How to play Flash movie SWF on iPad?

When Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced iPad as a new tablet computer in January 2010, it brought great impact to Flash fans. Making iPad compatible with Flash movie seems to be a dream, to be accurate, it is impossible.

Since the released of Adobe Flash Player, SWF can be used as a file format to include video content. SWF file then includes two definitions: animation file and Flash movie file. No matter you notice it or not, there are two kinds of Flash movies on internet. One is with player script that you can control with play button, mute button or the link, the other is without player script which means that you could not control the playback of the Flash movie. The Flash movie with player script is not the file you get from YouTube, as the youtube videos are in FLV (Flash video) format. Flash movies used on some websites are in SWF format.

What if you want to play Flash movies on iPad? Despite the battle between the two big companies: Adobe and Apple, we can get it work. Let's have a look at the iPad compatible video format first.

- M4V, MP4, MOV file with H.264 video codec.

- M4V, MP4, MOV file with MPEG-4 video codec.

- AVI file with Motion JPEG (M-JPEG).

Well, we can convert Flash movie to MP4 or MOV format and enjoy the movies on iPad. Aunsoft SWF Converter is the recommended tool for converting Flash movie and Flash project file to iPad video. Here are the steps to put Flash movies to iPad.

Step 1. Load Flash movies to the SWF to iPad tool.

Run Aunsoft SWF Converter as the SWF to iPad tool, and click the Add button to load Flash movies in SWF format. The Flash movies will be listed on the program with original size (width & height).

Step 2. Choose the best output settings for your iPad.

Even though there is no default profile for iPad on this program, we can get MP4 file with H.264 format from the Common Video category of profile list.

With 1024 x 768 resolution on iPad, the video with 4:3 will play in full screen on iPad. We shall also pay attention to the original file aspect ratio. In my opinion, keeping the original file size and aspect ration will provide the best visual experience on iPad.

When I choose Common Video > H.264 Video(*.mp4) from the profile list, the program use the original file size by default.



Then, click the Settings button next to the profile option, and choose original video bit rate for the best visual quality.

Step 3. Convert Flash movie in auto mode.

After clicking the convert button under the preview window, you can choose to convert SWF to MP4 in automatically or manually. The manual mode is useful when your SWF file includes interaction like player script. For Flash movie without player script, just choose the auto mode and the video will be placed to the output folder in a short time.

After the conversion is finished, just run iTunes and add the output MP4 file to iTunes library. Connect iPad to the computer via Apple cable, and sync movies to iPad. Then you can enjoy Flash movies on iPad without limitation.