Best way to reduce 18GB MP4 video file

[OM2]

I've got an 18GB MP4 video file.

What would be the best tool to reduce the size?

Bard tells me ffmpeg is a good choice.
EDIT: what's the link for download for standalone portable version? I can't seem to figure out which.

It also recommends Handbrake - the last time I downloaded, it was full of spamware.

I used Virtualdub amny years ago - just looked it up, it says it's for processing AVI files.

Thanks.

[pandy]

As you not providing any details about your source then it is extremely difficult to recommend detailed procedure.
ffmpeg is free and it is equipped with many latest state of art encoders as such it is commonly used for video conversion and transcoding - as ffmpeg is batch/command line tool it may be easier for you to use ffmpeg with one of many available ffmpeg GUI's.
Never used handbrake as such can't say anything about it.
VirtualDub is quite old, there are many similar applications way modern but still comparable to VirtualDub - check for example AviDemux .

[ProWo]

Use clever Ffmpeg-GUI
It's small, portable, no installation needed.
Load your file, click main, click encode videostream, click keep size, click encode.
If finished, click multiplex, deselect the original videostrean (the blue one), click multiplex.
Done.

[OM2]

Thanks for the replies guys.
The video was shot on a Samsung mobile.
It's 18GB but total video is 2 hours and 15 min - many videos joined together.

Clever FFMpeg looks good. But comes up with 2 flags for virus.

I think I'll stick with ffmpeg.
Still can't find 'portable'. I've downloaded and will run tmrw.

Thanks for the help.

[davexnet]

Thanks for the replies guys.
The video was shot on a Samsung mobile.
It's 18GB but total video is 2 hours and 15 min - many videos joined together.

Clever FFMpeg looks good. But comes up with 2 flags for virus.

I think I'll stick with ffmpeg.
Still can't find 'portable'. I've downloaded and will run tmrw.

Thanks for the help.

ProWo is the author of Clever FFmpeg, there is no virus, it's either a false positive, or it's a reputation
warning because the program hasn't been seen much in the wild.

It's safe to download programs from the software section of this site - which you should know since you've been a member
here for years

[pandy]

Quick bitrate estimation for your file is approx 17.7Mbps - depends on resolution and frame rate it may be close to normal quality - provide more details so more accurate estimation can be done - for HD you can probably reduce bitrate by half and video should be still OK but for UHD hypothetical gain may be lower and encoding time cost will be simply not justified. And i agree with davenext recommendation - try ProWo ffmpeg clever Ffmpeg-GUI - this should do things way simpler.
There is lot false positivies, especially if code is not from big software vendor.

[Sharc]

@OM2: You may also want to try this simple ffmpeg commandline

ffmpeg.exe -i "your source" -c:a copy -c:v libx264 -preset slow -crf 20 "recompressed_.mp4"

Play with the -crf value for trading in filesize vs quality to fit your needs. Higher values compress more.

You can compress more by reducing the frame size using the 'scale' filter (720 hight in the example below), like

ffmpeg.exe -i "your source" -c:a copy -c:v libx264 -preset slow -crf 22 -vf scale=-2:720 "recompressed_.mp4"

You can download ffmpeg from here:
https://ffmpeg.org/download.html
or
https://www.videohelp.com/software/ffmpeg

[Santiago]

I have never had a problem downloading HandBrake.