How to send a video that is too big for email
November 12, 2026 3 min read
Short answer
Personal Gmail and Outlook.com accounts allow 25 MB of attachments per email, and a few minutes of phone video easily goes over that. You can compress the video or lower its resolution to get under 25 MB, or put the file in Google Drive or OneDrive and send a link instead.
If attaching a video gives you an error, or a link appears instead of an attachment, the size limit is the reason. Here are the limits and the methods that work.
Compress videoShrink video size while keeping quality.What are the Gmail and Outlook limits?
According to Google's help page, a personal Gmail account can send up to 25 MB of attachments. If your attachments are bigger, Gmail automatically adds the file as a Google Drive link instead of an attachment. For work and school accounts, the organization's administrator sets the limit.
According to Microsoft, an email in Outlook.com can be up to 25 MB in total, and that includes the text and all attached files. Links to OneDrive files don't count toward this limit; a file shared by link can be up to 2 GB.
The recipient's email service may have its own receiving limit, so aiming a bit below 25 MB is safer than aiming right at it.
1. Compress the video
Phones record video at very high bitrates. Compression removes data you won't notice and often makes the file much smaller. For short clips it is usually enough on its own.
- 1Open the Compress video tool on mp4indir, or if you need a specific size, pick a target size (for example 16 MB) in the Compress for WhatsApp tool.
- 2Drag and drop the video or choose it from your device.
- 3Press Start, download the result and attach it to your email.
2. Lower the resolution or trim it
For someone watching in their inbox, 720p is often enough even if you filmed in 4K or 1080p. Lowering the resolution cuts the size a lot. If only part of the video matters, trimming the rest shrinks the file in proportion to the length.
3. Send a cloud link
For long videos, or when you don't want any quality loss, the best way is to upload the file to cloud storage and send the link. Google Drive works from inside Gmail and OneDrive from inside Outlook. The Mail app on iPhone also offers Mail Drop for large attachments.
With this method the file is uploaded to the cloud service and uses your storage space. Check the sharing settings to control who can open the link.
Which should I choose?
If the video is short and top quality isn't critical, compress it. If you need to send a long video in one piece, use a cloud link. If the recipient will edit the video or use it for production, send the original quality by link.
Frequently asked questions
- What happens if I attach more than 25 MB in Gmail?
- Gmail doesn't send it as an attachment. It uploads the file to Google Drive and puts a link in the email instead.
- What is the Outlook.com size limit?
- According to Microsoft, an email can be up to 25 MB in total. OneDrive links don't count toward that limit.
- Will compression ruin my video?
- There is some quality loss, but at a medium setting it is usually hard to notice on a phone or laptop screen. Very small target sizes make the picture softer.
- Does zipping a video make it smaller?
- Hardly. Video files are already compressed, so a ZIP won't reduce the size in any meaningful way.