# Run CodeFormer

Repairs faces in old, blurry, or heavily compressed footage. Ready in about 90 seconds on an RTX 4090, from $0.45/hr. No install, no code.

## What it does

CodeFormer rebuilds faces that have been damaged by compression, low resolution, or age. It is the tool that fixes the one thing general upscaling gets wrong.

It works on video and on still photographs. The most common use is running it after Real-ESRGAN, so the frame gets sharper and then the faces get fixed properly.

It has a strength dial. Low settings stay faithful to the original person, high settings look cleaner but start to drift away from the real face. The default is deliberately conservative.

## Your setup

We run CodeFormer on an RTX 4090 with 24GB of memory, at $0.45 per hour, billed by the minute. It takes about 3 minutes per minute of footage.

CodeFormer detects faces, crops each one, restores it, and blends it back. On a busy frame that is several passes per frame rather than one. The RTX 4090 has enough memory to hold a whole 4K frame plus every detected face crop at once, which avoids a slow round trip to system memory on crowded shots.

## What it costs

30 minutes of footage takes about 75 minutes of GPU time, which is about $0.56.

## Two ways to run it

- **Open the app.** Upload a clip or a photo, move the strength slider, compare before and after.
- **Run a batch job.** Process a whole archive at one setting.

## Model facts

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Parameters | 95M |
| License | S-Lab License 1.0 (non-commercial) |
| Memory required | 8GB minimum |
| Base model | Trained from scratch |
| Publisher | S-Lab, Nanyang Technological University |
| Recommended hardware | RTX 4090, 24GB |
| Category | [Video and film](https://gpuvault.io/working-on/video-and-film/) |

## Questions people ask

### Can I use CodeFormer on paid client work?

Not under its own license. CodeFormer is released under the S-Lab License 1.0, which is research and non-commercial only. For commercial restoration work, use Real-ESRGAN, which is BSD 3-Clause and permits commercial use, and accept that faces will be slightly softer. We show the license on every model page for exactly this reason.

### Do I need to install anything to use CodeFormer?

No. We start a machine with CodeFormer already loaded and hand you a link. Everything runs in your browser, there is nothing to download, and nothing is left on your computer afterwards. It works the same on a Mac, a Windows laptop, or a Chromebook. A workspace is usually ready in about 90 seconds.

### How much does it cost to run 30 minutes of footage?

About $0.56. CodeFormer takes about 3 minutes per minute of footage on the RTX 4090 we recommend, so 30 minutes of footage is roughly 75 minutes of GPU time at $0.45 per hour. Billing is by the minute, and a batch job shuts the GPU off the moment the last item finishes. The calculator above works this out for your own numbers.

### Can I run CodeFormer on a cheaper card?

Sometimes, and the calculator will not always make it look worth it. CodeFormer detects faces, crops each one, restores it, and blends it back. On a busy frame that is several passes per frame rather than one. The RTX 4090 has enough memory to hold a whole 4K frame plus every detected face crop at once, which avoids a slow round trip to system memory on crowded shots. If you want to try a different card anyway, the advanced catalog lets you pick one and shows the estimated time before you commit.

### What are the license restrictions on CodeFormer?

CodeFormer is released under the S-Lab License 1.0 (non-commercial). That is not a permissive license, so read it before you use the output in paid work. We show the license on every model page precisely because this catches people out, and there is usually a permissively licensed alternative in the same category.

### What happens to my files after I stop?

Anything you save into your workspace folder stays in your account and is there when you come back. Everything else is destroyed: the machine is terminated and its disk is wiped. Batch job inputs and outputs are deleted from our storage 24 hours after you download them. We do not read your files or use them to train anything.

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*Source: https://gpuvault.io/model/codeformer/ — GPUVault, GPU rental by the minute.*