Steps To Repair Corrupt AVI Video Files

Read time 6 minutes

The Audio Video Interleave files, commonly abbreviated as .avi files, refer to a video file format widely used to share audio and video data through internet and other popular mediums. This format was introduced by Microsoft. AVI files are used on an extensive scale because of its compression capabilities. It usually takes less compression space as compared to other formats. Moreover, AVI files are supported by multiple OS platforms like Windows, Macintosh, and Linux.

Like other video file formats, AVI files are also prone to corruption. They can get corrupt regardless of where they are stored, be it a hard drive, memory card, or USB flash drive. Once an AVI file gets corrupt, it can’t be played using any of the media players.

What are the traits of a corrupt video file?

Identification of a corrupted AVI file is a task which is difficult to master. However, there are many traits that a corrupt video file shows. Some of them are mentioned below which will help you to identify a corrupt AVI file:

• You are unable to play the video file with an error stating that your file fails to play.
• Video is patchy, sluggish, flickering, or chapping.
• It is unplayable with any media player.
• There is distorted or no audio in the file.
• Audio and video of the file don’t sync.
• There is no video, just audio.
• Video stops playing after some time when you can see the remaining time.
• Blurry, grainy, or pixelated video quality

An AVI file may get corrupt due to many reasons, and knowing those reasons are important as well. Knowledge about the reasons will help you in finding the right solution. In addition, it gives you a clear vision about what to avoid in the future and you will be able to adopt better video file handling practices. These are the reasons behind your AVI videos getting corrupt-

• Corruption in the storage drive where the video file is saved
• Corruption due to the damaged index
• Bad sectors on the hard drive
• Incomplete video file
• Any interference while downloading or transferring the video file
• Sudden power failure while editing the video
• Any electromagnetic interference.
• Virus or malware attack.

VLC is not just a media player. It has various feathers to the cap in terms of added features. The damaged index of an AVI file can be temporarily fixed using the VLC media player. VLC provides an option to repair the damaged index as soon as you launch the affected .avi file. You can also enable the “Always Fix” option from the VLC media player’s preference setting to run the automatic repair whenever you play corrupted files.

Moreover, it can repair MP4, corrupt M4V video files and it also repair corrupt FLV video files.

Step 1: Install VLC Media Player on your system.

Step 2: Click Tools from the Menu bar and Go to “Preferences”.

Step 3: Go to the “Input/Codecs” tab, and in Damaged or incomplete AVI file, select “Always fix” and then click on the Save button.

Now, if you open any damaged or corrupt AVI file through VLC, the application will automatically fix the damaged index and play the file for you.

VLC doesn’t provide a permanent solution for the damaged index; instead, it only fixes the issue while playing the video.

Since VLC is not capable of providing a competent solution to repair damaged AVI files, you can seek some professional tools for video repair.

Kernel Video Repair is one of the most prominent tools to repair video files of almost all formats be it MP4, MOV, MPEG, MJPEG, MTS, M4V, etc. You can repair corrupt videos irrespective of their file size and format. Just download the trial version of the tool and repair MP4 or damaged videos free. If you like the performance of the tool, you can easily upgrade to the premium version by purchasing it online. Here is how the tool works:

• Launch the tool and click the ‘+’ sign to navigate to the folder containing the corrupt video file. Select the file and click on the ‘OK’ button.
• Select the corrupt video files and click OK.
• The tool has uploaded the video files. Click Repair Files.
• Choose where you want to save the recovered video files.
• You can visit the recovered video files at your mentioned location. Click Close.

The repaired file gets saved at the specified location.

Conclusion

This article intends to help users looking for effective ways to solve corruption issues in AVI video files. VLC, however, comes in handy, and you can fix low-level corruption issues using this media player application. In case your .avi format videos are corrupted on a severe scale, even VLC seems to be of no use. You can always use Kernel Video Repair to repair your AVI files.