iMovie: How to export your projects on your Mac and online

When it comes to creating amazing film projects, iMovie has you covered. You can put together a full film, complete with transitions, titles, credits and music in a matter of minutes that will look absolutely fantastic. But once you’ve finished your film, then what do you do? Apple has included several quick and easy sharing options in iMovie that enable you to finish and export your creation as simply as the production process. Whether you want to send your finished film to an online video site like YouTube or Vimeo, or if you’d rather just export it into iTunes or QuickTime, these options are all available. There are plenty of quality parameters to play with as well, allowing you to choose from smaller sizes for a faster export, or the full 1080p HD experience that might take a little longer to render but offers top results. We’ll take you through all the settings in this tutorial so you can efficiently export your videos and present them to best effect.

Step 1: Media Browser

If you’ve already finalised your project, your video will be added to the Media Browser automatically. If not, you can add it through the Share menu.

Step 2: Size it up

When exporting to a location with a range of size options, you can hover over the information sign at the end of each row for more details about each.

Step 3: YouTube details

When uploading your videos to online services like YouTube you’ll need to add details into this dialog such as a category and search tags, separated by commas.

Step 4: Size matters

Choose a size that fits your specifications – 720p will work perfectly on both iOS and other devices, but if you want the highest-quality setting, go with 1080p.

Step 5: Standard export

You can export your movie as a file on your Mac too. This will enable you to share it with others via CDs or memory sticks, rather than publishing it online.

Step 6: Removals

If you want to remove the video you’ve created at any point, the Share menu has this option at the bottom of the list. All the controls you need sit in one place.

(Click on the image below to zoom in and view the annotations)