How to Rotate a Video in iMovie

David Wilson
2024-04-18 16:33:55 • Filed to: Basic Editing Tips

Can you rotate a video in iMovie? Well, iMovie is a free built-in video editing software application for iPhone, macOS, classic Mac OS, and iOS devices. It is developed by Apple Inc and comprises of options to alter and intensify video color situations, crop and iMovie rotate video option, change the orientation of the video, etc.

It further comprises options to change the speed of the video, and much more. Also, this application can magnify the audio of a clip by minimizing the background sound and maximizing the sound you want to add. It also comes with a trailer feature that allows the videos to be easily run into the timeline.

Furthermore, it includes templates with added titles and credits to the trailer. The application also supports the importing and exporting of projects from other Apple Software. The fine resolution and the correct orientation enhance the clip for a great experience in watching and sharing a video.

However, if a video has too much noise in the background or is too dark or has a poor resolution? For these types of modifications and corrections, you can depend on the rotate video iMovie iPhone option, which is very easy to use. One final editing technique that can beautify a video clip in your project is to rotate the video. iMovie lets you rotate the videos in their correct orientation by clockwise or anticlockwise sideways. Here is an in-depth process on how to rotate a clip in iMovie:

How to Rotate a Video in iMovie for Mac

If you end up with a video that's turned over on its side and you want to rotate it around, don't worry we have a solution here. If you use a Mac, you can rotate the video with the free built-in iMovie app.

    • Let's start things off by opening up the iMovie App.
    • Once you're within the iMovie, you can create a new project by clicking on the “create new” option.

create new project imovie

    • Now select the option “movie”.

select movie option

    • Select the footage you want to import within your iMovie library.

import media into imovie

    • So to do that, you can click on the arrow pointing down on the top left corner.
    • Once you have the selected video, you can click on it. Also, make sure that you have a yellow boundary around it.
    • Now drag it on the timeline (which is a grey area down there).
    • Remember, you can make any changes and edits to the video on this timeline only.

drag video to the timeline

    • Now click on the little box icon on the top right of the page, and you will see two rotate buttons on the screen.

rotate videos in imovie

    • Click on the correct direction button for whichever way your video needs to be rotated.
    • And that's it. Your video is rotated.
    • If you want to share your video directly to the social media, you can click on the share button up in the top right of the page.

save or share videos

  Saving the video as a file

  • In case you want to save it as a file, click on the File option and enter the file name.
  • Then click on the Save button.
  • Now depending on the speed of your computer and the size of your video that you are exporting, this could take a while so give it some time.
  • Once your videos exported, you can see a notification on the screen.
  • Ignoring that, you can see your resulting file on the desktop, and you can click the spacebar to preview, and there you go.

Change the Orientation of a Video on iPhone

If you like shooting videos with your iPhone, you've probably been to this situation. The video plays just fine on your iPhone, but when you upload it on Youtube or Facebook, they become sideways with the vertical orientation. Why? That happens when you shoot vertically and rotate your phone for landscape mode while recording, but the video stays locked in portrait orientation.

Luckily this mistake can be easily fixed with apps on every operating system.

The first thing you can think of is probably iMovie. But it's not built-in in every model. So for this, you will have to download the iMovie app from the App store. So, here is a quick guide on how to rotate video in iMovie iPhone:

    • Open the iMovie app, and all you need to do is to import the selected video.

import imovie video on iphone

    • Click on the edit button to make any changes and then click Done at the top right.

done video editing on imovie

    • Now click on the three dots at the bottom and select the iMovie option.
    • Choose the right rotating option from the app.
    • Then save the video to your Camera Roll.

save imovie videos on iphone

Conclusion

There are so many paid video enhancement software applications available to buy in the App store. But if you want to go with the free video editor app, iMovie is the best option for you. Also, this software application is powerful enough to modify your video clips. It is available on the latest versions of the iPhone, Mac OS, and iPadOS. Here, you will find some professional tools to get help in improving the quality of your video clip and in changing the video effects without much effort. 

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Now you know the basics to edit and enhance your video clips on iMovie, so which video editing software application is your favourite? Selecting a video enhancer application is not an easy task because there are so many applications available in the App store.

However, if you have just started with learning the skills of video editing, spending too much money over the paid software is not recommended. Moreover, professionals who want to edit their movie clips can proceed with the paid software because they provide many creative possibilities.