Publisher to WMV Converter
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Supports: PUB
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Need help?Convert Publisher (.pub) to WMV
WMV is what you reach for when the destination is a Windows machine that has to play the file with no codec pack, no browser and no extra software — a lobby display driven by Windows Media Player, an older PowerPoint deck that will only embed WMV, or a corporate desktop locked down to Microsoft formats. Turning a Publisher document into WMV gives you a silent video slide of every page in exactly that container.
The conversion reads the .pub with LibreOffice's Draw component (the libmspub importer), renders each page at 300 DPI, and encodes the page images as a slideshow inside an ASF container. Video Codec opens on WMV 2.
How to Convert Publisher to WMV
- Upload Your Publisher File: Drag your
.pubonto the page or click "+ Add Files". Each page in the publication becomes one frame of the finished video. - Set Image Duration: This opens at 5 seconds per page, with a dropdown running from a single frame (1/60s) to 10 seconds. Runtime is simply page count multiplied by this value.
- Switch File Compression to Constraint Quality: This is the important one. Leave Video Codec on WMV 2, then open "File Compression" and choose Constraint Quality, setting a Max bitrate — on WMV the default Quality Preset mode has nothing to work with on a still image (see below).
- Convert and Download: Click "Convert". Files upload over an encrypted connection, are processed on our servers, and are deleted automatically after a few hours. No sign-up, no watermark.
WMV 1 vs WMV 2 — and What Is Not Here
| WMV 1 | WMV 2 (default) | |
|---|---|---|
| Microsoft's name for it | Windows Media Video 7 | Windows Media Video 8 |
| FourCC | WMV1 |
WMV2 |
| Encoder used | wmv1 |
wmv2 |
| Compatibility | Every Windows Media Player build that ever shipped | Everything that plays WMV 1, plus every later player |
| Size on a rendered page | We measured it landing slightly smaller than WMV 2 at the same quantiser on an A4 page | Marginally larger on the same page, but the safer default |
| Pick it when | You are feeding a genuinely ancient playback chain | Anything else |
Note what is not offered: Windows Media Video 9 (fourCC WMV3) and its SMPTE-standardised sibling VC-1. Neither has an open-source encoder — ffmpeg can decode both but cannot produce them — so no converter built on that toolchain can output them. If a specification insists on "WMV 9", you will need Microsoft's own encoder. WMV 2 plays in the same players; it is only the compression generation that differs.
Rate Control on WMV: Use Constraint Quality
This is the single most useful thing to know about this page, and the interface does not make it obvious.
| Mode | What happens on a Publisher (still-image) source |
|---|---|
| Quality Preset (the default) | Does nothing. The preset is designed to scale the source bitrate, and a still page has no source bitrate, so the calculation resolves to zero and no rate target is set. |
| Constant Quality | Works, but is mislabelled. WMV is a qscale codec, so the slider you see labelled "CRF" is really a 1–31 quantiser scale where lower is better — the opposite intuition to an x264 CRF. A value like 23 is near the worst end of the scale, not the middle. |
| Constraint Quality | The mode to use. Set a Max bitrate in the field beside it and the encoder is given a real ceiling to work to. |
The target-file-size and fixed-bitrate modes that appear on video-to-video pages are hidden here for the same reason the preset is inert: there is no input bitrate to scale from.
What the Encoder Actually Does
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Source reader | LibreOffice Draw via libmspub, then a 300 DPI page render |
| Container | ASF (Advanced Systems Format) |
| Default codec | WMV 2 (Windows Media Video 8) |
| Frame rate | 1 fps, fixed — no frame-rate control on this page |
| Frames | One per publication page |
| Default duration | 5 seconds per page |
| Audio | None. The output is silent and the audio-codec control is hidden |
| B-frames | Disabled |
| Frame-size ceiling | 4096 pixels on the long edge before encoding |
| Background Color | White by default; fills letterbox bars and any transparent artwork |
At 300 DPI an A4 page renders to 2481 x 3508 pixels, even-rounded to 2480 x 3508 before encoding; US Letter comes out at 2550 x 3300. Pages longer than roughly 13.6 inches cross the 4096-pixel ceiling and are scaled down to fit it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does the Quality Preset dropdown do nothing on this page?
Because WMV is not a CRF codec. For H.264, H.265, VP9 and AV1 the preset is translated into a constant-quality value the encoder understands. WMV has no such mode, so the preset instead falls back to scaling the source video's bitrate — and a Publisher page is a still image with no bitrate to scale. The calculation lands on zero and nothing is passed to the encoder. Use Constraint Quality with an explicit Max bitrate instead.
The Constant Quality slider is labelled CRF but goes 1 to 31. What scale is that?
It is a quantiser scale, not an x264-style CRF, and the direction is inverted: 1 is the highest quality and 31 is the lowest, which is the opposite of what "CRF" normally implies. If you are used to setting CRF 23 for H.264, the equivalent instinct here would produce a badly degraded page. Start low — around 2 to 6 — if you use this mode at all.
Why is the output silent?
There is no audio anywhere in the pipeline. A Publisher document has no sound track, so the audio-codec control is hidden on every image-to-video page and the ASF file is written with a single video stream and no audio stream at all. Add one afterwards in an editor if a downstream tool requires it.
Can I get Windows Media Video 9 or VC-1 out of this?
No, and neither can any other converter built on open-source encoders. ffmpeg ships decoders for wmv3 (Windows Media Video 9) and VC-1 but no encoders for either — the only entries in the encoder list are wmv1 (Windows Media Video 7) and wmv2 (Windows Media Video 8). Anything requiring genuine WMV 9 output has to go through Microsoft's own tooling.
Will this play in a web browser?
No. WMV in ASF has never had native browser support and Silverlight is long gone, so a <video> tag will not play it. For web delivery use Publisher to MP4 for the broadest reach, or Publisher to WebM for a royalty-free option. WMV is for local playback on Windows, and for tools that specifically demand it.
How long will the video be, and what shape?
Runtime is page count multiplied by Image Duration — a five-page flyer at the default 5 seconds gives 25 seconds. The frame shape follows the page: at "Keep original" you get a tall portrait video, which looks wrong on a landscape display. Choose a Fixed Resolution such as 1920 x 1080 under "Video resolution" and the page is fitted inside the frame, with the remainder filled by the Background Color.
Why 1 frame per second?
Every frame is an identical static page, so encoding one picture per page rather than twenty-five copies of it produces a far smaller file that looks exactly the same. There is no frame-rate control here. Windows Media Player handles a 1 fps file without complaint; if an editor refuses to import it, re-encode the finished WMV at a conventional rate.
What happens to my Publisher file after the conversion?
It is uploaded over an encrypted connection, converted on our servers, and deleted automatically after a few hours — never shared, never made public, and no account is required. The output carries no watermark. If a still image would serve better than a video, Publisher to TIFF renders each page at the same 300 DPI.