Rotate Video
Fix a sideways or upside-down clip.
Choose video file
or drop it anywhere on this page
MP4 · MOV · WEBM · MKV · AVI · WMV · FLV · M4V · 3GP · MPEG · +3
Processed on your device — never uploaded
How to rotate video
- Drop in the video.
- Pick the rotation and any flips needed.
- Download. Use metadata-only mode for an instant fix, or the full re-encode for a rotation that works everywhere.
About this tool
The sideways-video problem is fundamentally the same as the sideways-photo problem: the device records in one orientation, flags the preferred display orientation in the metadata, and relies on viewers to honour that flag. Most do. Some do not, and videos uploaded to certain platforms get rotated unexpectedly because the platform strips or misreads the metadata on ingest.
The safest fix is to bake the rotation into the actual pixel data, which is what the re-encode path does. The metadata-only option is faster and useful when you know the video will be played by a player that respects MP4 rotation flags — which is most modern phones and desktop players, but not every web platform.
Questions
Why is my phone video sideways?
Phones record video in a fixed sensor orientation and embed a rotation flag in the MP4 container. Most video players read that flag and display the video correctly. Software that ignores the flag — certain editors, upload tools, older operating systems — shows the raw pixel data, which looks sideways or upside-down.
What is the difference between metadata rotation and a real rotation?
Metadata-only sets a flag in the container header. It is instant and does not touch the pixels, but relies on the player honouring that flag. A full re-encode actually rotates every frame, producing a file that plays correctly everywhere regardless of how the player handles metadata. For anything you are going to upload somewhere you do not control, the re-encode is safer.
Will rotating degrade quality?
A re-encode always involves some loss for H.264 and VP9, which are lossy codecs. In practice the difference is invisible at the default quality setting. Choose a high-bitrate encode if you want to minimise it.