Repair · GoPro · MP4 · HEVC
Repair broken GoPro footage.
Recording cut off when the battery died, SD card pulled too soon, RECOVERY mode on the next boot? Haven rebuilds MP4 and HEVC clips from HERO9 through HERO13, MAX, Session and FUSION — locally, in seconds.
Analysis free · Pay only when it works · No sign-up
Supported
- · HERO13
- · HERO12
- · HERO11
- · HERO10
- · HERO9
- · MAX
- · Session
- · FUSION
Recognize your problem?
Common damage patterns with GoPro
RECOVERY mode on the next power-up
On the next boot the camera warns that a file was not closed cleanly and kicks off its own recovery process. When that fails, you are left with a GH010001.MP4 that has no moov atom.
LRV exists, MP4 will not play
In the DCIM folder you find the low-resolution preview (.LRV or .THM), but the main file opens in no player at all. The container is truncated, yet the frames are still there.
0 KB file, or it stops after a few seconds
The file looks normal on the card but is empty or holds only the first couple of seconds. A classic sign of a thermal shutdown or an interrupted write.
"File corrupt" in QuickTime, VLC, Premiere
Even VLC, which plays almost anything, refuses it. Premiere shows a red "Media offline" strip. The codec data is intact — the container is not.
Why does this happen?
The most common causes
01
Battery drop during a 4K60p recording
Under load (4K60p HEVC) HERO12/13 batteries last only 60–80 minutes. If the battery dies mid-recording, the moov header is never written. This is exactly what Haven is built for.
02
SD card ejected during recording
An accidental tap on the SD-card slot, a loose mount — and the container is left incomplete. The last 30–60 seconds are usually gone entirely.
03
SD card too slow for HEVC 4K60+
GoPro recommends UHS-I V30 as a minimum. An old Class 10 card cannot keep up with 4K60p HEVC and causes write stalls. The resulting gaps in the mdat block are repairable, but they need reference material.
04
Thermal shutdown on long takes
When a GoPro writes 4K60+ HEVC in summer and overheats, it sometimes shuts off abruptly. The file is frozen and the header is not finalised — directly repairable.
How to do it
Repair in four steps
- 01
Spare the card, save the file
Take the SD card out of the camera and put it in a card reader. Copy the broken file into a working folder on your Mac or PC — never work straight off the card, or a second write can overwrite what is left.
- 02
Have a reference clip ready
An intact clip from the same GoPro with identical settings (resolution, frame rate, codec, bitrate) helps Haven rebuild the missing header data exactly. Ideally the clip shot right before or right after.
- 03
Open in Haven, wait for the analysis
Drag and drop both files in. Haven analyses the container, automatically recognises it as GoPro footage and shows what is missing (usually the moov atom, plus possibly the last frames).
- 04
Check the preview, then save
Before you pay, you see and hear the finished result. Once picture and sound are in sync and there are no visible jumps left, you export the repaired MP4 — the original file is never touched.
Engineering detail
What makes GoPro HEVC special
From HERO11 on, GoPro writes HEVC with hvcC headers that encode NAL units with a length prefix rather than Annex-B start codes. Many generic repair tools (ffmpeg without the right flags included) miss this and hand back a video with no picture. Haven detects the format, parses the SPS/PPS parameters from your reference and reassembles the bitstream correctly.
For CLI nerds — fallback without Haven
ffmpeg -err_detect ignore_err -i kaputt.mp4 -c copy repariert.mp4For light damage (not a missing moov, but individual corrupt packets) ffmpeg with ignore_err can copy the video straight through. It does not work when the moov atom is missing — then you need Haven.
FAQ · GoPro
Common questions
Does this work with a HERO9 or older?
Yes. The HERO9 still used H.264 rather than HEVC, which is actually easier to repair. HERO5–8 work too — the underlying MP4 container has been largely unchanged since the HERO5.
My GoPro footage got corrupted after a hard fall. Can it be repaired?
If the card itself is still readable and the file could be copied, usually yes. After a heavy fall the card’s NAND flash can develop bit errors, in which case a few individual frames may not come back — but the rest will.
GoPro Quik cannot open my file. Can Haven still do it?
GoPro Quik gives up immediately when the header is missing. Haven starts exactly there and rebuilds the header from the raw frames. This is the main case the tool was built for.
Do I need the physical GoPro camera?
No. The broken file plus one intact reference clip is enough. The camera itself does not have to be connected.
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