Convert a tweet to GIF
GIF is the format that autoplays inline everywhere a video would need a click: Slack, Discord, forums, wikis, email clients and old CMSes. It loops forever by default, which is exactly what you want for a short tweet animation.
The catch is 256 colours and no real compression. This page builds one shared palette across every frame rather than a fresh palette per frame, which is what stops flat card backgrounds from shimmering — the tell of a cheaply made GIF. Dithering is off, because dither exists to fake photographic gradients and only adds noise to flat interface colours.
Questions
- Why is my GIF so large?
- GIF has no inter-frame video compression. Cut the frame rate, the length or the dimensions — halving the frame rate roughly halves the file.
- What frame rate should I use for a GIF?
- 12 fps looks smooth enough for text animation and keeps the file small. GIF timing is stored in 1/100s units, so 5, 10, 12, 20, 25 and 50 fps are exact and other values drift.
- Does the GIF loop?
- Yes, forever by default. You can turn looping off, and then it plays once and stops on the final frame.