---
title: "Video processing with FFmpeg"
sidebarTitle: "FFmpeg video processing"
description: "These examples show you how to process videos in various ways using FFmpeg with Trigger.dev."
---

import LocalDevelopment from "/snippets/local-development-extensions.mdx";

## Prerequisites

- A project with [Trigger.dev initialized](/quick-start)
- [FFmpeg](https://www.ffmpeg.org/download.html) installed on your machine

### Adding the FFmpeg build extension

To use these example tasks, you'll first need to add our FFmpeg extension to your project configuration like this:

```ts trigger.config.ts
import { ffmpeg } from "@trigger.dev/build/extensions/core";
import { defineConfig } from "@trigger.dev/sdk";

export default defineConfig({
  project: "<project ref>",
  // Your other config settings...
  build: {
    extensions: [ffmpeg()],
  },
});
```

<Note>
  [Build extensions](/config/extensions/overview) allow you to hook into the build system and
  customize the build process or the resulting bundle and container image (in the case of
  deploying). You can use pre-built extensions or create your own.
</Note>

You'll also need to add `@trigger.dev/build` to your `package.json` file under `devDependencies` if you don't already have it there.

If you are modifying this example and using popular FFmpeg libraries like `fluent-ffmpeg` you'll also need to add them to [`external`](/config/config-file#external) in your `trigger.config.ts` file.

## Compress a video using FFmpeg

This task demonstrates how to use FFmpeg to compress a video, reducing its file size while maintaining reasonable quality, and upload the compressed video to R2 storage.

### Key Features

- Fetches a video from a given URL
- Compresses the video using FFmpeg with various compression settings
- Uploads the compressed video to R2 storage

### Task code

```ts trigger/ffmpeg-compress-video.ts
import { PutObjectCommand, S3Client } from "@aws-sdk/client-s3";
import { logger, task } from "@trigger.dev/sdk";
import ffmpeg from "fluent-ffmpeg";
import fs from "fs/promises";
import fetch from "node-fetch";
import { Readable } from "node:stream";
import os from "os";
import path from "path";

// Initialize S3 client
const s3Client = new S3Client({
  // How to authenticate to R2: https://developers.cloudflare.com/r2/api/s3/tokens/
  region: "auto",
  endpoint: process.env.R2_ENDPOINT,
  credentials: {
    accessKeyId: process.env.R2_ACCESS_KEY_ID ?? "",
    secretAccessKey: process.env.R2_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY ?? "",
  },
});

export const ffmpegCompressVideo = task({
  id: "ffmpeg-compress-video",
  run: async (payload: { videoUrl: string }) => {
    const { videoUrl } = payload;

    // Generate temporary file names
    const tempDirectory = os.tmpdir();
    const outputPath = path.join(tempDirectory, `output_${Date.now()}.mp4`);

    // Fetch the video
    const response = await fetch(videoUrl);

    // Compress the video
    await new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
      if (!response.body) {
        return reject(new Error("Failed to fetch video"));
      }

      ffmpeg(Readable.from(response.body))
        .outputOptions([
          "-c:v libx264", // Use H.264 codec
          "-crf 28", // Higher CRF for more compression (28 is near the upper limit for acceptable quality)
          "-preset veryslow", // Slowest preset for best compression
          "-vf scale=iw/2:ih/2", // Reduce resolution to 320p width (height auto-calculated)
          "-c:a aac", // Use AAC for audio
          "-b:a 64k", // Reduce audio bitrate to 64k
          "-ac 1", // Convert to mono audio
        ])
        .output(outputPath)
        .on("end", resolve)
        .on("error", reject)
        .run();
    });

    // Read the compressed video
    const compressedVideo = await fs.readFile(outputPath);
    const compressedSize = compressedVideo.length;

    // Log compression results
    logger.log(`Compressed video size: ${compressedSize} bytes`);
    logger.log(`Temporary compressed video file created`, { outputPath });

    // Create the r2Key for the extracted audio, using the base name of the output path
    const r2Key = `processed-videos/${path.basename(outputPath)}`;

    const uploadParams = {
      Bucket: process.env.R2_BUCKET,
      Key: r2Key,
      Body: compressedVideo,
    };

    // Upload the video to R2 and get the URL
    await s3Client.send(new PutObjectCommand(uploadParams));
    logger.log(`Compressed video saved to your r2 bucket`, { r2Key });

    // Delete the temporary compressed video file
    await fs.unlink(outputPath);
    logger.log(`Temporary compressed video file deleted`, { outputPath });

    // Return the compressed video buffer and r2 key
    return {
      Bucket: process.env.R2_BUCKET,
      r2Key,
    };
  },
});
```

### Testing your task

To test this task, use this payload structure:

```json
{
  "videoUrl": "<video-url>" // Replace <a-video-url> with the URL of the video you want to upload
}
```

## Extract audio from a video using FFmpeg

This task demonstrates how to use FFmpeg to extract audio from a video, convert it to WAV format, and upload it to R2 storage.

### Key Features

- Fetches a video from a given URL
- Extracts the audio from the video using FFmpeg
- Converts the extracted audio to WAV format
- Uploads the extracted audio to R2 storage

### Task code

```ts trigger/ffmpeg-extract-audio.ts
import { PutObjectCommand, S3Client } from "@aws-sdk/client-s3";
import { logger, task } from "@trigger.dev/sdk";
import ffmpeg from "fluent-ffmpeg";
import fs from "fs/promises";
import fetch from "node-fetch";
import { Readable } from "node:stream";
import os from "os";
import path from "path";

// Initialize S3 client
const s3Client = new S3Client({
  // How to authenticate to R2: https://developers.cloudflare.com/r2/api/s3/tokens/
  region: "auto",
  endpoint: process.env.R2_ENDPOINT,
  credentials: {
    accessKeyId: process.env.R2_ACCESS_KEY_ID ?? "",
    secretAccessKey: process.env.R2_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY ?? "",
  },
});

export const ffmpegExtractAudio = task({
  id: "ffmpeg-extract-audio",
  run: async (payload: { videoUrl: string }) => {
    const { videoUrl } = payload;

    // Generate temporary file names
    const tempDirectory = os.tmpdir();
    const outputPath = path.join(tempDirectory, `audio_${Date.now()}.wav`);

    // Fetch the video
    const response = await fetch(videoUrl);

    // Extract the audio
    await new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
      if (!response.body) {
        return reject(new Error("Failed to fetch video"));
      }

      ffmpeg(Readable.from(response.body))
        .outputOptions([
          "-vn", // Disable video output
          "-acodec pcm_s16le", // Use PCM 16-bit little-endian encoding
          "-ar 44100", // Set audio sample rate to 44.1 kHz
          "-ac 2", // Set audio channels to stereo
        ])
        .output(outputPath)
        .on("end", resolve)
        .on("error", reject)
        .run();
    });

    // Read the extracted audio
    const audioBuffer = await fs.readFile(outputPath);
    const audioSize = audioBuffer.length;

    // Log audio extraction results
    logger.log(`Extracted audio size: ${audioSize} bytes`);
    logger.log(`Temporary audio file created`, { outputPath });

    // Create the r2Key for the extracted audio, using the base name of the output path
    const r2Key = `extracted-audio/${path.basename(outputPath)}`;

    const uploadParams = {
      Bucket: process.env.R2_BUCKET,
      Key: r2Key,
      Body: audioBuffer,
    };

    // Upload the audio to R2 and get the URL
    await s3Client.send(new PutObjectCommand(uploadParams));
    logger.log(`Extracted audio saved to your R2 bucket`, { r2Key });

    // Delete the temporary audio file
    await fs.unlink(outputPath);
    logger.log(`Temporary audio file deleted`, { outputPath });

    // Return the audio file path, size, and R2 URL
    return {
      Bucket: process.env.R2_BUCKET,
      r2Key,
    };
  },
});
```

### Testing your task

To test this task, use this payload structure:

<Warning>
  Make sure to provide a video URL that contains audio. If the video does not have audio, the task
  will fail.
</Warning>

```json
{
  "videoUrl": "<video-url>" // Replace <a-video-url> with the URL of the video you want to upload
}
```

## Generate a thumbnail from a video using FFmpeg

This task demonstrates how to use FFmpeg to generate a thumbnail from a video at a specific time and upload the generated thumbnail to R2 storage.

### Key Features

- Fetches a video from a given URL
- Generates a thumbnail from the video at the 5-second mark
- Uploads the generated thumbnail to R2 storage

### Task code

```ts trigger/ffmpeg-generate-thumbnail.ts
import { PutObjectCommand, S3Client } from "@aws-sdk/client-s3";
import { logger, task } from "@trigger.dev/sdk";
import ffmpeg from "fluent-ffmpeg";
import fs from "fs/promises";
import fetch from "node-fetch";
import { Readable } from "node:stream";
import os from "os";
import path from "path";

// Initialize S3 client
const s3Client = new S3Client({
  // How to authenticate to R2: https://developers.cloudflare.com/r2/api/s3/tokens/
  region: "auto",
  endpoint: process.env.R2_ENDPOINT,
  credentials: {
    accessKeyId: process.env.R2_ACCESS_KEY_ID ?? "",
    secretAccessKey: process.env.R2_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY ?? "",
  },
});

export const ffmpegGenerateThumbnail = task({
  id: "ffmpeg-generate-thumbnail",
  run: async (payload: { videoUrl: string }) => {
    const { videoUrl } = payload;

    // Generate output file name
    const tempDirectory = os.tmpdir();
    const outputPath = path.join(tempDirectory, `thumbnail_${Date.now()}.jpg`);

    // Fetch the video
    const response = await fetch(videoUrl);

    // Generate the thumbnail
    await new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
      if (!response.body) {
        return reject(new Error("Failed to fetch video"));
      }
      ffmpeg(Readable.from(response.body))
        .screenshots({
          count: 1,
          folder: "/tmp",
          filename: path.basename(outputPath),
          size: "320x240",
          timemarks: ["5"], // 5 seconds
        })
        .on("end", resolve)
        .on("error", reject);
    });

    // Read the generated thumbnail
    const thumbnail = await fs.readFile(outputPath);

    // Create the r2Key for the extracted audio, using the base name of the output path
    const r2Key = `thumbnails/${path.basename(outputPath)}`;

    const uploadParams = {
      Bucket: process.env.R2_BUCKET,
      Key: r2Key,
      Body: thumbnail,
    };

    // Upload the thumbnail to R2 and get the URL
    await s3Client.send(new PutObjectCommand(uploadParams));
    const r2Url = `https://${process.env.R2_ACCOUNT_ID}.r2.cloudflarestorage.com/${process.env.R2_BUCKET}/${r2Key}`;
    logger.log("Thumbnail uploaded to R2", { url: r2Url });

    // Delete the temporary file
    await fs.unlink(outputPath);

    // Log thumbnail generation results
    logger.log(`Thumbnail uploaded to S3: ${r2Url}`);

    // Return the thumbnail buffer, path, and R2 URL
    return {
      thumbnailBuffer: thumbnail,
      thumbnailPath: outputPath,
      r2Url,
    };
  },
});
```

### Testing your task

To test this task in the dashboard, you can use the following payload:

```json
{
  "videoUrl": "<video-url>" // Replace <a-video-url> with the URL of the video you want to upload
}
```

<LocalDevelopment packages={"ffmpeg"} />