatsApp?
None at all. It is a file tool: you choose a video, your browser re-encodes it locally with WebCodecs, and you get a smaller file back to send yourself. Nothing is uploaded to this site, no account is connected, and the tool has no idea where the file goes afterwards.