You can use the VLC media player to split videos into short clips. Unlike other video editors, VLC player doesn’t allow you to select the starting and ending frames, then cut a video clip at the selected moment, VLC player uses its Record tool to split video clips and create cuts.
Trim video with VLC player on PC
Launch VLC media player on your computer. It works with Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Unix, iOS, Android and more OS. Here we will use its Windows version to demonstrate how it cuts videos on PC in this demo.
Click Media from the top menu bar, choose Open File … from the drop-down menu, browse to the folder where the video you like to edit is saved and open it in the media program.
The video will be played automatically. Click the Pause button at the bottom left corner to pause the playback.
The recording options that we need to use to trim videos are hidden by default. We can go to reveal these options from View > Advanced Controls. See below screenshot.
Now you should find the recording buttons above those normal player control buttons.
Play the video or drag the playhead to the starting point from where you want to trim. Hit the Play button to play the video and hit the Record button (the round red button above the Play button). When you reach the ending frame, click the Record button again.
Now open Windows File Explorer to find those trimmed video clips. They will be saved in your “My Videos” folder in Windows. Browse to C:\Users\yourname\Videos, look for file names starting with vlc-record-year-month-day-time…, they are the shortened video clips created with VLC player.