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How to rotate a video on a Mac
By Himanshu Ranjan · Updated 8 November 2026
To rotate a video on a Mac, open it in QuickTime Player, choose View > Show Clips, select the clip and use the Edit menu to rotate left or right, then click Done. Or select it in Finder and run FileDial's Frame › Rotate 90° right or Rotate 90° left, which makes a new copy with no re-encoding.
Rotate with QuickTime Player
Apple's guide gives the steps. Open the movie in QuickTime Player, choose View > Show Clips, then select the clip, which is outlined in yellow. From the Edit menu choose to rotate the clip left or right, or flip it horizontally or vertically. Click Done when you finish.
This works well for a single clip. After rotating, save or export the movie, because the change is not applied to the original file until you do.
Rotate with FileDial
FileDial has two rotation tools and one flip. They save a new copy beside the original and, per their notes, do not re-encode the video.
- Select the video in Finder.
- Hold the right Option key to open the dial.
- Choose Frame › Rotate 90° right or Frame › Rotate 90° left. For a mirror image use Frame › Flip horizontally.
- Open the new copy and confirm the orientation.
Which direction do I need
If the top of the picture points to the left, rotate right. If it points to the right, rotate left. For a clip upside down, run the rotation twice, one result after the other. Because the tools make a copy each time, run the second rotation on the first result.
Videos from phones sometimes look correct on the phone and wrong elsewhere, because an orientation flag is stored in the file rather than in the picture. A rotation copy writes the correct orientation for players that ignore the flag.
Rotating a whole folder
If a whole shoot came out sideways, you do not need to rotate clip by clip. Select all of them in Finder and run the same rotation tool once. Each file gets its own corrected copy beside the original.
A mixed folder, where some clips are right and some are wrong, is better handled by selecting only the wrong ones. Check one result before running the batch.
Rotating before other edits
Fix orientation early. If you crop, compress or join first, you carry the wrong orientation into every later copy. After rotating, you can crop to a vertical shape with the Frame crop tools, trim with Cut › Trim… and compress.
If the video is not sideways but mirrored, such as a front-camera selfie with reversed text, Frame › Flip horizontally is the tool, not rotation.
Orientation, metadata and quality
Phones record the sensor image in one orientation and add a flag that says how to turn it for display. Players that respect the flag show the video upright, and others show it sideways, which is why one clip can look right in Photos and wrong in another app.
A rotation tool that writes a copy removes the doubt. FileDial notes that its rotate tools make a new copy with no re-encoding, which means the picture data is not recompressed, and the quality of the original is kept. That is the practical difference between rotating and many other edits, which re-encode and always lose a little.
Mistakes to avoid: rotating in the wrong direction and then rotating again, which makes another copy each time; rotating a video that only needed a flip; and rotating a clip you intend to crop to vertical, when a crop might have done the job directly. If a video is only slightly crooked rather than turned by a quarter, rotation tools will not help, and Adjust › Stabilize smooths handheld shake but does not level a tilt.
QuickTime Player is the better choice for a single clip that you are already viewing, because the steps are fast and need no extra software. FileDial is better for a batch, or when you want a file that behaves the same in every app.
Checklist for sideways footage
A few quick checks save a second pass.
- Open the clip in QuickTime Player to see how macOS shows it.
- Decide the direction, then rotate only once.
- Play the new copy in a second app to confirm it looks the same.
- Rotate the remaining clips as a batch only after one result looks right.
- Keep originals until the edit is finished.
Rotate or crop
Rotating a landscape video does not make it a good vertical video: the picture just turns on its side. If your goal is a portrait clip for social platforms, see the vertical video guide, which uses framing tools instead. For cutting out unwanted edges, see the crop guide.
Batches work too. If you filmed a set of clips the wrong way, select all of them and run the same rotation once.
Questions
How do I rotate a video in QuickTime Player?
Open the movie, choose View > Show Clips, select the clip, then choose Edit and rotate left or right (or flip). Click Done. Apple documents these steps on its QuickTime Player support page. Apple documents these steps in the QuickTime Player user guide, and the shortcuts shown there may vary by version.
Does rotating reduce video quality?
FileDial's rotate tools are noted as making a new copy with no re-encoding, so the picture is not recompressed. The original stays unchanged beside the new file. Recompressing the picture is what costs quality, and these tools are noted as avoiding it entirely.
Can I flip a video like a mirror?
Yes. QuickTime's Edit menu has flip horizontally and vertically, and FileDial has Frame › Flip horizontally. Remember that text in the picture will appear reversed. Front cameras sometimes record mirrored text, and a flip, not a rotation, is what fixes that.
Why is my video sideways only on some apps?
Some players read an orientation flag in the file and others ignore it. Rotating with a tool that writes a corrected copy gives consistent results across players. The usual cause is an orientation flag stored in the file, which some players read and others ignore.