MP4 to AVI
MP4 to AVI with Xvid video and MP3 sound, the mix older DVD players, TV USB ports and car screens expect. Free, no sign-up, no watermark.
- Free & unlimited
- No sign-up
- Files never uploaded
- No watermark
- Up to 2 GB per file
How to convert MP4 to AVI
Three steps in a desktop browser. Every AVI is encoded fresh, so there is no copy mode to choose.
- 1
Pick the MP4
Drop an .mp4, .m4v or .mov file on the page. Picking only reads it: you see its size, length and resolution, and nothing starts until you click Convert.
- 2
Choose quality and resolution
Select High, Medium or Small file, then keep the original size or step down to 1080p, 720p or 480p. Options larger than the source can't be selected.
- 3
Save the .avi
The file keeps its name with an .avi ending and downloads like any other file. The result screen lists the MP4 size beside the AVI size.
What this MP4 to AVI converter puts inside the file
An AVI is only a wrapper. What an old player cares about is the codec in it.
Xvid video, MP3 audio
Video is MPEG-4 Part 2 tagged XVID, and every audio track becomes MP3 at 192 kbps. That is the pairing players with a DivX or Xvid logo were built around.
Three quantizer steps
High, Medium and Small file set the Xvid quantizer to 2, 4 and 7. A lower number keeps finer detail and writes a bigger file.
Scale down for SD screens
Many older players decode only standard definition. The 480p option shrinks the picture for them and never stretches a smaller source up.
Interlaced sources fixed
Interlaced footage is deinterlaced during the encode, so fast motion doesn't show comb lines on a flat-panel TV.
Encoded on your computer
The MP4 is read and converted inside this browser tab. A two-hour home video never waits behind an upload bar.
Ways to convert MP4 to AVI compared
The routes that come up in search and on forums, side by side.
| This converter | Upload converter sites | VLC Convert/Save | HandBrake | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Makes an AVI | Yes | Yes | Yes, with an AVI profile | No: MP4, MKV and WebM only |
| Video codec | Xvid (MPEG-4 Part 2), fixed | Often a dropdown you set | Set by the profile you edit | n/a |
| Audio | MP3 192 kbps | Varies by site | Set by the profile | n/a |
| Your video leaves the device | No | Yes; retention depends on the service | No | No |
| Install | Nothing | Nothing | Desktop app | Desktop app |
| Files per run | One | Often several | Several | n/a |
Where converting to AVI still pays off
Phones and new TVs play MP4. This is the hardware that often doesn't.
DVD player with a USB port
Many players from the 2000s read AVI from a stick or a burned data disc but ignore MP4. Small file at 480p suits them best.
TV USB playback
Older flat-screen TVs often list AVI as a USB video format while skipping H.264 MP4 files. Check the format table in the manual first.
Car headrest and dashboard screens
Aftermarket head units and headrest monitors that play from USB commonly list AVI. Their small screens look fine at 480p.
Portable DVD players for trips
Kids' portable players with a USB slot are a classic Xvid device. Convert a few cartoons the night before you leave.
Older AVI-only editors
Tools such as VirtualDub were designed around AVI. An Xvid copy opens in them where an MP4 may not.
Why renaming an MP4 to .avi doesn't work
MP4 and AVI are containers. Your MP4 most likely holds H.264 or HEVC video, and an old DVD player can't decode either one, whatever the file is called. Changing the extension, or moving the same H.264 stream into an AVI wrapper, still leaves the player with a codec it doesn't know.
That is why this page always re-encodes to Xvid, an older and less efficient codec, so expect the file to grow. In our test a 30-second 720p MP4 of 696 KB became a 3.9 MB AVI in about 17 seconds on Medium. For long videos, Small file and 480p keep the size and the encode time down, and the MP4 stays the better master copy.
Before you copy the AVI to a USB stick
- Look up the device manual for the formats it lists, such as AVI, Xvid or DivX, and the highest resolution it plays.
- Convert a short test clip first and play it on the real device before doing a whole movie.
- Use 480p for DVD players and small car screens unless the manual lists HD playback.
- Format the stick as FAT32 if the player asks for it; FAT32 can't hold a single file over 4 GB.
- Keep the file name short and plain, since some players hide names with special characters.
- If the player doesn't list the file, move it to the root folder of the stick.
Common slip-ups with Xvid files
Mistake: Choosing High for a feature-length video.
Do this instead: High uses quantizer 2 and makes the largest files. Medium or Small file is plenty for an older TV.
Mistake: Expecting soft subtitles to carry over.
Do this instead: The AVI gets no subtitle track. Subtitles that are part of the picture stay, because they are just pixels.
Mistake: Feeding in an AV1 MP4.
Do this instead: This converter has no AV1 decoder, so it can't re-encode AV1 to Xvid. Re-export it as H.264 from the app that made it, then convert that file.
Mistake: Converting for a device that already plays the MP4.
Do this instead: If it plays as it is, keep the MP4. It is smaller and loses nothing.
Mistake: Deleting the original after converting.
Do this instead: The AVI is a lossy re-encode. Keep the MP4 as your master; another AVI can always be made from it.
Privacy, cost and limits
Stays on your machine
Your file is converted on your own device and is never uploaded to our servers. The only thing downloaded is the converter program.
Free, no account
No sign-up, no watermark and no cap on how many videos you convert. Files go through one at a time, not as a batch.
About 2 GB per file
The limit is the memory a browser tab may use: a 1.6 GB test file converted, a 2.1 GB one stopped with an out-of-memory error.
Plain FFmpeg inside
The engine is unmodified FFmpeg 5.1.4 built for WebAssembly. It loads once from jsDelivr, about 32 MB, then comes from the browser cache.