How to rotate a video on iPhone
A video that came out sideways is fixable in the Photos app, no download needed.
In the Photos app
- Open the video in Photos and tap Edit.
- Tap the crop icon along the bottom.
- Tap the rotate button in the top left of that screen. Each tap turns the video 90 degrees.
- Tap Done, then Save Video or Save as New Clip.
Two taps of rotate gets you 180 degrees for footage that came out upside down.
Straightening a tilted clip
Rotation moves in 90 degree steps. It will not fix a horizon that is two degrees off, which is the more common problem with handheld footage.
For that you need a tilt adjustment, which crops in slightly as it turns so the corners do not show. Our editor has one:
- Drop the video in.
- Press G to put a grid over the picture and line it up against a real horizontal.
- Drag the Tilt slider, or nudge it with the comma and full stop keys.
- Press Export.
Why does the video rotate itself back
Video files carry a rotation flag in their metadata. Some players read it, some ignore it. A clip that looks correct in Photos but sideways on someone else's laptop usually has a rotation flag that their player did not honour.
Exporting a rotated copy bakes the rotation into the picture itself, so every player shows it the same way. That is what our editor does on export.
Questions
Does rotating a video lose quality?
A 90 degree rotation is lossless in principle, but Photos re-encodes on save, which costs a little. A tilt adjustment always re-encodes and crops slightly.
Can I mirror a video instead of rotating it?
Photos does not have a mirror control for video. Our editor does, on the M key. It is useful for selfie footage that reads backwards.
How do I undo a rotation?
In Photos, open the clip, tap Edit, then Revert. That only works if you saved over the original.