GIF Under 1 MB
The estimate updates as you drag; stop when it says under 1 MB. Nothing is uploaded.
This page opens at 320 px, 10 fps and 128 colours — the settings that get most two-to-four-second clips under a megabyte. The number under Convert is measured from your actual frames, so you can watch it drop as you shorten the selection or reduce the width, and convert only when it reads under 1 MB.
Open the converter → Opens the converter set to 320 px wide at 10 fps. Drag the handles to pick the part you want.- 100% freeNo account, no daily quota, no paid tier.
- Nothing is uploadedThe video is read and converted on your device and never reaches a server.
- No catch on the outputNo watermark, no forced downscaling, no size cap.
- Updated in the openEvery fix and every change is written down on the changelog page.
Where the bytes go in a GIF
A GIF's size is roughly frames × pixels × bytes-per-pixel. The last factor depends on the picture — a flat screen recording might be 0.1 bytes per pixel after compression, a busy camera shot 0.6 or more — but the first two are entirely yours. Frames = seconds × frame rate; pixels = width × height. Halve the width and the pixels drop to a quarter. Halve the frame rate and the frames halve. Shorten the clip by a second at 10 fps and ten frames go away. Colours matter less than people expect: going from 256 to 128 saves 10–20%, to 64 a little more, and below that the picture visibly suffers.
So the order of operations for a size limit is: shorten the selection to the essential moment, reduce the width, lower the frame rate, then reduce colours. This page starts you at the second-to-last step; most clips under four seconds are already under a megabyte at 320 px and 10 fps.
Using the estimate to hit the number
Every time you move a handle or change a setting, the converter encodes two pairs of your actual frames with the current settings, measures the bytes a full frame and a follow-on frame take, and multiplies by the frame count. That takes a fraction of a second and usually lands within a few percent of the real file; after each conversion it corrects itself by how far off it was. Watch the estimate, not the clock: if it says 1.3 MB, drag the end handle in until it says 950 KB, then convert. If the result comes out just over, convert again with the width one step lower.
If your limit is not 1 MB — email signatures often want 500 KB, some forums 2 MB, Slack emoji 128 KB — the same method applies; the estimate is a number, not a threshold. For very small targets, the changed-pixels-only storage under Advanced is doing most of the work on screen recordings; for camera footage it barely helps, and width is your only real lever.
Frequently asked questions
The result is 1.05 MB, just over.
Convert again with the selection a few frames shorter or the width one step down. The estimate is close but not exact; leaving 5–10% headroom avoids the second pass.
Can the converter target a size automatically?
Not yet. The estimate is live, so tuning by hand takes a few seconds; an automatic "fit under N KB" is on the list.
Does reducing colours to 64 look bad?
For camera footage, visibly. For interface recordings and animations with flat colours, often not at all. Try it and look at the result — it loops in place.
Why is a 3-second GIF bigger than the 30-second video it came from?
Video stores differences between frames; GIF stores full pictures with 256 colours. They are different tools; GIF pays for playing everywhere without a player.