
Then it’s time to pick the output format. Starting at the top, I’ve already picked out my demo MKV file, you can either click to select or just drag the file onto the top portion of the window to select your file. That opens up a bit, rather sparsely populated window: Launch the program, then choose Convert/Stream from the File menu: There ya go, today’s trivia, right?Īnyway, download it onto your computer and here’s how easy it is to basically pluck the MP4 video file out of the MKV container in VLC: Its name actually comes from the Russian word for Nesting Dolls, matryoshka. MKV = Matroska Video and it’s an open source standard created by Russian programmers Lasse Kärkkäinen and Steve Lhomme. It’s a container that lets you embed other video and audio format files within. It’s a must-install just for those situations when the regular video player fails to read the file you have.īut MKV is a particularly interesting format because it’s not actually a format at all. Nice, but who wants to pay money when there’s a free alternative? You can grab a copy of VLC for your Mac from and I have it on every one of my systems. Turns out that there are a lot of commercial programs that promise you the ability to convert from just about any format to any other. But it turns out that VLC has some conversion capabilities hidden in its menu choices too! Fortunately there’s a terrific open source video player app called VLC that will let your Mac (or PC or Linux system) play just about any possible video format you can imagine, including MKV. You can try dragging and dropping videos into your Web browser too, but give how many formats are floating around on the ‘net, it’s a disappointingly small subset. It's important to take that into consideration, both as you're deciding what format you want to use for your videos and as you're evaluating what steps you need to take when converting your MKV videos.Your Mac system has a fairly narrow set of video file formats it can understand and play, mostly all through the QuickTime Player program. In short, these large files are the price you pay for high-quality video playback.

The codecs used for the content inside the MKV file take up a great deal of space. If you're trying to convert an MKV file, it probably hasn't taken you long to figure out that the format is very large – especially if you've attempted to perform that conversion online. While they offer an excellent viewing experience, they may be difficult to watch in some formats, including on mobile devices and Apple computers. MKV files are very large file formats, which can make them unwieldy. The MKV file type supports high-quality H.264 video.

It contains video and audio content in one easy file, which makes it easier for others to view. The MKV file format is a common multimedia file.
