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Best Solutions to QuickTime Not Playing MP4 Files

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Even an omnipotent media player will have to be yield to video format incompatibility, and the veteran QuickTime is no exception. Although QuickTime natively supports MP4 format, not all MP4 movie files can be played well on QuickTime. "the movie could not be opened" error would occur. If you are a QuickTime user and failed to open MP4 files here, we'll provide you some solutions to get QuickTime open and play MP4 without hassle.

Why QuickTime can't play/recognize MP4? That's because QuickTime only plays MP4 files compressed with the codec of MPEG-4 and H.264. If you try to open a MP4 video with incompatible codec with QuickTime player, the program will reject it. In order to solve MP4 won't play in QuickTime issue, directly converting MP4 videos into MOV or other files formats that QuickTime can handle is one of the most convenient way to avoid QuickTime not playing MP4 problem.

QuickTime Supported File Format

Media Type File Formats Codecs
Video

QuickTime Movie (.mov), MPEG-4(.mp4, .m4v), MPEG-2 (OS X Lion or later), MPEG-1, 3GPP, 3GPP2, AVCHD (OS X Mountain Lion or later), AVI (Motion JPEG only), DV

MPEG-2 (OS X Lion or later), MPEG-4 (Part 2), H.264, H.263, H.261
Audio iTunes Audio (.m4a, .m4b, .m4p), MP3, Core Audio (.caf), AIFF, AU, SD2, WAV, SND, AMR AAC (MPEG-4 Audio), HE-AAC, Apple Lossless, MP3

How to Convert MP4 to QuickTime

To achieve the goal, Brorsoft Video Converter for Mac is the best choice. It is the great assistant to help you convert any QuickTime unsupported videos like certain MP4, MKV, WMV, 3GP, MTS, MXF, FLV, AVI, etc to MOV that QuickTime can play.

You just load the QuickTime unreadable MP4 video on this QuickTime video converter for Mac OS, choose the MOV format from "Common Video" and then click Convert button to start the MP4 video to QuickTime MOV conversion. Just three steps, you can finish the video conversion and therefore playback any video in QuickTime with best supported video formats. What's more, you can also DIY your converted video file like crop, trim, add watermark or add subtitle to better suit your QuickTime player with this all-round video converter program. If you are on Windows, Brorsoft Video Converter is right for you.

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MORE: Some other solutions to playing MP4 on QuickTime

1. QuickTime Player Upgrade for MP4 Codec

If you find your QuickTime fails to open MP4 files, check immediately whether you have the latest version of QuickTime player for MP4 playback. For the most part, QuickTime 7 and above can handle MP4 files well and even other formats beyond. So, make sure if you've got the QuickTime upgraded in time.

2. Download QuickTime MP4 Codec Pack

If you still cannot play MP4 videos on QuickTime, chances are that the MP4 video/audio codec is not supported by QuickTime built-in codec pack. You can go to Softonic or CENT to get QuickTime MP4 codec pack downloaded as a supplementary. Be aware, we do not fully recommend this approach since it might bring along adware/malware and is not 100% safe for your computer.

3. MP4 QuickTime Player Alternative

With a versatile video player installed in your Mac, you can play any video without format limitation concerns on Mac. The most famous are VLC and MPlayer OSX. Both of them are excellent and free multimedia players for Mac users. Apart from MP4, they can deal with many of the video formats unknown to QuickTime.

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