Video Frame Extractor: Scenes, Thumbnails | $1.50 per 1,000

Extract still frames from video files as JPEG, PNG or WebP images with timecodes: one every N seconds, a number evenly spaced, exact times, one per scene or every keyframe, plus a contact sheet. Paste MP4, MOV, WEBM, MKV or other video links; long files are read only around the frames asked for.

• Pay per frame (the price is on the Pricing tab): the platform usage of the run and the storage of the images are included, and a video that fails is not charged.
• No login, no cookies, no account on the video host: public video files only.
• Export to JSON, CSV, Excel, XML or HTML, or read the rows through the Apify API.
• Start it from the Console, on a schedule, through the API, or as a tool for agents over MCP.
• Tested every day on its example input, with the rows checked, and repaired when a check fails.

What you can use it for

• Thumbnails: a number of evenly spaced frames of each video as JPEG or WebP, sized for your site or app.
• Visual search and labelling: a frame every few seconds with its time, ready to tag, caption or index.
• Scene lists: the first frame of every scene with its timecode, for editing, trailers and storyboards.
• Contact sheets: one image per video with its frames side by side, to review footage at a glance.
• Quality checks: frames at exact times from a batch of videos, to spot black frames, bad cuts or broken encodes.

What you get

Every result is one row in the run's dataset. Download it as JSON, CSV, Excel or HTML, or read it through the Apify API. The main fields:

Field	Meaning
imageUrl	Frame
timecode	Time
frameNumber	No.
kind	Row
videoFile	Video
imageWidth	Width
imageHeight	Height
videoDurationSeconds	Video length (s)

Example row:

{
  "kind": "frame",
  "videoUrl": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Modern_Times_trailer_%281936%29.webm",
  "videoFile": "Modern_Times_trailer_(1936).webm",
  "frameNumber": 4,
  "requestedSeconds": 21.271,
  "timeSeconds": 21.271,
  "timecode": "00:00:21.271",
  "imageUrl": "https://api.apify.com/v2/key-value-stores/aBcDeFgHiJkLmNoPq/records/000004-Modern_Times_trailer_(1936)-0004-00h00m21s271.jpg?signature=1a2b3c4d5e",
  "imageFormat": "jpeg",
  "imageWidth": 472,
  "imageHeight": 360,
  "imageBytes": 23280,
  "keyframe": false,
  "sceneScore": null,
  "mode": "count",
  "videoDurationSeconds": 121.5,
  "videoWidth": 472,
  "videoHeight": 360,
  "videoFps": 23.976,
  "videoCodec": "vp8",
  "videoContainer": "matroska",
  "videoBytes": 10916363,
  "frames": 1,
  "error": null,
  "extractedAt": "2026-10-23T18:30:05Z"
}

How to use it

1. Open the Input tab (or call the actor through the API, see below).
2. Fill in Video links; the form opens with a working example.
3. Set Maximum results to cap the size and the cost of the run.
4. Click Start. Rows appear on the Output tab while the run works.
5. Download the dataset, or connect it to Google Sheets, Make, Zapier, n8n or a webhook.

Input

Field	Type	Required	Description
videoUrls	array	yes	Direct links to video files: MP4, MOV, M4V, WEBM, MKV, AVI, FLV, MPEG TS, OGV, WMV, MXF or animated GIF. Links to web pages (a YouTube or Vimeo page) are not files and are refused, and streaming playlists (M3U8, MPD) are not read.
mode	select	no	Every N seconds (Seconds between frames), a number of frames spread evenly over the video (Number of frames), the times you list (Times), the first frame of each scene, or every keyframe of the video. Allowed: interval, count, timestamps, scenes, keyframes. Default: "count".
intervalSeconds	integer	no	For One frame every N seconds: the first frame is at Start at second. Default: 10.
frameCount	integer	no	For evenly spaced frames: each frame sits in the middle of its equal part of the video, so the first and last are not the black start and end. Default: 10.
timestamps	array	no	For Frames at exact times: seconds or hours:minutes:seconds, such as 90, 1:30 or 00:01:30.5.
sceneSensitivity	select	no	For One frame per scene: how much the picture must change to count as a new scene. Allowed: low, medium, high. Default: "medium".
startSeconds	integer	no	Skip the part of each video before this second. Default: 0.
endSeconds	integer	no	Stop at this second of each video; 0 reads to the end. Default: 0.
maxFramesPerVideo	integer	no	Caps the frames of one video in every mode. Default: 100.
maxWidth	integer	no	Wider frames are scaled down to this width, keeping their shape; 0 keeps the size of the video. Default: 1280.
imageFormat	select	no	File type of the frame images. Allowed: jpeg, png, webp. Default: "jpeg".
imageQuality	integer	no	JPEG and WebP quality from 1 to 100; PNG is always lossless. Default: 85.
contactSheet	boolean	no	Add one image per video that shows its frames side by side with their times (up to 100 frames). It is not charged. Default: false.
maxItems	integer	no	The run stops after this many result rows. It also caps what one run can cost. Default: 500.
proxyConfiguration	object	no	Leave as is: the run starts on the cheapest network the site accepts and switches to Apify Proxy automatically when the site blocks it. Pick proxy groups here only to force one specific network.

Example input:

{
  "videoUrls": [
    "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Modern_Times_trailer_%281936%29.webm"
  ],
  "mode": "count",
  "frameCount": 20,
  "maxItems": 20
}

Pricing

You pay per frame image produced, at the price per frame on the Pricing tab. There is no fee per video or per minute scanned: scene and keyframe search are included. Contact sheets and rows of videos that fail cost nothing. Set Maximum frames per video and Maximum results to cap what a run can cost; the run also stops at your spending limit.

Limits and notes

• One row per frame: the image link (imageUrl), its time in seconds and as a timecode, its size, whether it is a keyframe, and the length, size, frame rate, codec and container of the video. With Contact sheet on, each video ends with one more row that holds the sheet.
• The images are files in the run's key-value store; imageUrl opens them directly and works in the dataset table, in spreadsheets and in your own code. They are kept as long as your Apify plan keeps the run's storage.
• Files up to 250 MB are downloaded once and read from disk. Bigger ones are read with range requests around each frame, so ten frames from a two hour film read a small part of the file. Scene and keyframe search read the whole file but decode only its keyframes.
• Scenes: the frame is the first keyframe of each new scene. Most web video has a keyframe at every cut; camera files and some screen recordings place keyframes every one or two seconds, so a scene can start up to that much earlier than its frame.
• Phone videos filmed upright come out upright: the rotation stored in the file is applied.
• Files are read only from addresses whose robots.txt allows it, and not from hosts that close their content to machine learning agents in robots.txt. Such a video comes back as a row with the reason, at no charge.
• Links to web pages are not video files: a direct file link is needed (a storage bucket, CDN or your own server). Streaming playlists (M3U8, MPD) are not read.
• Only publicly visible data is collected. No login, no paywalled content, no personal contact details.
• The actor reads only pages that the site's robots.txt leaves open to automated access.
• Sites change their pages from time to time. The actor is checked automatically and repaired when a check fails.
• Each run sends one short usage record to the developer: the Actor and run IDs, the number of results, whether the run succeeded (and if not, the kind of error, such as "blocked" or "input problem"), whether the account is on a paid Apify plan, how the run was started (for example from the Console, the API or a schedule) and a one-way fingerprint of the account (a hash, not the account ID), so that repeat runs of one account count once. It contains nothing from your input or results.

Run it through the API

Python, with the apify-client package:

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>")
run = client.actor("v0iddo/video-frame-extractor").call(run_input={"videoUrls": ["https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Modern_Times_trailer_%281936%29.webm"], "mode": "count", "frameCount": 20, "maxItems": 20})
for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

JavaScript, with the apify-client package:

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>' });
const run = await client.actor('v0iddo/video-frame-extractor').call({"videoUrls": ["https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Modern_Times_trailer_%281936%29.webm"], "mode": "count", "frameCount": 20, "maxItems": 20});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

One HTTP call that waits for the run and returns the rows (for runs that finish within 5 minutes):

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/v0iddo~video-frame-extractor/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=<YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"videoUrls": ["https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Modern_Times_trailer_%281936%29.webm"], "mode": "count", "frameCount": 20, "maxItems": 20}'

Use it from an agent (MCP)

Claude, Cursor, VS Code and other MCP clients can call this actor as a tool through the Apify MCP server. Add it to the client's MCP configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify": {
      "url": "https://mcp.apify.com?tools=v0iddo/video-frame-extractor",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer <YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Then ask, for example: "Give me one frame per scene from this video as JPEG images with their timecodes."

FAQ

Do I need an account on the video host, cookies or an API key?

No. The actor reads only what every visitor of the video host can see, without logging in. You only need an Apify account to start it.

How many results can one run return?

Up to 20,000 rows per run. Without a limit it stops at 500. Set Maximum results to the number you need; large jobs can also be split into several runs or scheduled.

How am I charged?

Per frame image, at the price on the Pricing tab for your Apify plan. The platform usage of the run is included in that price, with no extra fee per video or per minute of video read. A video that fails costs nothing, and contact sheets are not charged. When the run reaches your spending limit, it stops after the last frame you can pay for.

Why did my run return no results?

The status message of the run says why: nothing matched the input, the input was not a page the actor understands, the page is closed to automated access by robots.txt, or the site refused every network the actor tried. Check the input against the example above and run it again with a small limit.

Can I run it on a schedule?

Yes. Save your input as a task and add a schedule in the Apify Console (daily, hourly or with a cron expression). Each run gets its own dataset, so you keep a history.

Which formats can I export?

JSON, CSV, Excel, XML, HTML table and RSS from the Output tab or the API. Integrations send the rows to Google Sheets, Slack, Make, Zapier, n8n or a webhook.

Is collecting this data allowed?

The actor collects only what the video host publishes to every visitor, without a login, and it reads only pages that robots.txt leaves open. Public data can still be personal data under laws such as the GDPR, and sites have their own terms: make sure your use of the data follows the rules that apply to you.

What happens when the video host changes its pages?

Automated tests run the actor every day on the example input and check the rows, not only that the run finished. When a check fails, the actor is repaired and rebuilt; the build history on this page shows each update.

Something is missing or wrong. Where do I report it?

Open an issue on the Issues tab of this actor with the run link. Requests for a new field are welcome too.

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