diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index a7c3664..76d6865 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -19,7 +19,10 @@ pillow = "*"
 pydantic = ">=1.10.8"
 tokenizers = ">=0.14.0"
 langchain-text-splitters = ">=0.3.8"
-ffmpeg-python = "*"
+ffmpeg-python = {version = "*", optional = true}
+
+[tool.poetry.extras]
+video = ["ffmpeg-python"]
 
 [tool.poetry.group.test.dependencies]
 pytest = "^7.4.2"
diff --git a/voyageai/__init__.py b/voyageai/__init__.py
index 452328e..5a3c07a 100644
--- a/voyageai/__init__.py
+++ b/voyageai/__init__.py
@@ -36,6 +36,19 @@
 )
 from voyageai.version import VERSION
 
+
+def _is_ffmpeg_available() -> bool:
+    """Check if ffmpeg-python is installed."""
+    try:
+        import ffmpeg  # noqa: F401
+
+        return True
+    except ImportError:
+        return False
+
+
+HAS_VIDEO = _is_ffmpeg_available()
+
 if TYPE_CHECKING:
     import requests
     from aiohttp import ClientSession
diff --git a/voyageai/video_utils.py b/voyageai/video_utils.py
index 8acb12a..f2ee4db 100644
--- a/voyageai/video_utils.py
+++ b/voyageai/video_utils.py
@@ -187,8 +187,8 @@ def _load_video_bytes(video: Union[str, PathLike[str], bytes, Video]) -> bytes:
 def _ensure_ffmpeg_available() -> None:
     if ffmpeg is None:
         raise ImportError(
-            "ffmpeg-python is required for video optimization. "
-            "Install `ffmpeg-python` and ensure `ffmpeg` is available on PATH."
+            "The 'ffmpeg-python' package is required for video optimization. "
+            "Install it with: pip install voyageai[video]"
         )
     if shutil.which("ffmpeg") is None:
         raise EnvironmentError(