There can be many occasions when you may want to watch a YouTube video frame by frame. Maybe you want to learn a cool trick that is difficult to watch even in slow motion or need to share a video starting from a particular frame. Whatever the reason, I know two ways to play YouTube videos frame by frame.
There is no need to download the YouTube video, it can actually be done right inside the YouTube player. Even if it doesn’t work, there are some third-party tools as well that could get the job done. In this post, we will discover two methods to watch YouTube videos frame by frame.
Use YouTube frame by frame keyboard shortcuts
YouTube has many handy keyboard shortcuts to fully control the player, and there is a keyboard shortcut to play videos frame by frame as well. Here is how to play YouTube frame by frame using keyboard shortcuts:
- First, pause the video using the spacebar key or by clicking the pause button.
- Now press the “>” (period) button to skip a frame forward or press the “<” (comma) button to skip a frame backward.
Do keep in mind that this will only work if the creator of the video encodes the video frame by frame. Most YouTube creators do encode videos frame by frame, so this method should work in most cases. If it doesn’t, check the below method.
Use a third-party app to play YouTube videos frame by frame
If you are an animator who needs to study videos frame by frame or the above method doesn’t work for you, then an online tool will be useful for you. These tools offer more control over the frames and can also play videos frame by frame which YouTube players can’t.
For this purpose, I recommend Watch Frame By Frame online tool which is easy to use and offers reliable control.
Note: Do keep in mind that they use cryptocurrency mining to make money. You might like to block cryptocurrency mining if you don’t want to share CPU power.
Open the Watch Frame By Frame website and paste the URL of the video that you want to play frame by frame.
The video will be loaded with controls at the bottom of it. You can click the back button to skip a frame backward, or the forward button to skip a frame forward.
There is also an option to increase framerate up to 60 FPS. If you need to be even more precise, increasing FPS will help.
Furthermore, you can adjust how many frames to skip when you press the backward or forward button (up to 32 frames can be skipped).
Even at 25 FPS, Watch Frame By Frame provided more precise frame skips than YouTube’s built-in player. You should keep note of it if more frames matter to you. Additionally, if you need to use it often, you can also install the Frame By Frame Chrome extension.
Ending words
If you need to quickly take control of a YouTube video’s frames to slowly see what’s happening, then the first method is the best choice. However, if you need to play the YouTube video frame by frame for learning purposes, then using the Watch Frame By Frame tool is a much better option.