Best Free Video Editing Software + Other Video Creation Tools

Finding free shit isn’t easy, until now.

Trying to find the best free video editing software can be a daunting task for someone new to video. Many of us bloggers wear 50 gazillion hats, and videographer is just another hat in paradise with a steep learning curve.

Everyone is saying Video is the Rage for over 15 years now. It’s true. Facebook is giving preference to videos. Home-Made You Tube videos are becoming more famous than TV Shows, especially among the millennials. TikTok is growing among Gen Z, and Instagram Influencers cannot even without instagram video. Pinterest has even introduced video pins. Plus, video is often used for webinars and online course creation.

That’s without studies. It’s been studied. Let’s look at some fun video marketing stats circa 2020:

• Video ads were the #1 way consumers discovered a brand they later purchased from. (Animoto)
• 93% of brands got a new customer because of a video on social media. (Animoto)
• 84% of marketers say video has helped them increase traffic to their website. (Wyzowl)
• 81% of marketers say video has helped them generate leads. (Wyzowl)
• 80% of marketers say video has increased dwell time on their website. (Wyzowl)

That last one is important because many bloggers rely on advertising income, and they are learning that video increases their monthly income because it increases dwell time on their site.

So, video is a thing we all should be doing more of.

And none of us will be filming the next Oscar.

So what is the best free video editing software or app? Here’s a list of everything you need to make decent videos…

♥ Hearts on my Favorites ♥

Video Editing Software

Adobe Premiere Pro: Free trial. This is probably the best option for video, but I personally haven’t played with it yet up at the time I updated this page. That will change. But Adobe has Premiere Rush for the phone / desktop (great for getting footage and sharing it), and then Pro for the desktop (to take your video editing even further). I am an affiliate for Adobe because I like to create things, and they are the industry leading creation software.

Adobe Premiere Rush: This freemium app is what Adobe has for video on the phone as well as other places. Again, I feel like I should mention I am an affiliate for Adobe, someone I hand picked because of their awesomeness.

♥ Wondershare by Filmora: They have a free trial. I’m not sure how it works now, but in the past, you couldn’t produce a video that didn’t have the watermark on it until you paid for it, but I have found it to be the most user friendly for people who don’t want to read tutorials and just want to learn by playing with it. Some video producers have made blockbuster-ish movies with this, but it’s not one they commonly use. It reminds me of the Canon Rebel. It’s almost professional, but not quite. I do pay annually for it, and I will warn you, the paypal transaction is all in some kind of calligraphy, and you might swear someone is stealing from you.

OBS Studio: Open Broadcaster Software for video recording and live streaming

Lightworks: Ok so this is free and usually highly recommended, but I’m too stupid to use this software personally, apparently.

VSDC: Free Video Editor a user describes as best for “heavy lifting.”

ShotCut: Free Video Editing Software a user describes as “robust for a free program.”

Easiest Video Editing Software but Less Robust

♥ Loom: Free screen recorder with or without web cam. Most popular among bloggers making tutorial videos.

♥ Lumen 5: Several options for video creation, but it can take a web address and automagically create a video from it where you have editing options, or you can start from scratch. In the end, you get slides of stock photos and stock videos with a text overlay set to music. Free and paid plans available.

♥Canva: Canva does video. You can upload your own videos or choose from their library and create still frames for video, or you can choose from their animated presentation templates, and with Canva Pro, you can animate a design by making a normal picture, going to Publish, See More, and then choosing Animation (perfect to quickly animate pinterest pins).

Adobe Spark: Quickly make short videos by adding photographs, video clips, icons, your voice, and then apply some music and cinematic motion. You can also get the app on your phone.

♥ PowerPoint: Not free unless you already have the Office 365. This is kind of a trade secret nobody talks about, but you can make video for your powerpoint slides, insert video onto the slide, or turn your slide show into a video. You can capture screen time. You can also record audio over slides. You can do slide transitions and animations. So many options with the user-friendliness of Microsoft. But this only works on the desktop app, not the free online version.

Ezvid: I used to use Ezvid sometimes, especially to record the computer screen, but it’s not really that ideal because A, you have to use one of the songs from their list you cannot upload nor can you keep it silent, and B, it saves it in a weird format the only way I get it to use in a video is to upload to Youtube and then download it. I thought I”d mention it because it was a struggle for me to find a video editing software that resembled the old Microsoft Movie Maker with a timeline instead of slides.

Sparkol: Story Pix is free and it basically just makes a video out of photos, but perfect for quick Facebook videos and turning memes into a video or making videos that feature products. Video Scribe has a free trial, but it’s designed to make those whiteboard animation videos where someone draws notes on a board with a marker while you talk.

Microsoft Movie Maker: Ok so this one was awesome, then they changed things around, and I can’t seemingly figure out the video the way I want to without the timeline features. But this is usually recommended for beginners.

Free Animation Software

Adobe AfterEffects: Animate things, animate words, and apply visual effects. Affiliate link.

Adobe Animate: Free trial. Draw new frames on top of previous frames. Exports / Saves as flash, MOV, gif, and other things. To export as an mp4, you’ll need to team up with Adobe Media Encoder. Again, I am an affiliate for Adobe.

Unity: This is a 3D rendering software that professionals use. They have several free versions.

Blender: Free open source software to do almost anything you need to with animation.

Pencil2D: Free open source software to make 2D animations.

Animaker: Freemium, and free comes with a watermark. Great for beginners with a drag n drop style.

FlipAClip App: For phones and devices, this a great free flip book style animation app.

Stykz: Free stick figure animation.

Note: Professional Software like Cinema 4D and AutoDesk’s Maya offer a short free trial and then a more expensive monthly fee. But I want to note that when I google jobs for Animators, just about all the jobs required knowledge (and would be working with) Adobe products (Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, After Effects) as well as Cinema 4D, Maya and Unity.

Video Footage / Stock Clips

♥ VidEezy: Free for personal or commercial use with attribution; HD stock video and 4K videos. Includes After Effects Templates.

♥ Videvo: Free for personal or commercial use; some with creative commons license requiring attribution and others with just free use no attribution required. Also has music and sound effects.

♥ Coverr: Reminds me of Unsplash when it first came out. Free for almost any use for the most part.

Pixabay: They offer stock video as well as stock photos.

Note: Canva, Lumen5, Adobe Spark all have some stock video to choose from.

AP Archive: Search a database of video footage, some is available for reuse and others need permission so look for that.

Bottled Video: Free videos for personal and commercial use. Offers a paid site as well. A lot more realistic videos with people.

Cute Stock Footage: Free for personal or commercial use. Terms linked in the FAQ.

Free HD Footage: Free to use videos

Ignite Motion: Background videos of motion free for personal or commercial use

Motion Elements: Get 5 free downloads a week if you sign up, and get 5 more free downloads a week up to 30 extra downloads for each friend you refer. Also paid options (pretty expensive).

Orange HD: Free for non-commercial use. Paid commercial options

VidsPlay: Background videos free for personal or commercial use

XStock Video: Offers free licenses and paid licenses

Other Video Things

Giphy: Create gifs from video or photos 

Nimbus Capture: Capture screen shots and video, but video still must be washed through a video software as it saves it as a webm file.

♥ Production Crate: Really cool effects to lay over video like add a nuclear bomb explosion or magical force field to any photo or video. Free plan includes 5 effect downloads per day from the free archives; Pro Plan at $49 a year gets unlimited downloads and access to pro archives.

Splasheo: Free Outro downloads and guides

Zoom: Video Conferencing + Webinars

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