Posted by Farrah Penn -
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VLC Zoom Not Working - Can't Move Interactive Zoom
VLC Media Player still can't move zoom box? Jump to try the solution [test successfully]
Effective solution to solve you can't move interactive zoom in VLC
VLC media player (for Windows) offers a great function "Interactive Zoom" to allow us to zoom videos. But it's not always working properly. By chance, I encounter an issue that I can't change the zoom level and area to zoom into with VLC. Then, I find there're many people have the same problem with me, for example:
"i took a couple of videos on my phone Huawei LUA-L21 Y3 II and im trying to use the zoom function but i cant move the box itself …is it because of the file format or something? the resolution?" – from VideoLAN Forums
As the VLC's developer explains that the VLC zoom can't move issue is an "old bug which appears with interactive zoom on videos with orientations ticket 16792" and it's still unsolved.
Then here comes the point. My colleague, Jordi and I started to analyze and study the issue. We've found two main situations for the interactive zoom problem, and discovered the possible solutions that worked.
Situation 1: VLC Can't Move Zoom Box with Portrait Video
In many cases, the VLC interactive zoom fails when VLC opens your vertical or portrait video from phone, such as the sample "NoZoom?.mp4" file from that bug ticket.
Situation 2: VLC Zoom is Not Working with Landscape Video
In very few cases, you may encounter that VLC zoom box is stuck with landscape iPhone videos or video files that you receive from others (in our case).
VLC Can't Move Zoom Box Issue Is Still Unsolved?
Try the Automatic Fix: Rotate Your Video with Specific Tool The Only Easy and Effective Solution
For the two situations in the above, the solution is the same. Here I'll take a portrait video as example.
Preparation:
1. Update VLC to the latest version.
System: Windows 10, 64-bit
VLC version: 3.0.6
2. Since the Interactive Zoom issue cannot be solved by VLC itself so far, you have to rely on other video processing tool to rotate videos to fix the problem. We tested on the "NoZoom?.mp4" file and a few vertical/horizontal videos with phone. Finally, we've found a way to fix the issue with VideoProc. So we recommend you to download the easiest and most effective software below to rotate your videos.
VideoProc - One-Click Way to Rotate and Zoom Videos.
- Accept nearly all types of videos, incl. videos of mobile Phone, DSLR camera, etc
- Ready-made toolkit to rotate, mirror, enlarge, crop, cut, merge, stabilize videos.
- Download, record, transcode and process videos at one go...
Download VideoProc on Windows 
to Rotate Videos
Download VideoProc on Mac to Rotate Videos
You may follow this video guide to fix VLC Interactive Zoom not working problem:
Here's the step-by-step guide to solve VLC zoom can't move issue:
Step 1. Add your video
Open VideoProc and click into Video module. Drag your portrait video into VideoProc to add file.
Step 2. Rotate video by 90 degrees
Click "Rotate" icon. Tap "Rotate Right" button to rotate the video from vertical to horizontal. Then click "Done" to save it. Choose an export format and tap "RUN" to process the video.
Tip: Normally, the video format for mobile phones is MP4 format. So you just select "MP4" as export format. But if your video is in other formats, like MOV, you may either transcode it to MP4 or find MOV in the profiler.
Step 3. Rotate the new video
So you've converted your portrait video to landscape. Clear your original file from VideoProc, add your new landscape file from step 2, and rotate it to left by 90 degrees to bring it back to normal. Export the video.
Step 4. Magic time!
Open VLC, go to "Tools" > "Adjustments and Filters" > "Video Effects" and enable "Interactive Zoom". The move box is not stuck and works normally.
Advanced Trick: Zoom Video with VideoProc
Reason: In step 2, you'll also find that VLC Interactive Zoom function works when you play the output landscape video. But we know many of you don't want the landscape mode. That's why we introduce the advanced trick to solve the issue. The VLC bug still exists, we just figured out a solution to help you use interactive zoom function in portrait mode properly.
Step 1. Open VideoProc and click into Video. Drag and drop your video file to the program.
Step 2. Click "Crop" icon. Tap "Enable Crop" button, adjust the "Preset" as "Keep Current". Then select the area and scale you want to zoom by mouse. Tap "Done".
Step 3. Choose an output format, tap "RUN" to process the zoom task and save the file.
Final Words:
Hope that the solution we provide can help you solve your VLC zoom not working problems. Take a try and tell us how it works! There may be different situations for the interactive zoom problem. You may also drop you issue to the VLC forum. For more VLC editing tips like cropping, cutting or adding text, please turn to How to use VLC hidden video editing features >
