How to Compress Videos on a Windows Computer

Method 1: Use Microsoft Clipchamp

Microsoft acquired the popular web-based video editor Clipchamp and integrated it with Windows. It’s now the default video editor on Windows and lets you perform basic editing such as rotating videos, removing sound from a video, and more quickly. Here are the steps to compress videos with the Clipchamp app.

Step 1: Open Clipchamp and sign in with your Google, Facebook, or Microsoft account. If you are a Microsoft 365 subscriber, you get extra perks with Clipchamp.

Step 2: Select Create a new video at the top.

Step 3: Click Import media and select a video you want to shrink from the File Explorer menu.

Step 4: Drag and drop a video to the editor menu and make the necessary changes. Click Export at the top right corner.

Step 5: Select 720p or any other lower resolution.

Step 6: After completing the export process, check the video length and size. Hit Save to your computer and pick a relevant folder on your PC.

In our testing, we imported a video 130MB in size. We selected 720p during the export process, and Clipchamp managed to shrink the size to 71MB. You can select 480p if you want to reduce the video file further.

Method 2: Use Third-Party Video Players like VLC

VLC is one of the popular video players on Windows. Although it’s known for smooth video playback on a desktop, you can also use it to reduce video size. Download and install VLC and follow the steps below.

Step 1: Open VLC > click Media at the top > select Convert / Save.

Step 2: Click Add > select a video from the File Explorer > click on Convert / Save.

Step 3: Confirm the source file > select a video profile > browse a destination folder > hit Start.

During the process, VLC reduced a video file from 130 MB to 40 MB for the video we selected. VLC is an open-source project that is entirely free to download and use.