How to Cut Videos in VLC Media Player for Free

As one of the most well known free cross-platform multimedia players, VLC Media Player is not only best for playing videos, audios and DVDs from different sources, but can also be used as a video editor to cut any large video into small clips. No matter what operating systems you are using, such as Mac, Windows, Ubuntu, or Linux, you can use VLC to easily cut out small segments from any video for free. It might not be the perfect video editing tool, but it could be the easiest video cutter for anyone. Now follow the below steps to learn how to use your VLC as free video cutting tool to create video clips with ease.

VLC Video Cutter - How to Easily Trim Videos with VLC

Before getting started, make sure you have already downloaded and installed the latest version of VLC media player on your computer.

Step 1 Launch VLC media player

Firstly, open VLC media player by double clicking the software icon. Then from the normal VLC screen, click the menu bar, and go to View > Advanced Controls.

Step 2 Add the video you want to cut

As soon as you activated the advanced controls, you will see four more buttons come up above the normal player control buttons. Under Media, click Open File. You can also use drag and drop method to import the video to VLC.

Step 3 Play and record the video

Now begin to play the video and scroll around to the starting point from where you want to trim. At the starting point, click on the Record button. For a more accurate recording, you can also use the Frame by Frame button to navigate to the exact frame you want to start recording.

Step 4Stop cutting

Hit the Record button again once you reach the ending point. Then the trimmed video clip will be saved automatically as MP4 under C:\Users\Username\Videos folder on Windows.

More Tips: How to Cut Video with VLC Alternative - TunesKit Video Cutter

As you can see, when using VLC as a video cutter, you must sit in front of the computer because it trims the video frame by frame. Therefore, it's good for small cuts only. When it comes to cut video in large size or quantity, VLC is not a reliable solution. If you are seeking for a video splitting tool to cut large videos with more powerful and professional functionality, you should switch to the best alternative to VLC, that is, TunesKit Video Cutter for Mac/Windows.

To learn the complete user guide of TunesKit Video Cutter, you should visit: How to Losslessly Cut, Edit, Convert Videos/Audios.

More about VLC Media Player

VLC media player (also known as VLC), is a free and open-source, cross-platform media player available for desktop and mobile operating systems, including Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, iOS, Windows Phone and more. It supports playing many audio and video file formats, including DVD-Video, video CD and streaming protocols.

Input Formats

VLC can read various formats, including 3GP, ASF, AVI, DVR-MS, FLV, MKV, MIDI, QuickTime File Format, MP4, Ogg, OGM, WAV, MPEG-2, AIFF, Raw audio, Raw DV, MXF, VOB, RM, DVD-Video, VCD, SVCD, CD Audio, DVB, AAC, AC3, ALAC, AMR, DTS, DV Audio, XM, FLAC, It, MACE, Mod, MP3, etc.

Output Formats

VLC can also transcode or stream audio and video into several formats, including ASF, AVI, FLAC, FLV, Fraps, MKV, MP4, MPJPEG, MPEG-2, Ogg, PS, PVA, QuickTime File Format, TS, WAV, WebM, AAC, AC-3, DV Audio, FLAC, MP3, etc.