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Interviews and webinars

Interview video editor. Cut it by its words.

Write out the transcript, drag across the rambling and delete it, and the picture, sound and captions close up with it. Cover the join with b-roll, add your guest’s name, and export. It runs in your browser, with no watermark.

Edit an interview free See how it works
  • Free with a free account
  • No watermark
  • Any video length
Three sentences cut from the transcript, the join covered while she keeps talking. Interview: astronaut Kayla Barron, NASA (public domain; NASA does not endorse VidTL). Submarine shot by Andrey Kirievskiy on Pexels.

How it works

Read it, cut it, cover the join.

  1. 01

    Write out the transcript.Click the interview, then choose Generate Subtitles in the Tools menu or in the Subtitles panel. Pick Free Processing and the words appear in the panel, each one timed to the sound.

  2. 02

    Drag across what to cut.Drag a box over the words, or click them one at a time. The eye button, Preview Cuts, marks them in red on the timeline first. Delete Selected cuts them, and the picture, sound and captions close up together. Ctrl+Z brings them back.

  3. 03

    Cover the join.Drag a shot from the media library onto the track above the interview, so it starts just before the cut and runs past it. The interview’s sound keeps playing underneath, so nobody sees the jump.

The Subtitles panel showing an interview transcript. Three sentences in the middle are highlighted in red: the ones about the speakerthe ones about the speaker’s father teaching at the Navy’s nuclear training schoolrsquo;s father and his career in the Navy. The preview and delete buttons are lit above them.

What you get

One clean answer, and no visible seam.

In the demo, a 26-second stretch of an interview loses about eight seconds of her father’s career. The two halves of the answer sit side by side on the lower track, and the cutaway sits on the track above, covering the cut from just before it to just after. Everything is an ordinary clip, so you can drag the cutaway longer, move the cut, or put the words back with undo.

The VidTL editor after the edit. The transcript has lost three sentences, the interview’s two halves sit side by side on the lower picture track, and a short submarine clip sits on the track above, starting just before the join and ending just after it.
After the cut: two halves of the answer on Video 1, the cutaway on Video 2, her voice on the audio track below.

Around the cut

The rest of the interview, finished.

  • Two cameras

    If you filmed with two cameras, Multi Cam Smart Sync lines them up by their sound and Multi Cam Auto Cut cuts to whoever is speaking. It works best when each camera hears its own person loudest. More on the multicam video editor page.

  • A name on screen

    Open the Graphics tab, go to Name Tags, and click Name Tag Card or Name Tag Bar to add it at the playhead. Double-click its words to type your guest’s name and job. The Cards group also has a Quote design for pulling out a line.

  • B-roll to cut away to

    The Stock tab searches free stock footage, so a cutaway is one search and one drag. For a longer interview, Auto B-Roll reads the captions and lays matching stock footage over each stretch of what is said.

  • Captions from the same words

    The transcript you cut from is also your captions, so they close up with every cut. The Words on screen menu sets how many words show at once, from one to a full line. A misheard word can be fixed in the Subtitles panel.

  • Even sound

    Normalize Audio brings a quiet guest up to the host’s level. Remove Silence cuts long pauses and closes the gap on every track, and Remove Background Sound takes out a hum like a fan. All three are in the Tools menu, under Audio.

  • Recordings that stay private

    Editing and exporting happen on your own computer, and Free Processing writes the transcript there too. Footage leaves it only if you save to cloud storage or use a tool that runs on VidTL’s servers, like Priority Processing.

Free and Pro

Pro adds the AI assistant: rough cuts that keep your best sentences, and highlight reels from a long interview.

The free plan still does the whole edit by hand. With a free account and a confirmed email, Free Processing writes the transcript on your computer. Cutting by words, cutaways, name tags, captions, the Multi Cam tools, sound clean-up and export are free, with no watermark. Pro also adds Priority Processing, a faster way to write transcripts.

See plans

Questions

Interview editing, answered.

Is there a free interview video editor?

Yes. Cutting by hand, layering b-roll, name tags, the Multi Cam tools and exporting need no account, and nothing you export has a watermark. Cutting by transcript and captions need a free account with a confirmed email, because that is what lets Free Processing write the transcript on your computer.

How do I cut an interview by its transcript?

Write the transcript with Generate Subtitles, drag across the words you want gone, and press Delete Selected. Picture, sound and captions all close up. The edit video by text page has the whole walkthrough.

How do I hide a jump cut in an interview?

Cover it. Put a shot of what the guest is talking about on the track above the interview, starting a moment before the cut and ending a moment after it. The guest’s voice keeps running underneath, and the picture changes before anyone sees the jump. Free stock footage from the Stock tab works as well as your own.

Can it cut a two-person interview between cameras?

Yes, when each person has a camera. Multi Cam Smart Sync lines the recordings up by sound, then Multi Cam Auto Cut switches to whoever is speaking, with a shortest-shot setting from 1 to 10 seconds. One camera that sees both people can’t be cut by voice. See multicam video editor.

Can it find the best answers in a long interview?

On Pro, yes. The AI assistant reads the transcript and a Rough cut keeps the sentences that tell the story, in order, or Highlight Reel picks the strongest moments. On the free plan you read the transcript and delete what you don’t need. There is a step-by-step AI rough cut of an interview walkthrough.

How long an interview can I edit, and what about webinars?

There is no limit on video length, and a recorded webinar is a video file like any other: open it, write the transcript, cut the false starts and pauses, add captions. A long recording takes longer to transcribe on your computer, and Free Processing works best in Chrome or Firefox. Priority Processing on Pro is faster.

Also in the editor

Cut your next interview by its words.

It opens in your browser on a laptop or desktop computer, with nothing to install and no watermark on what you export.

Edit an interview free See pricing