Live Camera
Last updated: August 2026
What you are extracting
On Android, a moving photo is a Motion Photo: an ordinary JPEG with an MP4 glued onto the end of it and a note near the front saying where that video starts. Converting to video is therefore not really conversion at all — it is pulling out a file that was already there, at its original quality.
That is why this is quick and lossless, while turning the same clip into a GIF genuinely re-encodes it.
From Google Photos
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Open the Motion Photo
Any photo that plays when you press and hold it.
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Open the three-dot menu
Google Photos offers to export the motion part — saving it either as a video or as a plain still.
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Choose video
An MP4 lands in your gallery next to your other videos. The original photo is untouched.
From Samsung Gallery
Open the picture, tap View motion photo, and use the menu offered while the clip is showing. Samsung's wording has changed across One UI versions, but the option is consistently near the motion-photo playback controls rather than in the main photo menu.
From an iPhone Live Photo
If the photo came from an iPhone, do the conversion on the iPhone — Photos app, three dots, Save as Video — and send the video across. Trying to do it after the fact on Android almost never works, because the video half usually never made the trip.
Video or GIF?
Both get the movement out. They fail in opposite directions.
| Video (MP4) | GIF | |
|---|---|---|
| Sound | Kept | Gone — GIFs have no audio |
| Colour | Full range | 256 per frame, so gradients band |
| File size | Small | Often larger than the video |
| Loops by itself | Depends on the player | Always |
| Where it lands | In videos | In photos |
| Works in a chat window | As an attachment | Inline, animating |
Rule of thumb: video when quality matters — archiving, editing, anything with sound worth keeping. GIF when it needs to move where it lands — chats, forums, comment boxes.
What not to bother with
Online converters
They ask you to upload a personal photo to a stranger's server, wait, download the result, and frequently stamp a watermark on it. For a file already sitting on your phone with the video already inside it, there is no reason.
Screen recording the playback
It works, technically, and it gives you a lower-quality copy with your phone's interface around the edges. Only worth it if every other route has failed.
Common questions
How long is the exported video?
Whatever the clip was — usually between one and three seconds, depending on the camera app that took it.
Will it have sound?
Only if the camera recorded sound in the first place. Some camera apps capture the clip silently by default.
Can I export several at once?
Google Photos handles them one at a time. For a batch, it is faster to copy the photos to a computer and extract the MP4 portions there, though that is a job for someone comfortable with a command line.