Tutorial

Converting Videos with FFmpeg to H.264 MP4

Learn how to convert videos with the popular tool FFmpeg to the H.264 MP4 format. We provide a step-by-step guide which also covers opening a command prompt or terminal, navigating to the video folder, and running the conversion command. We also show you how to check the converted video to ensure that the conversion was successful.

Install FFmpeg (if not already installed):

Linux:
sudo apt-get install ffmpeg
MacOS:
brew install ffmpeg
Windows: Download from ffmpeg.org

Opening a Command Prompt or Terminal

Open a command prompt or terminal and navigate to the folder where the video you want to convert is located.

How do I open the Command Prompt in Windows?

How do I open the Command Prompt in Linux?

Running the Conversion Command

Run the following command to convert the video to the H.264 MP4 format:

ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -c:v libx264 -crf 20 -c:s copy -c:a copy output.mp4

Replace

input.mp4

with the name of your input file and

output.mp4

with the desired name of the output file.

Once the conversion is complete, the converted video should be found in the specified output path. Check the video to ensure that it was properly converted.