Every platform wants a different shape. TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts are vertical 9:16, the Instagram feed favours 4:5 portrait or 1:1 square, and YouTube and LinkedIn videos are usually landscape 16:9. Upload the wrong shape and the app will crop off heads and captions or shrink your video into a tiny strip. This free video resizer changes the aspect ratio of any clip in your browser. Pick a preset, then choose how to fill the space: blurred background (the popular look where a blurred, zoomed copy of your video fills the bars), a solid colour in your brand shade, or crop to fill, which zooms in so there are no bars at all. A live preview shows exactly what you'll get before you process anything. It's perfect for turning a landscape YouTube clip or Zoom recording into a vertical Short, making a square version for a Facebook or LinkedIn feed, or reframing phone footage for a website hero banner. It keeps your audio, adds no watermark and never uploads your video, so it's safe for client work and personal clips alike.
Resize a video
Your video is processed on your own device by your browser. It is never uploaded to Botvana or any server, so it works for private clips and there is no file-size paywall.
How to resize a video for TikTok, Reels or Shorts
- Choose your video.
- Pick 9:16 – TikTok, Reels, Shorts (or another preset).
- Choose a fill style and check the preview frame.
- Tap Resize video and keep the tab open while it processes.
- Download and upload it to your app.
Video sizes cheat sheet (2026)
| Where | Aspect ratio | Recommended size |
|---|---|---|
| TikTok | 9:16 | 1080×1920 |
| Instagram Reels and Stories | 9:16 | 1080×1920 |
| YouTube Shorts | 9:16 | 1080×1920 |
| Instagram and Facebook feed | 4:5 or 1:1 | 1080×1350 or 1080×1080 |
| LinkedIn feed | 1:1, 4:5 or 16:9 | 1080×1080 |
| YouTube, Vimeo, websites | 16:9 | 1920×1080 |
| X (Twitter) | 16:9 or 1:1 | 1280×720 or 1080×1080 |
Need a custom size, or want to know the height for a given width? Use our aspect ratio calculator.
Blur, bars or crop: which should I use?
Blurred background keeps your whole frame visible and fills the empty space with a soft, zoomed copy of the same video. It looks native on vertical feeds and is the safest choice when turning landscape footage into a Short, because nothing important gets cut off. Solid colour bars look cleaner and more "designed", and leave space above and below the video for captions or a headline you add later in CapCut, Canva or Instagram's editor; use your brand colour. Crop to fill zooms in until there are no bars. It looks the most immersive, but on a landscape-to-vertical conversion it throws away about two thirds of the width, so only use it when your subject is centred.
Keep text out of the danger zones
On TikTok, Reels and Shorts the app draws its own buttons over your video: the like, comment and share column on the right, and the caption and sound name along the bottom. Keep faces and on-screen text inside the middle area, roughly away from the bottom 20% and the right 15% of a 9:16 frame. With the solid-colour option, the bars above and below your video are a natural home for a title.
How the in-browser engine works (and its honest limits)
Most "free" online video sites upload your file to their servers, process it there, and then make you wait in a queue, watch ads or pay to remove a watermark. Botvana's video tools work differently. Your browser already contains a complete video decoder and, in all modern browsers, an encoder exposed through the MediaRecorder API. The tool plays your clip into a hidden canvas, applies the change you asked for (a new size, a lower bitrate, a crop or a cut), and records that canvas together with the original audio into a fresh file. Nothing leaves your phone or computer.
That design has trade-offs you should know about before you start:
- It runs in real time. A 60-second clip takes roughly 60 seconds to process, because the browser has to play it once. Keep the tab open and in the foreground while it works; most browsers slow down background tabs.
- The output format depends on your browser. Chrome and Edge (version 126 and later) and Safari save an MP4 (H.264). Firefox and older Chrome save WebM (VP8/VP9), which plays in every modern browser and uploads fine to YouTube, but some phone galleries and older editing apps prefer MP4.
- Frame rate is capped at about 30 fps. 60 fps gameplay footage will come out at around 30 fps.
- Very long or 4K files can be heavy on older phones. For anything over 10 minutes, a desktop app such as HandBrake (free) will be faster.
We looked at ffmpeg.wasm, the popular WebAssembly build of FFmpeg, but it needs special server headers (cross-origin isolation) to run well, which a Blogger site can't send. The native browser route is lighter, loads instantly and keeps your file private.
FAQ
How do I convert a horizontal video to vertical?
Choose the 9:16 preset and the blurred background fill. Your full landscape video sits in the middle with a blurred copy above and below.
Will resizing stretch my video?
No. The tool always keeps the original proportions and either adds a background or crops, so faces never look squashed.
Does it keep the sound?
Yes, the original audio is kept.
What resolution should I upload to TikTok?
1080×1920 at 9:16. The lighter 720×1280 preset processes faster on older phones and still looks fine on most screens.
Is my video uploaded?
No. It is processed in your browser and never leaves your device.
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