OpenShot: a FREE, Powerful, and Easy-to-Use Video Editor

Do you have a need for occasional (perhaps even one-time) video editor to manipulate video files? Perhaps you don’t want to spend $299 for Final Cut Pro or a similar video editor? If you have such a need, I have a suggestion for you:

OpenShot

OpenShot is a free and open source video editor. Versions are available for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux. It is a powerful yet very simple and easy-to-use video editor that delivers high quality video editing and animation solutions. OpenShot offers a myriad of features and capabilities, including powerful curve-based Key frame animations, 3D animated titles and effects, slow motion and time effects, audio mixing and editing, and so much more. It also has a very simple and friendly interface.

Now, to be blunt: this free software is not the full equivalent of the $299 Final Cut Pro. However, if your needs are simpler and you perhaps don’t need all the capability of the high-priced software, you may find the FREE OpenShot meets your need perfectly. I have been experimenting with OpenShot for the past few weeks and I find it meets my admittedly simple needs perfectly.

Amongst the capabilities are:

Support for various all the more common file formats for video, audio, and image files

Powerful curve-based Key frame animations (I am still learning to use that)

Desktop integration (drag and drop support)

Unlimited tracks

Trim, scale, snap, rotate and cut clips

Video transitions

Compositing, image overlays, watermarks

Title editor

2D animation support

3D animations and effects

SVG friendly

Scrolling motion picture credits

Digital video effects

Experimental hardware encoding and decoding

Import & Export widely supported formats (EDL, XML)

Render videos in many codecs and formats

Simple and friendly user interface

The above is an abbreviated list; the full list may be found at https://www.openshot.org/features/.

You can also download the complete User Guide and read more about it to see if it will meet your needs at https://www.openshot.org/user-guide/.

You can learn a lot more about OpenShot and even download and install the complete program at https://www.openshot.org/.

Again it is FREE, simple to use, and has a surprising number of features.