Bitrate
Also known as: bit rate, video bitrate, data rate
Bitrate is the amount of data used per second of audio or video, usually measured in megabits per second (Mbps). A higher bitrate carries more detail and produces a sharper result, but it also makes the file proportionally larger.
- Data used per second, measured in Mbps
- Higher bitrate = more detail and larger files
- File size ≈ bitrate × duration
What bitrate controls
Bitrate is the single biggest lever on a video file’s size. It measures how many bits are spent on each second of footage: more bits mean more detail preserved, fewer bits mean a smaller file with more visible compression. Two clips of the same length and resolution can differ wildly in size purely because of bitrate.
Resolution, frame rate, and codec all influence the bitrate a video needs. A 4K clip demands far more data per second than a 1080p clip to look clean, which is why high-resolution video grows so quickly.
Bitrate and file size
Because file size is roughly bitrate multiplied by duration, lowering the bitrate is how compression tools shrink a video. Cut the bitrate too far and you get blocky artifacts; trim it sensibly and you reclaim space with little visible difference.