Apple computers have long targeted creative professionals, particularly when it comes to photo and video editing. Unfortunately, industry-leading packages like Adobe Premiere, After Effects, and Apple's own Final Cut Pro aren't cheap.
Free Video Editing Software For Mac
But all is not lost. There's a selection of capable, free video editing apps for Mac to sink your teeth into. Some are made for beginners, while others will satisfy seasoned video editors thanks to the impressive feature sets on offer.
iMovie is free for anyone who owns a Mac. Plus, the iOS version is free for all iPhone and iPad owners. The software targets consumers who want to quickly create videos with footage stored in their Photos library. To facilitate this, iMovie uses a simplified timeline editor that doesn't allow for multi-track editing.
Despite the linear editing and basic UI, iMovie is a highly optimized application that can handle 4K video and green screen compositing. It lets you generate titles, drag-and-drop transitions, and add motion graphics like 3D globes or travel maps. It also supports picture-in-picture video and slow-motion/fast-forward visual effects.
The app has built-in music and sound effects that are ready to go. It can generate Hollywood-style trailers using footage that you supply. Additionally, the app allows you to export directly to YouTube and Vimeo at up to 4K resolution. So, if you were looking for an all-in-one, free video editor for your Mac that's simple to use, this is it.
The Studio version of DaVinci Resolve costs $295, but the basic version is completely free, which still includes the same high-quality image-processing abilities as the pricier version. You get a powerful video editor, some of the best color correction capabilities around, and even support for external hardware panels to enable faster editing.
The app might have a pretty steep learning curve, but DaVinci Resolve is one of the most powerful video editing suites on the planet, and you get a lot for free. See our comparison of DaVinci Resolve and HitFilm Express for more on how it stacks up.
OpenShot is a cross-platform, open-source tool that's been around since 2008. It was built to provide a stable, free, and accessible video editor. The project receives several major updates yearly, in line with the expectations for an open-source project with a small team.
Here's another free, cross-platform, open-source video editor. Shotcut's feature list is just as impressive as OpenShot, but Shotcut features a prettier interface. It more closely resembles a pro-tier application than a free one.
Blender is a free, 3D-modeling and compositing app used in some high-profile productions. Yet, many don't realize Blender is also a capable non-linear video editor, provided you're willing to take the time to learn how to use it.
You can use Blender to cut and splice video, mix and sync audio, or apply adjustment layers, transitions, and filters. You probably won't edit a whole film together in Blender, but for basic editing tasks, it might suffice.
Lightworks is one of the most powerful apps on this list. We'd happily recommend it above all the other packages if it wasn't so restrictive for free users. The free version includes video effects, multi-cam editing, titling, and the usual multi-layered timeline approach you'd expect from a comprehensive editor.
Avidemux also made our list of the best Linux video editors. Though it's a basic program, it works well for simple editing tasks. The app supports a wide variety of input and output formats. The project also undergoes several updates a year, with development continuing at a steady pace.
HitFilm Express is a free video editing software for Mac and Windows machines. It comes in two versions. We'll focus on the free version, HitFilm Express, which you can use to manage all your basic editing needs.
The tool is suitable for beginner and mid-level editing. The software's home interface gives you all the top industry news and a slew of tips and tricks for using the tool. You can drag videos, images, and music files to the software panel to get going right away. The built-in clipper is bound to come in handy as well.
Even better, it also offers VFX editing. But what if the free version doesn't have a particular functionality? Yeah, they've got that covered, too. You can buy the additional features right from the home workspace. So, if this free editing software for Mac piques your interest, you can find out more about it from HitFilm's website.
InVideo is the Canva of video editing. For the uninitiated, Canva is a free online graphic design tool. So, what this essentially means is that you can edit your videos right from your browser and avoid all the tussle and clutter that comes with offline tools.
With over 5,000+ video templates and over 3 million images in the standard media library, this is one beast of a free video editing software for Mac. Also, did we tell you that the videos will be watermark free?
So, which is the best free video editing software for Mac? If you're just dipping your toes in the video editing space, iMovie will probably suit you best: it's free, easy to use, and carefully optimized for Apple hardware.
The media and delivery pages have everything you need to import, manage and deliver final projects. The media page is a dedicated full screen workspace that lets you prepare footage, sync clips, organize media into bins and add metadata before you start editing. Use the clone palette to ensure every bit of data in the camera media cards is copied during backup. During edit or grading, stream video outputs to a remote client monitor via DeckLink. You can output and upload files to YouTube, Vimeo and Twitter from anywhere page using the quick export tool. The deliver page gives you total control over all encoding options and formats, along with a render queue for exporting multiple jobs! Learn More
Adobe Premiere Pro and Apple Final Cut Pro may be considered some of the best video editing software on the market. But they both have a big barrier to entry for advanced editing tools, especially for newcomers.
It may be aimed squarely at the professional end of the market, but Apple Final Cut Pro is an easy video editing software tool, and its 'trackless' timeline is super intuitive. You pay for it once upfront, so it could be very affordable long-term. Reviewing the tool positively, we called it an incredibly powerful piece of video editing software.
You can also get the more powerful Resolve Studio for a fee - of $295 for a perpetual license, with all future upgrades free from then on. The software even includes its own VFX software, Fusion - one of the best Adobe After Effects alternatives for designers.
Top free video editing software HitFilm is powerful, professional, and multi-platform. There are subscription tiers which include higher-end tools, and also grant you access to an extensive media library,
While testing the software, our review praised it as "a strong contender in the video editing field, Shotcut might not wow you with a dazzling interface, but everything you need to edit a simple video is right there for the taking."
As it currently stands, Shotcut is a very robust and stable video editing package (it only crashed on us when trying the newest VoiceOver feature). And it's packed with numerous features, including markers, time remapping and a generous use of keyframing abilities.
The free version retains all the features of the premium, paid-for upgrades (available on a monthly/annual subscription, or a lifetime license). The only downside is that Luxea adds an intro and outro to all exported videos.
On the free Premiere Rush starter plan, you can create and share as many videos as you like, but you're limited to the free features. Premium features are locked away behind a paid-for Creative Cloud subscription.
As you'd expect from Adobe, whose industry-standard Premiere Pro has grown to define the bar for modern video editors, using Premiere Rush is a sleek, simple experience. In our hands-on review, we noted the video app "sports a nice, clean interface with very simple editing features. A snappy clipper that's perfect for making short videos for social media."
And that's the main appeal of Adobe Premiere Rush - the clue is in the name. The video editing tool is designed to work across multiple platforms: start on an iPhone, continue on a PC, polish on Android, and fine-tune on a Mac.
Elsewhere, the software for editing videos seems to have trouble letting Mac users actually edit those videos. At present, the official build has issues, requiring Apple users to use the latest Daily Build.
Ultimately, it's fine for what it does. And it's one of the best free video editing software for low-end PCs. But there's a good reason we dubbed the tool Windows Movie Maker without any of the charm (or nostalgia, for that matter).
Remember that most, if not all, free video editing apps are limited while not all high-end editors are unaffordable. Think about whether a free-to-use option is best for you or if it's worth paying a little more for a bit more functionality.
Free video editing software may not be as involved as paid ones, but many of the best ones are still full of features that are worth taking a deep dive. So, when testing free video editing software, we go beyond its most basic and most used features.
We take stock of its available tools, testing the important ones to see how they fare against those on paid-for video editors like Premiere Pro, as well as check out the filters and effects on hand. We also make a note of just how many of them are free and how many are stuck behind a paywall. A number of free apps typically come bundled with bloatware, so we make sure to mention in our review if that specific app comes with it.
Daryl had been freelancing for 3 years before joining TechRadar, now reporting on everything software-related. In his spare time he's written a book, 'The Making of Tomb Raider', alongside podcasting and usually found playing games old and new on his PC and MacBook Pro. If you have a story about an updated app, one that's about to launch, or just anything Software-related, drop him a line.","contributorText":"With contributions from","contributors":["name":"Steve Clark","role":"B2B Editor - Creative","link":"href":"https:\/\/www.techradar.com\/author\/steve-clark"]}; var triggerHydrate = function() window.sliceComponents.authorBio.hydrate(data, componentContainer); var triggerScriptLoadThenHydrate = function() var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = ' -8-2/authorBio.js'; script.async = true; script.id = 'vanilla-slice-authorBio-component-script'; script.onload = () => window.sliceComponents.authorBio = authorBio; triggerHydrate(); ; document.head.append(script); if (window.lazyObserveElement) window.lazyObserveElement(componentContainer, triggerScriptLoadThenHydrate); else triggerHydrate(); } }).catch(err => console.log('Hydration Script has failed for authorBio Slice', err)); }).catch(err => console.log('Externals script failed to load', err));Daryl BaxterSocial Links NavigationSoftware & Downloads WriterDaryl had been freelancing for 3 years before joining TechRadar, now reporting on everything software-related. In his spare time he's written a book, 'The Making of Tomb Raider', alongside podcasting and usually found playing games old and new on his PC and MacBook Pro. If you have a story about an updated app, one that's about to launch, or just anything Software-related, drop him a line. 2ff7e9595c
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