Automate Video Compression with the CLI, MCP Server & AI Agents

July 2, 2026 • VideoRecompress Studio Team

Most people meet VideoRecompress Studio through its Windows wizard: drop in a folder of videos, pick a preset, click Start. But the wizard is only one way to drive it. The same compression engine — H.264, H.265, AV1, VP9, GPU hardware encoding — also ships with a full command-line interface called videorecompress, a built-in MCP server, and an installable Claude Code skill.

This post walks through all three: scripting with the videorecompress CLI, wiring the MCP server into Claude Desktop or Claude Code, and letting an AI agent run your compression pipeline from plain English. Full CLI and MCP reference lives in the public GitHub repository at github.com/brunojanvier77/ContentaSoft

The videorecompress CLI: the same engine, scriptable

The executable is called videorecompress and installs together with the desktop app — same installer, same license. You will find it in C:\Program Files\ContentaSoft\VideoRecompress Studio PREMIUM\; add that folder to your PATH and it is available from any terminal.

It exposes 9 commands: analyze, recompress, batch, presets, profile, watch, status, register, and serve. Analyze a file, recompress with codec and CRF settings, or batch-process an entire folder — all from one line:

videorecompress analyze video.mp4 --json

videorecompress recompress video.mp4 --output ./compressed --preset-id phone_archive

videorecompress batch ./raw-footage --output ./archived --preset-id wedding_archive --workers 2

Every command accepts --json for machine-readable output (JSON or NDJSON for batch progress) and returns proper exit codes, so the CLI drops cleanly into PowerShell scripts, bash pipelines, CI jobs, and scheduled tasks.

Watch the preset flags. --preset-id phone_archive selects a named workflow preset (codec, CRF, and savings profile). --preset medium sets the encoder speed (ultrafast through veryslow). They look similar but do completely different things — use --preset-id for workflow presets and --preset only when tuning encoder speed.

Real automation recipes

1. The scheduled archive job

Point batch at a folder of raw footage and let it recompress overnight with a quality-first preset. One command turns a memory-card dump into an archived library:

videorecompress batch ./raw-footage --output ./archived --preset-id wedding_archive --workers 2

Schedule it in Task Scheduler to run weekly and your camera imports compress automatically — original files untouched, H.265 archives ready for long-term storage.

2. The self-running watch folder

The watch command monitors a folder and recompresses every new video automatically. Start it once and it keeps running — drop files in, get compressed files out:

videorecompress watch --folder C:\Videos --preset phone_archive --output C:\Compressed

Run it at logon via Task Scheduler and you have a zero-click compression service: phone dumps, screen recordings, and camera imports land in the incoming folder, and smaller H.265 files appear in the output folder seconds later.

The MCP server: hand the engine to an AI agent

MCP (Model Context Protocol) is the open standard AI assistants use to call external tools. VideoRecompress ships with a built-in MCP server — you start it with a single command:

// claude_desktop_config.json
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "videorecompress": {
      "command": "videorecompress",
      "args": ["serve"]
    }
  }
}

It exposes 5 tools — analyze video, recompress a file, batch recompress, list presets, and estimate space savings — and it works during the free trial. To connect Claude Desktop, add this to your claude_desktop_config.json:

From then on you can ask your assistant things like “recompress every MP4 in my Downloads folder with the phone_archive preset” and it calls the local engine directly. Your videos never leave your machine — the agent orchestrates, the compression runs locally.

Claude Code skill: video compression in plain English

If you use Claude Code, there is an even shorter path: the /contenta-video skill teaches the agent the whole CLI — commands, presets, hardware acceleration, and common recipes. Install it by cloning the public repo and copying the skills into place:

git clone https://github.com/brunojanvier77/ContentaSoft.git
cp -r ContentaSoft/skills/* ~/.claude/skills/

Then just describe the job in your own words — “batch recompress this wedding folder with max quality” or “watch my screen recordings folder and compress new files”. The skill translates the request into the right videorecompress commands and reports back.

Everything is documented on GitHub

The complete reference lives in a public GitHub repository: accurate CLI documentation for every command and option, the full MCP server reference with all 5 tools, and the installable Claude Code skills for VideoRecompress Studio and the other ContentaSoft products. github.com/brunojanvier77/ContentaSoft

The docs are maintained alongside the product, so what you read there matches the binary on your disk. Copy the recipes straight into your own scripts, or open an issue if you hit an edge case.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the CLI cost extra?

No. The CLI, the MCP server, and the Claude Code skill ship in the same installer as the desktop app and are covered by the same $79 one-time license. There is nothing separate to buy or download.

Does it work during the free trial?

Yes. The 30-day free trial covers the CLI and the MCP server too. The first 10 files recompress clean; after that, output carries a small watermark and is cut to the first 10 minutes until you register with videorecompress register.

Can I use it in scripts and CI pipelines?

That is exactly what it is built for. Every command supports --json for structured output and returns meaningful exit codes (0 success, 3 license required, 5 file not found, and so on), so failures are easy to detect and handle.