Every Tape is filmed at one of three qualities, chosen when you create it and used for every recording inside it.
Standard is the right answer for almost everyone. The other two exist for specific reasons, and both use noticeably more storage.
The three options
- Standard — 1080p at 30 frames per second
- Full HD. Looks lovely on a phone and perfectly good on a television, and uses the least space. Recommended.
- High — 4K at 30 frames per second
- Four times the detail, and roughly four times the file size. Worth it for a big occasion you'll watch on a large screen.
- Smooth — 1080p at 60 frames per second
- Twice as many frames a second, so movement looks fluid. Good for sport, running children, and anything fast.
Rough guide to space
As a very approximate rule, an hour of Standard footage uses a few gigabytes; High uses several times that; Smooth sits in between.
The actual size depends on what you're filming — a still room compresses far smaller than a windy beach.
Why it's fixed for the whole Tape
Because everything in a Tape plays as one continuous video, and it should look the same throughout. Keeping one quality across a Tape also lets Videflo save your recordings without re-encoding them, which is why finishing a session is usually a matter of a second or two rather than a minute.
If you want a different quality, make a new Tape. Existing Tapes are unaffected, and Tapes at different qualities live happily side by side in your library.
Tips
Choose High for the wedding. Choose Standard for the Tuesday.
Smooth is the one people forget about, and it's genuinely lovely for sports days and toddlers learning to run.
Higher quality also means longer export times. A 4K Tape takes noticeably longer to prepare than a 1080p one.
Common mistakes
Picking High for everything on the theory that better is better.
You'll fill your iPhone far faster, and on a phone screen you'd struggle to tell the difference. Save it for the Tapes that deserve it.
Expecting Smooth to make the picture sharper.
Smooth changes how fluid motion looks, not how detailed the picture is. For detail, that's High.
Frequently asked
Can I change a Tape's quality later?
No. It's set when the Tape is created and applies to every recording in it.
Does exporting reduce the quality?
No. Exporting builds a copy at the quality the Tape was filmed at.
What about HDR or Cinematic mode?
Videflo records with the standard settings your iPhone camera provides for the chosen resolution and frame rate. There are no separate HDR, Cinematic, Action, or slow-motion modes.
Related articles
Creating your first Tape
Name it, choose how it will be filmed, and start recording — three decisions, one screen.
How much space Tapes use, and how to free some up
Where the gigabytes go, what's safe to delete, and what the low-storage warning means.
Preparing and exporting a Tape
Exporting a whole Tape as one ordinary video file, saved into your Photos library.
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