Video formats guide

Format	Container	Best for	Browser support
MP4	H.264/AAC	Universal sharing, YouTube, social media	All browsers
WebM	VP8/VP9 + Vorbis	Web video, HTML5 <video>, open web	Chrome, Firefox, Edge
MOV	H.264/AAC	Apple ecosystem, Final Cut Pro	Safari natively
AVI	DivX/Xvid/MJPEG	Legacy software, Windows Media Player	Limited (plugin needed)
GIF	Palette-based	Short looping animations, memes	Universal

MP4 (H.264) is the universal default. It plays on every device, every social platform, and every browser. When in doubt, use MP4. YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Vimeo all recommend H.264 MP4 as the upload format.

WebM is the web-optimized alternative. It's 30–40% smaller than comparable H.264 MP4 at similar quality, and it's royalty-free. Use it for self-hosted web video with the HTML5 <video> tag. Safari support was limited before Safari 14.1 — always provide an MP4 fallback.

MOV is Apple's native format. iPhone videos, QuickTime recordings, and Final Cut Pro exports all produce MOV. Windows doesn't open MOV natively — convert to MP4 before sharing with Windows users.

AVI is legacy. It was Microsoft's dominant format in the 1990s–2000s. Today it exists mainly in old archives and specific legacy software requirements. For everything else, MP4 is better.

GIF is uniquely universal for short animations — it plays everywhere without a video player or JavaScript. But it's wildly inefficient: a 2 MB MP4 animation becomes a 15–20 MB GIF. Converting GIF to MP4 typically saves 90% file size.