Why does Keynote on iPad duplicate referenced video?

When I make a new project in Keynote on the iPad, and then add video files that are already in the Photos app, the size of the Keynote project files grows dramatically. It appears that, despite the files already being on the iPad, instead of referencing them Keynote copies them again to its own Folder system! Is there no way to bypass this feature? It seems ridiculous. Why wouldn’t Keynote simply reference the files when they are already on the iPad. When I use large video files in multiple products this results in multiple duplicates of the original video taking up space on the iPad —- unless, of course, this is Apple‘s intention!

iPad Pro (1st generation)

Posted on Mar 20, 2025 7:54 AM

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Mar 20, 2025 11:06 AM in response to baldoyler

The point is that you may not be the only person viewing (or even editing) the presentation.


If Keynote simply kept a pointer to your Photos library, the presentation would break If you send the presentation to someone else who didn't have that video in their Photos Library.

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Mar 20, 2025 12:26 PM in response to Camelot

Thanks for the reply, that’sa fair point. It’s a pity however that Apple doesn’t offer the option of referencing the files as well. As it stands, I have three variations on a Keynote project (mostly just text slide differences) and between them they come to almost 70 GB. It would’ve been nice not to have that much duplication on the iPad but so it goes.

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Mar 20, 2025 3:48 PM in response to baldoyler

I can understand that.


There may be a compromise, though.


You could upload your video to YourTube or Vimeo and reference them from there. They'll be downloaded/streamed real-time when you play back, and wouldn't have the overhead of a file being embedded in the Keynote document.


You could also use a dummy online video as a placeholder, replacing it with the real/local video file prior to presentation or distribution. That would let your working documents remain small and not impact playback performance when it comes time to present.

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Why does Keynote on iPad duplicate referenced video?

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