Best Ogg Theora Video Compressor

A while back I did a comparison of the popular mp4 compressors. Specifically ones used to convert videos for HTML5 playback. Well here is a follow up, this time around though, we’re comparing compressors for Ogg Theora.

I try to make my content cross browser compatible, but for this one I have no choice. You must use Firefox or Chrome to fully view this post. The newer the version the better.

Anyway, back to the post. I started with a small clip from the 720p version of Elephants Dream. It’s a cool little short and I suggest going and watching it if you haven’t already.

So with this clip in hand I ran it through 6 different compressors.

ffmpeg2theora (6.10 MB)

• lots of settings
• smallest file
• moderate quality
• moderate ease of use

FFmpeg (6.19 MB)

• same as ffmpeg2theora
• no sound (can have sound if you encode separately and then combine)
• has to be a size divisible by 16

FireFogg (18.87 MB)

• decent settings
• fairly easy to use
• good quality at large size

Miro Video Converter (22.20 MB)

• largest size
• best quality
• easy to use
• can’t resize
• no settings for anything

QuickTime (17.37 MB)

• good quality large size
• same export as any other qt
• moderate amounts of video settings, no audio settings

VLC (21.94 MB)

• large size
• serious streaming issues
• small amount of settings

and for comparison

h264 (6.22 MB)