The xfade and xfade_opencl filters can create transitions between two inputs with various wipes, slides, crossfades, and other effects.

Offset Parameter

If it is not obvious by logical reasoning, the offset parameter should be set to value such as full duration of transition is possible between two videos, thus offset parameter into first video stream should not be greater than duration of first video minus duration of transition itself and also duration of second video should be at least long as transition duration itself.

Examples

MP4 output

Fade between two images. Each image has a duration of 5 seconds. The fade duration is set to 1 second with the duration option, and it occurs at 4 seconds using the offset option.

ffmpeg -loop 1 -t 5 -i 1.png -loop 1 -t 5 -i 2.png -filter_complex "[0][1]xfade=transition=fade:duration=1:offset=4,format=yuv420p" output.mp4

GIF output

Using the split, palettegen, and paletteuse filters:

ffmpeg -loop 1 -t 5 -i 1.png -loop 1 -t 5 -i 2.png -filter_complex "[0][1]xfade=transition=fade:duration=1:offset=4,split[s0][s1];[s0]palettegen[p];[s1][p]paletteuse" -loop 0 output.gif

Gallery

Below is gallery of the available effects. fade is the default transition. Names in bold are also available in xfade_opencl.

fade (default)	fadeblack	fadewhite	distance
wipeleft	wiperight	wipeup	wipedown
slideleft	slideright	slideup	slidedown
smoothleft	smoothright	smoothup	smoothdown
rectcrop	circlecrop	circleclose	circleopen
horzclose	horzopen	vertclose	vertopen
diagbl	diagbr	diagtl	diagtr
hlslice	hrslice	vuslice	vdslice
dissolve	pixelize	radial	hblur
wipetl	wipetr	wipebl	wipebr
fadegrays	squeezev	squeezeh	zoomin

Command used to make each gallery image; as reference for future gallery additions:

ffmpeg -f lavfi -i "color=c=blue:s=180x136:r=15:d=2,format=rgb24,drawtext=text='fadeblack':x=(w-text_w)/2:y=(h-text_h)/2:box=1:boxborderw=4:boxcolor=white:fontfile=/usr/share/fonts/TTF/VeraMono.ttf:fontsize=20" -f lavfi -i "color=c=aqua:s=180x136:r=15:d=2,format=rgb24,drawtext=text='fadeblack':x=(w-text_w)/2:y=(h-text_h)/2:box=1:boxborderw=4:boxcolor=white:fontfile=/usr/share/fonts/TTF/VeraMono.ttf:fontsize=20" -filter_complex "[0][1]xfade=duration=1:offset=1:transition=fadeblack,split[s0][s1];[s0]palettegen[p];[s1][p]paletteuse" fadeblack.gif

Custom effects

You can make your own custom effects using transition=custom and the expr options. See the xfade documentation for more info.

xfade_opencl

xfade_opencl is the Open CL variant of the xfade filter. This filter supports a subset of the filters available in xfade (see bold names in gallery above) and also supports creation of custom effects. It requires ffmpeg to be configured with --enable-opencl and you must initialize a hardware device in your command. See OpenCL Video Filters for general info.