What are the video formats for Facebook?
Facebook is giving more and more importance and space to the video format in its platform. The communicative impact of videos far exceeds both text and images and the Menlo Park social network encourages the propagation of this type of message. Many businesses buy Facebook video views to increase brand’s exposure.
However, not everyone knows which video formats are most suitable for Facebook.
Video formats for Facebook
The Facebook guide informs you of a long list of formats that can be used to upload videos to the social network, which I report below:
3g2 (Video from mobile), 3gp (Video from mobile), 3gpp (Video from mobile), asf (Windows Media Video), avi (Video AVI), dat (Video MPEG), divx (Video DIVX), dv (Video DV ), f4v (Video Flash), flv (Video Flash), gif (Graphics Interchange Format), m2ts (Video M2TS), m4v (Video MPEG-4), mkv (Matroska Format), mod (Video MOD), mov (Movie QuickTime), mp4 (Video MPEG-4), mpe (Video MPEG), mpeg (Video MPEG), mpeg4 (Video MPEG-4), mpg (Video MPEG), mts (Video AVCHD), nsv (Video Nullsoft), ogm (Ogg Media Format), ogv (Ogg Video Format), qt (QuickTime Movie), tod (Video TOD), ts (MPEG Transport Stream), vob (Video DVD), wmv (Windows Media Video).
But the social network itself advises you to opt mainly for MP4 or MOV. You should also know that Facebook optimizes videos at 1280 × 720 so it is useless to insert a video in full HD (1920 × 1080).
You also need to know that the maximum length of a video is 120 minutes, and its maximum size is 4GB.
Before moving on to video formats for your ads, I wanted to give you some advice.
Video formats for Facebook, for your ads
To be watched and appreciated, the videos must immediately hit the audience. One option is to post videos of short duration, people watch videos of 15 seconds or less. Another possibility is to lock them in the first crucial seconds and then take them to watch longer videos.
As you know, the world of the internet is quite hectic, so even when it comes to preparing a video, two keywords must never be missing: effectiveness and speed in engaging the viewer. This same rule applies to both desktop and smartphone viewers.
When exporting video editing software the recommended settings are:
- A H.264 video with AAC audio and preferably as I told you above in MOV or MP4
- Aspect ratio no greater than 1280 pixels wide and divisible by 16 pixels
- A frame rate equal to or less than 30 fps.
- A sampling rate of 44 100 Hr
Consider that for mobile you have to focus on vertical videos (4: 5 2: 3 and 9:16 formats).
It is good that the video message is designed with the sound muted, considering that often this is how it is displayed. But once the audio is activated, let it also be engaging.
One possibility is to use subtitles, which, despite the sound turned off, do not render the display incomplete.
For more details on video and image specifications for ad placements, I recommend reading the Facebook business guide.
To conclude, I will give you very important information. Know that Facebook treats videos shared for example by Youtube and native videos in a very different way, i.e. videos posted directly on the social network, with a much higher media interaction than sharing.
Once you understand what the basic settings for video formats for Facebook are, you can focus on the content, remembering that it is essential to immediately attract attention by starting right from the heart of the message you want to communicate.
