3 Ways to Combine Videos on iPhone: A Simple Guide for Beginners

Suppose you’ve ever recorded multiple clips for a project, event, or just a fun memory on iPhone. In that case, you might find yourself wondering how to combine those videos into one cohesive piece. Merging videos on an iPhone can be an essential task for those looking to create professional-looking content quickly. Whether you're working on a school project, preparing a birthday surprise, or sharing a travel diary, combining videos on your iPhone is both simple and efficient. In this article, we will share 3 easy methods, some free, others using paid apps to get the best results from each.

GUIDE LIST

Part 1: Why Combine Vides on iPhone

Part 2: 3 Ways to Combine Videos on iPhone

Part 3: FAQs

Part 1: Why Combine Videos on iPhone

Combining videos on your iPhone is useful for a range of reasons. You may want to create a single, streamlined video for social media, compile different clips of a vacation, or even merge several parts of a longer video into one. Here are some reasons why combining videos on iPhone is a great idea:

1. Easier sharing: Having a single video file is far easier to upload, share, or send to friends than dealing with multiple clips.

2. Professional-looking content: Merging videos ensures a smoother, more polished end product that will look more professional.

3. Creative projects: It helps when you're piecing together a vlog, documentary, or project for school or work.

4. Time-saving: Instead of editing multiple clips, you can combine them into one, speeding up the editing process.

Now, let’s dive into how you can combine videos on your iPhone!

Part 2: 3 Ways to Combine Videos on iPhone

There are multiple ways to combine videos on your iPhone. I’ve tried a few different tools myself and will share my experiences with each one.

iMovie

If you have an iPhone, you already have iMovie. It's Apple’s free, fantastic, and surprisingly powerful video editor. It’s designed to be intuitive, meaning you don't need an editing degree to make great stuff. iMovie is perfect for quickly joining clips, adding basic titles, and dropping in some free background music. It handles large files surprisingly well for a mobile app and integrates seamlessly with your Photos library, which saves so much time compared to importing files from scratch. Plus, the famous iMovie transitions are a super easy way to make the switch between clips look smooth and deliberate, not choppy. Seriously, it's the first place I recommend to anyone starting out.

This is an optional step: Drag the ends of clips to trim the video, tap between clips to add a transition, or add text overlays.

I personally love iMovie because it’s free and always there. It’s the fastest option for a simple merge, and I can join three clips and save the video in about 90 seconds flat. The biggest limitation, though, is its simplicity. If you want advanced features, and like multi-track editing, fine-tuning your video’s aspect ratio for different platforms, or even something critical like green screen effects, and iMovie hits a wall. For example, if you want to cleanly use an Adobe Express background remover or Adobe background remover on a clip before merging, iMovie won't help you with the final touch-up on that front. It’s a 10/10 for joining, but maybe a 6/10 for advanced polish.

ArkThinker Video Converter Ultimate

Sometimes, you need to go nuclear. If you’re dealing with different video formats, really large files, or you just want a desktop editing experience that gives you more control before sending the final video back to your iPhone, a tool like ArkThinker Video Converter Ultimate is the answer. While it’s not an on iPhone app, using a desktop tool for pre-production gives you a massive quality leap. These programs often come with built-in format conversion and compression tools, which is huge if your iPhone clips are enormous 4K files and you need to optimize them for the web while merging. Besides, its built-in editor feature lets you split the video and rearrange them to keep the parts you want.

Drag and drop all your clips into the program interface.

Tip: While you merge the videos, the background music may be not suitable for the merged video file. For that, you can also merge MP3 files to set as the new background audio file.

After the process is done, just AirDrop the final merged video back to your iPhone.

My experience with desktop tools like this is that they offer ultimate control. They are fantastic for dealing with weird codecs. The power is its best feature. The obvious limitation? It’s a desktop application, not an iPhone one, so it completely breaks the on-the-go workflow. You have to transfer files back and forth, which can be time-consuming. You pay for the power with a lot of extra steps.

Photos

Ready for the sneakiest, fastest trick? You can technically merge iPhone videos using the Photos app's native feature, but with a major catch. This method is a little complicated, and you need to read it carefully, so that you can catch each step.

Then tap the Share button to select Add to Album. Then give your new album a new name.

After that, find the video file you just saved by opening the File app. You now have a single file containing all the videos, but they are stitched together with no transitions and the native duration of the original clips.

My experience with this built-in Photos app is that it really works. The result is incredibly jarring. There are no transitions, and it just slams the end of Clip 1 straight into the start of Clip 2. It also uses the entire length of the original clips, and you have zero control over the connection point. It feels cheap and unprofessional.

Part 3: FAQs

Conclusion