How to turn a screen recording into a vertical 9:16 video

Screens are wide and phones are tall. If you drop a 16:9 screen recording into a 9:16 video, you get a thin strip in the middle and a lot of empty space, and nobody can read the text. The better approach is to fill the vertical frame and move it to wherever the action is. This guide explains how, and how Lensprout does it for you.

Why letterboxing fails

A 1920×1080 recording squeezed into a 1080×1920 frame shrinks to 56% of its size and fills less than a third of the frame. Small UI text becomes unreadable on a phone. Viewers scroll past.

Filling the frame means cropping: you show a tall slice of the screen at full size. The problem is choosing which slice, moment by moment. Doing that by hand means keyframing a crop for every click.

The idea: let the cursor steer

During a demo, the interesting part is almost always near the pointer. So a vertical crop that follows the pointer shows what matters most of the time. Add automatic zooms on clicks and typing, and the result reads well on a phone.

Doing it in Lensprout

1. Record as usual. Use the normal screen or window recording; you don’t need to record vertically. See how to record with automatic zoom.
2. Choose a vertical aspect. In the editor’s Style panel, set the aspect to 9:16.
3. Choose “Fill and follow”. Instead of fitting the whole recording inside the frame, Lensprout fills it and pans the view to keep the cursor in sight, even between zooms.
4. Check the zooms. Automatic zooms still apply. Their depth and the cursor offset control how tight each moment feels.
5. Export. Export an MP4 (or a GIF) as usual. The output is a true vertical video.

In fill mode there is no padding or device frame, since the recording covers the whole frame.

Tips for vertical screen videos

• Record a narrower window. A browser window about 1200 px wide gives the vertical crop less to chase.
• Increase the page zoom. Bigger text survives the crop.
• Keep actions in one area. Jumping from the far left to the far right makes the frame pan a lot.
• Use the webcam sparingly. In a tall frame, a stacked layout (camera above or below the screen) can work better than a bubble covering the UI.
• Watch it on a phone before you post.

Where vertical videos work well

• product updates on Shorts, Reels and TikTok;
• quick how-to clips in a help center;
• social posts that show one feature in under 30 seconds.

For a looping preview instead of a video, see how to make a GIF of your screen.