Shooting a vertical video had been considered something of a technological faux pas for years, though it’s so common now that a lot of apps have adapted to accommodate portrait videos. It’s very easy to accidentally do. In the excitement of the moment, you hold your phone in portrait, or a last-second tilt switches the orientation unexpectedly and you don’t notice until it’s too late. Landscape videos are generally preferable because they make the best use of the available screen real estate. Luckily, it’s relatively easy to fix. In fact, we’re about to teach you how to rotate a video on an iPhone.
If you’ve shot a portrait video, but would prefer it to be landscape, then you’re going to need to use an app to rotate it. The most obvious choice, which is free for iPhone owners, is Apple’s own iMovie app. Unfortunately, the process involves jumping through some hoops, but we’ll guide you each step of the way. At the end, we’ll mention a couple of alternative apps that you might consider because they make it quicker and easier to rotate those videos.
How to rotate a video with iMovie
If you don’t have iMovie installed already, open the App Store and search for it, then tap Get and wait for it to install.
Open the iMovie app and tap Create Project.
Tap on Movie.
Tap on Create Movie at the bottom of the screen.
Tap + to add videos, then tap Video, then All and double tap on the video you want to rotate.
You should see your video at the top with the timeline below. You need to place two fingers or a finger and a thumb on the video and then twist and swipe them left or right to rotate the image. Don’t worry if it isn’t right the first time — you can keep rotating it with the same motion.
When you’re happy with the orientation, tap Done in the top left.
Finally, tap Share (the upward arrow icon in the middle) at the bottom of the screen and choose where you want to save it to or share it.
Once you’ve installed iMovie, you can also edit and rotate videos using it as an extension in the Photos app. Here’s how:
Open the Photos app and find the video you want to rotate.
Tap Edit at the top right.
Tap the three ellipses in the circle at the bottom and select iMovie.
If iMovie isn’t there as an option, then tap More and toggle it on.
Use the two finger or finger and thumb twist motion to rotate your video.
Tap Done when you’re happy with it and it will be saved the right way up in the Photos app.
Alternative third-party apps
There are a few video=rotating apps in the iTunes App Store that you might want to try. Video rotate + flip video easy is completely free and pretty straightforward, but it does have annoying advertisements.
If this is an issue you run into frequently, then you may feel Video Rotate and Flip is worth the $1 investment. The nice thing about it is that it also works as an extension in the Photos app. It can handle backwards text, too, and it exports directly to the Photos app.
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