How to make a GIF from a video on your Mac

Going by Apple's guides, QuickTime Player, Photos and iMovie have no GIF choice when you export a video. The built-in way is the Shortcuts app, which has a Make GIF action you can turn into a right-click in Finder. Koi makes one in a drag: drop the video on More, click Convert, then GIF. For a GIF of just one part, cropped or sped up, Koi's Edit Video exports a GIF from your edit.

We make Koi, so read the Koi part with that in mind. Everything about Koi here is what version 1.13 does. The Shortcuts steps come from Apple's Shortcuts guide, checked October 21, 2026.

Apple's Shortcuts guide uses Make GIF as an example action. Build it once and it sits in Finder's Quick Actions menu from then on.

1. Open Shortcuts and make a new shortcut.
2. Search the actions for Make GIF and add it.
3. Add a Save File action after it, so the GIF lands in a folder.
4. Open the shortcut's details and select Use as Quick Action.
5. In System Settings, Privacy & Security, turn the shortcut on in the Finder extensions list.
6. In Finder, Control-click a video, choose Quick Actions, then your shortcut.

Apple's guide explains how a shortcut becomes a Quick Action. It doesn't list Make GIF's own settings, so try a short clip first and look at the size and smoothness before you rely on it.

1. Start dragging the video in Finder or on your desktop.
2. While you're still holding it, press and hold Shift. The video wheel opens round your pointer.
3. Drop the video on More. The wheel turns into Split, Metadata, Redact and Convert.
4. Click Convert, then GIF.
5. Koi shows its progress, then saves the GIF beside the original and shows it in Finder.

• The GIF is 10 frames a second and 480 pixels, at most 300 frames. That's 30 seconds at most.
• A GIF has no sound. The video's sound is left out.
• The original is never touched. It all runs on your Mac. Nothing is uploaded.

A GIF of a whole video is rarely what you want. Drop the video on Edit instead, and Koi opens its video editor, the same wheel's last wedge.

1. Drag the video, hold Shift and drop it on Edit.
2. Move the playhead to where the GIF should start and press C to split. Do the same where it should end.
3. Click a piece you don't want and press Delete (⌫). Drag a piece's ends to fine-tune it.
4. Click Crop Video over the picture to keep only what matters, or pick a shape like 1:1 under it.
5. Click a piece to give it its own speed, from 0.25× to 30×. A sped-up GIF of a long action stays small.
6. Click Export, pick GIF, choose Low, Medium, High or Original with each size shown, and click Export Video.

A GIF from Edit Video goes up to 15 frames a second and 960 pixels across, so it's smoother and sharper than the quick one. It's saved beside the original as “Name edited.gif”. Undo and redo work the whole way.

• A quick GIF of a short clip for a chat or a doc: Koi's Convert. 10 frames a second at 480 pixels is plenty there.
• A GIF for a README, a help page or a launch post: Koi's Edit Video, cut and cropped to the part that matters, at up to 15 frames a second.
• Free, and you don't mind building it once: a Shortcuts Quick Action. Test it on a short clip first.

Made your animation in Keynote? Keynote exports slides straight to a GIF with File, Export To, Animated GIF, with its own resolution and frame rate. Apple's Keynote guide has the steps.

• A GIF holds at most 256 colours in each frame. Smooth gradients and faces band; screen recordings of apps look fine.
• GIFs are big for what they show. A few seconds at a small size is the sweet spot. Cut first, then convert.
• There's no sound in a GIF. If the sound matters, send an MP4.
• Many chat apps and sites cap the file size of a GIF. Check theirs, and lower the quality or the length if it's over.
• Most apps loop a GIF forever. Start and end on similar frames so the jump back doesn't show.
• Need one still frame, not a moving picture? Snapshot, on the same wheel, saves the frame under the playhead as a PNG.

Need the video shorter first? Trim it. Want an MP4 instead? Convert MOV to MP4. Making a demo of an app? Edit the screen recording with a background and rounded corners, then export it as a GIF. The rest of the wheel is on the Shift wheel page. Comparing GIF apps? See Gifski alternatives.

Shortcuts is free and already on your Mac. Koi has no free plan: Pro is $20 a month, or $192 a year, after a 3-day free trial that needs a card. Lifetime is paid once, from $59. The Shift wheel uses no AI, so it never counts against Koi's usage. See the plans.