Compress a video for Discord on Mac
Neither native route takes a file size as the target. QuickTime Player's Export As offers 4K, 1080p, 720p, and 480p and writes .mov. Finder's Encode Selected Video Files offers a similar list of H.264 and HEVC resolutions, also as .mov. You pick a tier, wait, and check the size in Finder afterwards. Press has a Discord preset: it works out the bitrate that fits Discord's 20 MB cap for the clip's length and writes H.264 MP4, which Discord accepts.
- Drop the clip onto Press.
- Under Video, choose H.264, then pick Discord under Size limit. For 4K footage, also pick 1080p or 720p. Add 720p for a clip that runs several minutes, so the encoder has bitrate to spare.
- Click Convert. The finished row shows the output size, so you can check it is under 20 MB before you open Discord.
What you get
- Container
- .mp4 next to the source, named name (Press).mp4.
- Codec
- H.264 with AAC audio.
- Quality
- Press sets the video bitrate from the byte budget and the clip's duration, with 96 kbps reserved for audio and a 10 percent margin, then re-encodes once at a lower rate if the first pass overshoots. The full duration is always kept, so a long clip gets fewer bits per second and looks softer than a short one.
- Metadata
- Metadata is not carried over on size-limited exports, which are written through AVAssetWriter rather than the export presets.
What we measured
One 60-second 4K clip with the Discord preset at three resolutions. At 1080p and 720p it landed at 18.1 MB, about 10 percent under the cap as intended. At Original it came out at 22.9 MB, over the cap: on our test Mac the H.264 encoder would not go below about 2.9 Mbps for 4K frames, even on the second, lower-rate pass. Pick 1080p or 720p for 4K footage.
| Source | Setting | Output | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4K HEVC .mov, 153.5 MB | Discord, 1080p | 18.1 MB .mp4 | 7 s |
| 4K HEVC .mov, 153.5 MB | Discord, 720p | 18.1 MB .mp4 | 5 s |
| 4K HEVC .mov, 153.5 MB | Discord, Original | 22.9 MB .mp4, over the cap | 53 s |
Measured on 2026-10-08 with Press 1.0 on a MacBook Air (M5, 24 GB) running macOS 27.0.1. The video source is a 60-second 4K HEVC .mov at 30 fps with AAC audio: a slow pan across a photograph, with grain added. The H.264 source is the same clip encoded to 1080p. The photo is a 12-megapixel iPhone HEIC. Sizes are decimal megabytes, as Finder shows them. Times are for one file.
Why 20 MB?
Discord's File Attachments FAQ puts the upload limit without Nitro at 20 MB, up from 10 MB as of August 2026. Discord checks the size before any compression, so the size Finder shows is the number that counts. Press's preset tracks that limit. Nitro Basic raises it to 50 MB and Nitro to as much as 1 GB. With either, choose Custom and type your limit.
What if I want it smaller still?
Choose Custom and type a lower number, or add 720p so the bits go further. Press never touches the original, so repeating the conversion starts from the same source each time.
Is the Discord preset free?
Size presets are part of Press Pro. The free download converts to H.264 MP4 at Original, 1080p, or 720p without a size target, which is often enough for a short clip.
Press converts video and images on your Mac. The download is free, and Press Pro is a one-time $14.99 unlock for batch conversion, size presets, and WebP.