The best Gifski alternatives for Mac

Gifski turns a video into a GIF, and it's known for how good the GIFs look: it uses thousands of colours in each frame. The Mac app, by Sindre Sorhus, lets you trim and crop the video, set the exact width and height, pick a frame rate up to 50 frames a second, trade quality for size, set looping, a delay between loops and bounce (forward, then backward), change the speed and preview the result. It has a Share extension, a system service and Shortcuts support. Its App Store page is clear that it's a converter, not a GIF creator: it doesn't add text or stickers.

It's free. The current App Store version needs macOS 26 or later, and older versions for earlier macOS are on the developer's site. The engine underneath is open source, with a free command line for Mac, Windows and Linux on gif.ski, and a commercial license for closed-source apps.

We make Koi, so read this with that in mind. Koi is first below because it's ours, but for the GIF itself Gifski gives you more control, and costs nothing. Every fact about another app comes from that app's own site, checked October 21, 2026. We didn't compare GIF sizes or quality.

• The App Store version needs macOS 26, and you're on an older Mac.
• You want to record the screen straight to a GIF, not convert a video you already have.
• You want text, a background or a sped-up part in the GIF, and Gifski only converts.
• You want a GIF from the Finder without opening another app.
• You're on Windows or a borrowed computer and need a website instead.

With Gifski:

1. Open Gifski and drop the video on its window, or use Open With in Finder.
2. Trim the start and end, and crop if you need to.
3. Set the width, frame rate, quality and looping, and check the preview.
4. Convert, then save the GIF.

With Koi, from Finder or the desktop:

1. Start dragging the video, then press and hold Shift. The video wheel opens round the pointer.
2. Drop it on More. The wheel turns into Split, Metadata, Redact and Convert.
3. Click Convert, then GIF. Koi saves the GIF beside the video, at 10 frames a second, 480 pixels across, up to 300 frames.

For a GIF of only part of the video, or a bigger one, drop it on Edit instead: trim, split, speed up pieces or crop, then Export as a GIF, up to 15 frames a second and 960 pixels across. More on the Shift wheel page.

Gifski is a GIF tool first. Every setting that changes how a GIF looks and how big it is sits in front of you: width and height to the pixel, frame rate up to 50, quality, loops and bounce. Its own site says width does the most for file size, and a lower frame rate helps too. If you post GIFs often, those controls are the whole point.

Koi treats a GIF as one more thing a video can become. Convert under More picks the settings for you, 10 frames a second and 480 pixels across, and stops at 300 frames, which is 30 seconds at that rate. That suits a quick reaction clip or a bug report. For anything longer or sharper, Edit Video gives you up to 15 frames a second and 960 pixels across, after you've trimmed it, cropped it or sped up the slow parts.

• Gifski: better looking GIFs, every setting, free. Needs macOS 26 for the current version.
• Koi: a GIF in two clicks from Finder, or from an edited clip, with the same wheel that trims, crops, compresses and converts videos. Fewer GIF settings, and it needs a plan.

GIFs get big fast, whichever app makes them. A few things help with any of the apps here:

• Cut it first. Every second you drop is frames you don't store. Koi's Trim, or Gifski's own trim, does it before the GIF is made.
• Make it narrower. Gifski's site calls width the biggest lever on file size.
• Lower the frame rate. Ten to fifteen frames a second is plenty for a screen recording.
• Crop to what matters. A small part of the screen makes a smaller GIF than the whole screen.
• Ask whether it needs to be a GIF. Many places that take GIFs also take an MP4. Koi's Convert makes an MP4 from a MOV without encoding the picture again.

From each app's own site. “Not listed” means the site doesn't mention it.

• Record part of the screen as a GIF, free, on an older Mac? GIPHY Capture.
• An open source screen recorder with GIF export? Kap.
• Screenshots, recordings and GIFs in one paid app? CleanShot X.
• A GIF from a video right in Finder, or a GIF of a clip you've cut, cropped or sped up, with the same wheel that trims and compresses videos? Koi.

To cut the clip before you make the GIF, see our LosslessCut alternatives. To shrink a video instead of turning it into a GIF, the Clop alternatives page covers that. Koi's plans are on the pricing page.