Video bitrate calculator
Bitrate is the one setting that decides both how big a file is and how good it looks. This gives you a range to start from for a given resolution, frame rate, kind of footage and codec, plus what that range costs per minute.
Start at 3,500 to 6,500 kbps of video. If you want one number, use 5,000 kbps.
With 128 kbps of audio that is about 27.0 to 49.4 MB per minute, counting a megabyte as 1,048,576 bytes.
These are starting points, not answers. Real footage varies more than any table can predict. Encode thirty seconds, look at it, and move the number.
What bitrate is actually paying for
A video codec does not store frames. It stores the first one, then stores what changed. Bitrate is the budget for describing that change, which is why the same 1080p setting can look flawless on a podcast and fall apart on a snowboard run. The podcast changes almost nothing between frames. The snowboard run changes everything.
That is the whole model, and it explains the adjustments this calculator makes. More pixels means more to describe, so resolution raises the number. More frames per second means the frames are closer together and each one differs less from the last, so frame rate raises the number by considerably less than you would expect. A newer codec finds more redundancy in the same footage, so it lowers the number.
When a bitrate is too low the encoder cannot describe everything that changed, so it drops the parts it judges least important. You see that as blocking in shadows, smeared detail during pans, and text that goes soft while the page is scrolling and sharpens once it stops.
Bitrate reference, H.264 at 30 fps
Video bitrate in kbps, audio not included. Read across a row to see how much the content matters compared to the resolution. A 4K screen recording wants less than a 1080p gameplay capture, which is not what most bitrate charts will tell you.
| Resolution | Talking head | Screen recording | General footage | High-motion gameplay |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 360p | 150–400 | 150–300 * | 300–700 | 500–1,100 |
| 480p | 350–850 | 250–600 | 600–1,500 | 950–2,400 |
| 720p | 850–1,900 | 600–1,400 | 1,500–3,500 | 2,400–5,600 |
| 1080p | 1,900–3,600 | 1,400–2,600 | 3,500–6,500 | 5,600–10,400 |
| 1440p | 3,300–6,600 | 2,400–4,800 | 6,000–12,000 | 9,600–19,200 |
| 4K | 6,600–13,800 | 4,800–10,000 | 12,000–25,000 | 19,200–40,000 |
For 60 fps, multiply by 1.52. For H.265, multiply by 0.67. For VP9, by 0.75. Those are the exact factors the calculator above applies, so working from this table by hand gives the same answer the widget does. No cell goes below 150 kbps, because that is the point the size calculator and the compressor both call not viable at any resolution; a star marks a cell that was raised to that floor.
The 150 kbps floor
A screen recording is cheap and H.265 is cheaper, and multiplying the two together drives the arithmetic somewhere silly: 360p screen capture at 24 fps in H.265 works out to 50 kbps, which is not a bitrate any encoder produces watchable video at. The size calculator and the compressor both refuse to recommend anything under 150 kbps, so this page will not either. Where you see the floor, the honest reading is that the resolution is not the thing costing you bytes and you should stop optimising it.
Why the size calculator names a lower number
Put 2,000 kbps into the size calculator and it says 1080p; this page says 1080p wants 3,500 to 6,500. Both are right, because they answer opposite questions. That page asks what the most you can get away with is when a hard limit has already decided your bitrate for you. This page asks what the footage actually wants when nothing is limiting it. The first number is a ceiling under duress, the second is a target.
What each content type means
- Talking head — ×0.55 against general footage
One person, a fixed camera and a background that never moves. Most of each frame is identical to the frame before it, so the encoder spends almost nothing on it.
- Screen recording — ×0.4 against general footage
Long still stretches broken by scrolls and window switches. Cheap on average, but text goes mushy if the bitrate dips during a fast scroll, so keep the top of the range rather than the bottom.
- General footage — ×1 against general footage
Handheld phone video, an event, b-roll, anything with a moving camera and a normal amount of detail.
- High-motion gameplay — ×1.6 against general footage
Fast camera movement, particle effects, foliage, explosions. Almost every pixel changes every frame and there is very little for the encoder to reuse.
If your video is more than one of these, budget for the worst part of it. A tutorial that is mostly a still screen with one fast scroll will show its artefacts during the scroll, and that is the bit people will notice.
Codecs and the numbers they are sold on
- H.264 — ×1 against H.264
The baseline everything else is measured against, and the one thing that plays everywhere without a caveat.
- H.265 / HEVC — ×0.67 against H.264
The standardisation work claims about half the bitrate of H.264. On ordinary 1080p at the presets people actually use, a third off is the honest expectation.
- VP9 — ×0.75 against H.264
Roughly a quarter off H.264 on detailed footage, royalty-free, and several times slower to encode.
The efficiency figures printed on a codec come from slow encodes at high quality on reference material. Speed the encoder up, drop the bitrate, or hand it grainy phone footage and the gap narrows. Both of the multipliers here are deliberately less generous than the headline claims.
The compressor on this site encodes H.264 in every output container, or MPEG-4 in its fast mode. It does not offer H.265, because the browser build does not carry an HEVC encoder. If a calculation here points you at H.265, you will need a desktop encoder for it. The H.264 against H.265 comparison goes through the trade in full.
Bitrate or CRF
Everything on this page assumes you want a bitrate, which is the right thing to want when you have a size limit to hit. If you do not have one, constant rate factor is the better control. You ask for a quality level, the encoder spends whatever each scene needs, and the file lands where it lands. Still shots cost almost nothing and difficult shots get what they need, which is the opposite of what a fixed bitrate does.
The CRF guide covers the values worth using for each codec. What bitrate is is the longer version of the explanation above.
How to test rather than guess
Take the hardest thirty seconds of your video, not the opening title. Encode it at the middle of the recommended range. Watch it at the size it will actually be watched at, because a phone hides things a 27 inch monitor does not. If it holds up, go lower until it stops holding up, then come back one step.
Two or three short encodes will tell you more than any chart, including this one. The table exists so you start from a sensible number instead of a random one.
Questions
What bitrate should I use for 1080p?
For ordinary footage at 30 frames per second in H.264, somewhere between 3,500 and 6,500 kbps. A talking head at a fixed camera holds up from about 1,900. Fast gameplay wants 5,600 to 10,400. Those are the numbers in the table on this page, because both come from the same function. The spread is that wide because bitrate pays for change between frames, and how much changes is a property of your footage, not of the resolution.
Does doubling the frame rate double the bitrate?
No. Going from 30 to 60 frames per second costs roughly 50 percent more, not 100 percent. Each frame is closer in time to the one before it, so there is less difference to encode. This calculator scales by the ratio of frame rates raised to the power 0.6, which puts 60 fps at 1.52 times 30 fps rather than a round 1.5 — near enough to the guidance the major platforms publish, and it also handles 25, 50 and 120 fps without a second rule.
How much smaller does H.265 actually make a file?
The standard was measured at around half the bitrate of H.264 for equal quality, but that result came from slow encodes of high-resolution material. On ordinary 1080p at the presets people actually use, expect closer to a third off. This calculator assumes a third.
Should I use CRF instead of a fixed bitrate?
Usually yes. A bitrate target forces the encoder to spend the same amount on a still frame as on an explosion. CRF asks for a quality level and lets the size land where it lands, which is better for everything except hitting a hard file size limit. Use a bitrate when there is a limit, and CRF when there is not.
Is a higher bitrate always better quality?
Only up to the point where the encoder runs out of things to improve. Past that you are storing bits that describe noise. If you re-encode a file at a higher bitrate than it was originally encoded at, you get a larger file and no more detail than the original had.
Related tools
- Video file size calculator — turn a size limit into the bitrate it allows, or a bitrate into a file size.
- Upload time calculator — how long the finished file takes to send, and what compressing first saves you.
- All calculators