Filter Videos by Duration, Date, and Orientation

If your photo library has hundreds or thousands of videos, scrolling through all of them to find the right clips is slow and frustrating. Bitcut's media picker includes a set of filters that let you narrow down the list before you start selecting. Combine multiple filters to quickly isolate exactly the footage you need.

Opening the Filter Panel

When the media picker is open, tap the filter icon at the top of the screen. The filter panel appears with all available options. Active filters are indicated with a badge so you can see at a glance what is currently applied.

Filter by Duration

Quickly separate short clips from long recordings:

  • Short — under 1 minute. Useful for finding quick takes, B-roll clips, and transition shots.
  • Medium — between 1 and 10 minutes. Covers most interview segments, tutorials, and scene recordings.
  • Long — over 10 minutes. Full-length recordings, live sessions, or unedited event footage.

Select one or more duration categories. Only videos matching the selected durations appear in the list.

Filter by Date Range

Restrict the list to videos recorded within a specific time period. Tap the date filter to set a start and end date. This is especially helpful when you know roughly when the footage was shot — for example, all videos from a weekend trip or a specific event.

Tip: Combine date range with duration to zero in on footage fast. For example, filter to "last week" plus "medium" to find the interview clips you recorded on Tuesday without scrolling through months of other videos.

Filter by Orientation

Show only videos with a specific aspect ratio:

  • Horizontal — landscape (16:9 and similar). Standard for YouTube, presentations, and traditional video.
  • Vertical — portrait (9:16 and similar). Native format for Shorts, Reels, and TikTok.
  • Square — 1:1 aspect ratio. Common for Instagram posts and some social media formats.

This filter is particularly useful when you are building a project for a specific platform and want to start with footage that already matches the target orientation.

Favorites Only

Toggle the favorites filter to show only videos you have marked as favorites in your Photos app. If you pre-select your best clips using the heart icon in Photos before opening Bitcut, this filter gives you instant access to just those picks.

Show or Hide Retakes

When retake detection identifies duplicate recordings, you can choose whether to display them in the picker or hide them. Hiding retakes declutters the list so you see only unique clips. If you want to review all takes yourself, keep them visible.

Drone Footage

Enable the drone filter to show only aerial footage. Bitcut reads the video file metadata to identify clips recorded by a drone. This is useful when you want to pull in establishing shots or flyover sequences without scrolling past handheld clips.

Metadata required: Drone detection relies on metadata embedded by the drone or its companion app. If the metadata has been stripped (for example, by re-encoding or transferring through certain services), the clip may not be identified as drone footage.

Sort Order

Control how the filtered results are ordered:

  • Newest first — most recently recorded videos at the top. The default, and the best choice when you are working with fresh footage.
  • Oldest first — earliest recordings at the top. Helpful when building a chronological project from archive footage.
  • Duration (longest first) — sorts by clip length, longest at the top. Useful when searching for your main recording among many short clips.
  • Duration (shortest first) — sorts by clip length, shortest at the top. Good for finding B-roll and quick transition shots.

Combining Multiple Filters

All filters work together. Enable any combination and the list updates instantly to show only the videos that match every active filter. For example, you could filter to vertical videos, recorded this month, under 1 minute, from a drone — and see only the clips that meet all four criteria.

Tip: Tap the reset button in the filter panel to clear all filters at once and return to the full, unfiltered library view.

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