Apps & Tools

Video Export Bitrate Calculator

Name: Video Export Bitrate Calculator
Author: Infinite Creation

Pick your resolution, frame rate, and delivery target to get a recommended export bitrate, codec, and file size estimate.

Export Format

Resolution

Frame Rate

Delivery Target

Duration

Recommendation

How to Use This Calculator

Match your export bitrate to your actual resolution and frame rate rather than guessing at a round number, too low and you get visible compression artifacts, too high and you're wasting upload time and storage for no visible benefit since most platforms re-encode anyway. These recommendations follow the widely published bitrate guidance used across the industry (closely matching YouTube's own published upload recommendations, a common reference point regardless of destination platform).

Standard vs. High Quality

Standard Quality matches typical recommended upload bitrates, the sweet spot for most platform uploads. High Quality roughly doubles that, appropriate for an archival master file or a version you'll re-encode from later, where extra headroom protects against quality loss in a second compression pass.

Frame Rate's Effect on Bitrate

Higher frame rates need more bitrate for the same perceived quality because there's more unique motion information to encode per second. The calculator scales its recommendation accordingly rather than using one fixed number per resolution.

Not sure which codec to pair with that bitrate? See H.264 vs. H.265 for the tradeoffs between the two most common choices.

FAQ

Q: Should I always use the maximum bitrate my software allows?
A: No, beyond the recommended range for your resolution/frame rate, additional bitrate provides diminishing returns since the platform's own re-encode caps effective quality anyway.

Q: Does this account for H.265 being more efficient than H.264?
A: These figures assume standard H.264 delivery, the safest universal choice. H.265 can achieve similar visual quality at roughly half this bitrate if your platform and encoder both support it well.

Worked examples: bitrate by resolution and frame rate

Every combination the calculator offers, at standard quality, already worked out. File sizes assume ten minutes of video and a 192 kbps AAC audio track. Choosing high quality in the tool doubles the video bitrate and the file size.

Resolution	Frame rate	Video bitrate	Codec	10 min file
4K UHD (2160p)	24 fps	36.0 Mbps	H.265/HEVC	2.65 GB
4K UHD (2160p)	30 fps	40.0 Mbps	H.265/HEVC	2.94 GB
4K UHD (2160p)	60 fps	60.0 Mbps	H.265/HEVC	4.41 GB
1440p	24 fps	14.4 Mbps	H.264 or H.265	1.07 GB
1440p	30 fps	16.0 Mbps	H.264 or H.265	1.19 GB
1440p	60 fps	24.0 Mbps	H.264 or H.265	1.77 GB
1080p	24 fps	7.2 Mbps	H.264	554 MB
1080p	30 fps	8.0 Mbps	H.264	614 MB
1080p	60 fps	12.0 Mbps	H.264	914 MB
720p	24 fps	4.5 Mbps	H.264	352 MB
720p	30 fps	5.0 Mbps	H.264	389 MB
720p	60 fps	7.5 Mbps	H.264	577 MB
480p	24 fps	2.2 Mbps	H.264	183 MB
480p	30 fps	2.5 Mbps	H.264	202 MB
480p	60 fps	3.8 Mbps	H.264	296 MB

The pattern worth remembering: frame rate matters less than resolution. Moving from 30 to 60 fps costs half again as much bitrate, while moving from 1080p to 4K costs five times as much.

Vocabulary

Bitrate. The amount of data used per second of video, measured in megabits per second. Higher bitrate preserves more detail and produces a larger file. Beyond a point the platform re-encodes your upload anyway, so extra bitrate buys nothing.

Codec. The method used to compress video into a file. H.264 plays everywhere and is the safe default. H.265, also called HEVC, reaches similar quality at roughly half the bitrate, but not every platform and player accepts it.

Megabit and megabyte. Bitrate is quoted in megabits per second, file size in megabytes. Eight megabits make one megabyte, which is why a 10 Mbps clip produces roughly 1.25 MB of file for every second.

Frame rate. How many still images make up each second of video, written as fps. Higher frame rates capture motion more smoothly and need proportionally more data to stay clean.