Analyze videos

How video moderation works, supported formats, limits, and frame sampling settings.

How it works

Frames are sampled from the video at a configurable interval, then each frame is analyzed by all enabled image-based policies (NSFW, toxicity, etc.). If any sampled frame is flagged, the video is flagged. This means any policy that works on images also works on video with zero additional configuration.

const result = await moderationApi.content.submit({
  content: {
    type: "video",
    url: "https://example.com/video.mp4",
  },
});

Supported video formats

Format	Extensions
MP4	.mp4
QuickTime	.mov
M4V	.m4v
MPEG	.mpeg

Limits

Constraint	Value
Max file size	100 MB
Max duration	10 minutes
Processing timeout	10 minutes

Videos longer than 10 minutes are rejected with an error rather than partially analyzed. Split longer videos into segments of 10 minutes or less before submitting them.

Frame sampling

You can configure how frames are sampled per channel in the dashboard under Content > Video > Video sampling.

Setting	Default	Description
Capture interval	1 second (min 0.5)	Time between sampled frames.
Maximum frames	10	Caps the number of frames analyzed per video. Use this to control max spend.
Spread frames evenly	On	Distributes frames across the video duration instead of from the start.

Usage and billing

Each analyzed frame costs 3 units. Total usage for a video is the number of sampled frames × 3 — for example, a video sampled at 8 frames costs 24 units. Lower the Maximum frames setting to cap usage per video.