Video
What is a MOV file?
Updated Jul 2026
MOV (QuickTime Movie) is the video format Apple's software uses to save recordings, most commonly the video your iPhone or Mac camera records. It can hold very high quality video and audio together in one file. The tradeoff is that it's a lossy format, and it isn't as universally supported as some other video formats once you leave Apple's ecosystem.
- Extension
- .mov
- Type
- Video
- Typically
- iPhone / Mac recordings
- Compression
- Lossy
Why MOV exists
MOV started as Apple's own container format for QuickTime Player, dating back to the early 1990s. It's technically a container, meaning it can hold video encoded in a few different ways, but in practice most MOV files you encounter today come straight off an iPhone or a Mac's screen recording tool.
Inside the container, the video is compressed using lossy encoding, which throws away some visual detail to keep the file size manageable. On Apple hardware this barely matters, since the quality is high and playback just works. The friction shows up elsewhere: send a MOV to someone on Windows, upload it to a site that expects a different format, or drop it into editing software that doesn't recognize it well, and you'll often hit a wall.
That's the usual reason people go looking for a converter. They recorded something on an iPhone, and now they need it as an MP4 to upload, email, or edit somewhere that doesn't play nicely with MOV.
The trade-offs
Strengths
- Captures high quality video and audio straight from Apple devices
- Plays natively and smoothly on Mac and iOS with no extra setup
- Can carry multiple audio tracks and other extras alongside the video
Watch-outs
- Lossy compression means some quality is discarded compared to the original recording
- Less consistently supported on Windows, Android, and many web platforms than MP4
- Some upload forms and older editing software reject it outright
- Files can be large, especially for longer 4K recordings
A note on privacy
A MOV file recorded on an iPhone can carry metadata like the date, time, and GPS location of where it was filmed. Running it through an online converter means that video, and whatever location and timing details it holds, gets uploaded to someone else's server. Converting it on your own computer keeps the footage and that metadata on your machine the whole time.
Convert a MOV file
- Convert MOV to GIF
- Convert MOV to MP4
- Convert MOV to MKV
- Convert MOV to WebM
- Convert MOV to AVI
- Convert MOV to WMV
- Convert MOV to FLV
- Convert MOV to M4V
Questions
How do I open a MOV file?
It opens by default on a Mac or iPhone. On Windows, you'll often need a media player that supports it, or you can convert it to MP4, which plays almost everywhere without extra software.
Is MOV better than MP4?
Quality-wise they're similar, since both can use the same underlying video compression. MP4 has the edge in compatibility, since it plays on nearly every device and platform, while MOV is more tied to Apple software.
Why does my iPhone record video as MOV?
MOV is the native format for Apple's camera and video tools, so recordings save that way by default. There's no setting to change this on the camera app itself, which is why converting afterward is common.
Can I convert MOV without uploading it?
Yes. A desktop app like Morphjet converts MOV to MP4 or other formats directly on your own computer, so the video and any location data in it never leave your machine.
Morphjet opens and converts MOV and 1,800+ other formats, all on your own computer. Launching this July.