Split a video by scene

What scene detection does

A scene change, or cut, is where the picture changes sharply from one shot to the next. The splitter compares each frame with the one before it using FFmpeg's scene score, a value from 0 to 1 that rises with the size of the change. Frames above your threshold are marked as cuts, and the video is split at those points.

How to split a video into scenes

Drop the video above, set the scene threshold and press Detect and split scenes. Start between 0.30 and 0.40. The tool runs two passes in your browser, one to find the cuts and one to encode the clips, then gives you a ZIP. Inside are scene_000.mp4, scene_001.mp4 and so on, plus scenes.json with the source name, the threshold used and every cut time in seconds.

Choosing a threshold

Lower values find more cuts, including camera moves and flashes. Higher values only catch hard cuts. Cuts closer than half a second apart are merged so you don't get one-frame clips. If no cut passes the threshold, the ZIP holds a single clip of the whole video, so lower the value and try again.

Encoding and speed

Clips are re-encoded to H.264 with AAC audio so each one starts exactly at its cut, rather than at the nearest keyframe. That costs time. A long video can take a while on a laptop, so test the threshold on a short excerpt cut with Trim video first.

Your file stays on this device

Convertur reads the file in this browser tab and builds the result there. The file is never sent to a server. Larger browser engines load only when this tool needs them.

Before you start

Input: MP4, MOV, MKV, WEBM, and AVI. Output: scene clips and manifest. The settings appear before anything runs, so you can check them first. Your original file is never changed.

Video work uses a lot of memory and CPU. Try a short clip first and check that the sound and playback work. On a phone, split large batches into smaller ones.

Keep the original until you have opened and checked the result. The work happens in this browser tab, so the size you can handle depends on your device's memory, your browser and the file itself.

How to split a video by scene

1. Drop a video into the box above.
2. Set the scene threshold, between 0.30 and 0.40 to start.
3. Press Detect and split scenes and wait for both passes.
4. Download the ZIP of clips and the scenes.json list.