GIF video specs and requirements
Animated GIFs for READMEs, help articles and emails, where video files are not an option.
What it is
GIFs play everywhere without a player: in GitHub READMEs, help centre articles, chat apps and most email clients. The trade-off is file size and limited colours, so they suit short, simple clips.
What it expects from a video
- GitHub limits images, including GIFs, to 10 MB.
- Email GIFs should stay under about 2 MB. Larger files are often not loaded by email clients.
- GIFs have no sound.
Recordcake presets
Help Center GIF
For help centre articles. Up to 12 seconds.
- Size
- 800×450 (16:9)
- Frame rate
- 12 fps
- Video
- GIF
- Audio
- No audio
- Limits
- up to 12 sec · max 5 MB
Email GIF
For email. Up to 8 seconds and 2 MB.
- Size
- 600×338
- Frame rate
- 10 fps
- Video
- GIF
- Audio
- No audio
- Limits
- up to 8 sec · max 2 MB
GIF
For READMEs and docs. Up to 15 seconds.
- Size
- 800×450 (16:9)
- Frame rate
- 15 fps
- Video
- GIF
- Audio
- No audio
- Limits
- up to 15 sec · max 10 MB
GIF (small)
Smaller and lighter, for tight spaces.
- Size
- 640×360 (16:9)
- Frame rate
- 12 fps
- Video
- GIF
- Audio
- No audio
- Limits
- up to 10 sec · max 3 MB
Tips for product demos
- Keep GIFs short. Every extra second adds a lot of file size.
- Record a small area around the feature you want to show. GIFs look much better with fewer colours and less movement.
- For long demos, use an MP4 instead: the GitHub README preset uploads a real video with far better quality.
Official specs
There is no official spec for this one. The preset follows common practice.
Screen recordings, piece of cake.
Record the demo once. Let Recordcake handle the formats.
Coming soon to the Mac App Store