97
votes

What video editing software would you recommend on Ubuntu (or Linux in general) and why? It can be for either beginners or experienced users.

Please only place one piece of software per response and include details to what makes it great!

2

9 Answers 9

44
votes

Openshot

Install via the software center

OpenShot can take your videos, photos, and music files and help you create the film you have always dreamed of. Easily add sub-titles, transitions, and effects, and then export your film to DVD, YouTube, Vimeo, Xbox 360, and many other common formats.

alt text

7
  • 5
    What's so great about it?
    – badp
    Oct 11, 2010 at 11:48
  • 5
    It's much more stable than PiTiVi (in which you simply can't get things done), has transition effects, and easy joining of multiple clips together. Saves much time.
    – culebrón
    Feb 7, 2013 at 13:48
  • 2
    I tried OpenShot based on this answer. For me it crashes on exporting long videos, and is quite cumbersome to align short video fragments exactly. I cannot recommend.
    – SCBuergel
    Jul 20, 2016 at 8:31
  • Lovely! Looks like nice, simple what used to be called "A/B-Roll" Editing. Just what an editor needs...
    – Frank N
    Oct 31, 2016 at 0:40
  • Major difficulty with open shot is that it's impossible to select more than one clip section at a time. So if you want to "fill a gap" moving all the later clips back, it's very hard work. A bug has been filed for this since 2009, but nobody has implemented it yet. Feb 18, 2017 at 14:29
25
votes

PiTiVi:

Install via the software center

PiTiVi is an easy-to-use video editor targeted at beginners and intermediate users.

PiTiVi Screenshot

6
  • Pitivi is really shaping up with more great things (such as video effects) on the horizon. Oct 11, 2010 at 8:19
  • I'd pick Pitivi over Openshot because it just works while Openshot feels really strange to use. If you don't need effects and just need to edit videos, Pitivi is perfect. Otherwise look at Openshot.
    – mniess
    Oct 22, 2010 at 19:51
  • It's still very basic compared to other tools, and even the latest versions crash all the time.
    – culebrón
    Feb 7, 2013 at 11:42
  • Much easier interface than Openshot: visible audio waveform, video thumbnails on the timeline, good keyboard shortcuts, copy-paste from timestamp, which is more precise, not a cpu hog.
    – nealmcb
    Oct 25, 2013 at 4:11
  • Its interface is very well designed, but since it's fully written in Python it can respond terribly slow. Mar 23, 2017 at 19:18
21
votes

I have found kdenlive to be very easy to use and serves most editing needs very well:

Install via the software center

I understand it is now available for other desktop environments as well. Hence made it a separate answer so others can vote up their choice.

from their website

7
  • Kdenlive reminds me of Sony Vegas, it is quite a good program, though I have not used it in a while. Oct 11, 2010 at 8:19
  • 1
    Kdenlive's software dependencies may look too overwhelming for GNOME users though.
    – Gödel
    Oct 11, 2010 at 8:40
  • 3
    You don't have to use KDE to try kdenlive. It's available from the Ubuntu Software Centre and runs great in default Ubuntu Gnome environment. Oct 11, 2010 at 10:15
  • 4
    It seems silly to avoid using an otherwise good application because it has KDE-based dependencies. It's perfectly fine to run apps that depend on parts of KDE in gnome, and won't harm you or your desktop environment at all. Linux distros are supposed to be about bringing software together, not segregating it into all GTK/Gnome-based apps for Gnome or all Qt/KDE-based apps for KDE. If your package manager allows it, go ahead and mix-and-match. Gnome even does a fairly good job of integrating (some) KDE apps some of the time. kdenlive looks quite distinctive though. Apr 22, 2012 at 10:28
  • 1
    I also use kdenlive on Unity and it is awesome. Jun 16, 2012 at 6:49
14
votes

You have quite a few options:

Cinelerra

A non-linear video editor and compositor for Linux. It also allows users to perform common compositing operations such as keying and mattes.

enter image description here

Installation guide for 12.04 & 12.10

Avidemux

Avidemux is a free video editor designed for simple cutting, filtering and encoding tasks.

enter image description here

Kdenlive

Kdenlive is an intuitive and powerful multi-track video editor, including most recent video technologies.

enter image description here

Comparison

enter image description here

Cinelerra is used for professional work. It is very fast, and can handle a heavy load.

2
  • Have you found a way to make Cineleerra work in Ubuntu 12.04? AFAIK It won't run on 11.10 and further releases. Thanks in advance. Mar 4, 2013 at 20:16
  • Yes. See the edit. Hope it helps. Cheers :)
    – abhshkdz
    Mar 4, 2013 at 20:19
7
votes

Excellent question, because at this time it has not been addressed. I know exactly what you are going through. I've been down that road of frustration. I tried everything in the repos and everything I could manage to successfully compile. One app stood out above them all: OpenShot. Try it out.

  • It's in the repos, No confusing compiling necessary.
  • It has an intuitive interface.
  • It's stable.
  • Decent package of features.

There is one small dependency you might need for some hd wide-screen output but that's it.

I would suggest:

  • Vlc to make your clips
  • Audacity to edit your audio
  • Gnome-subtitles to add subtitles if you need
  • OpenShot to build your audio/video project

That's the real aspiring Directors package right there, when the professional stuff is out of reach, or for the hobbiest.

OpenShot also has a forum where you can showcase what you've done.

If you need any help getting vlc to make clips, just ask me, it can be a little confusing the first clip. OpenShot is so intuitive, I'd be surprised if you asked a question. I tried all the others, and finally found OpenShot last. OpenShot is what you want. Beat the others hands down.

This is just one fan vid I did. Check out what you can do: (Beware I Am A Vampire Fan!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_7iZfd63y4

Helpfull things To Know About OpenShot:

  • Save your project and videos in the same folder.
  • Save often, and save using Number, i.e., projectSave#1, projectSave#2, etc. You can go back to a previous state if you change your mind or have a strange issue.
  • Do not use an exported video as a source to build another video, every time you convert, quality will degrade. Use only direct source if possible with clips.
  • Do not use clips that are too long.
  • Do not move clips outside of you project folder, or you will disable your project.
  • Buy some RAM if you've been putting it off. It will smooth things out.
  • If you notice something out of the ordinary with the program itself, save then, and see if the bug goes away, or to go back to your last save. Otherwise if you continue to work, there is a potential for loss of work.
  • Keep a processor monitor up while you work, and if you apply an operation that consume lots of processor percentage, wait till it's done. I'm impatient and multi-task and crashed OpenShot because I tried to apply too many operations that had a heavy load all too close to one another.
  • Make sure you are up to date on your codecs!

With that in mind, some of the other editors would not even start or crash once a clip was added, or just flat out not work. OpenShot will get the project done if you take those things in mind.

5
votes

blender is a very capable option. It's essentially a 3D-modelling and animation platform, but also has video editing capabilities (which I haven't tested yet). It's worth giving a go, but I'd recommend watching some tutorials first, as the UI has an unusual logic, which takes a while to get used to. The interaction model is very consistent though, and optimised for productivity. Overall, it's one of the most mature and impressive graphic design packages with an open license Blender

3
  • 2
    You didn't answer fully: what's so great about it? Add a link maybe? :)
    – badp
    Oct 11, 2010 at 11:48
  • 7
    Blender is a very powerful tool, I've worked with it recently and was very impressed. It's essentially a 3D-modelling and animation platform, but also has video editing capabilities (which I haven't tested yet). It's worth giving a go, but I'd recommend watching some tutorials first, as the UI has an unusual logic, which takes a while to get used to. The interaction model is very consistent though, and optimised for productivity. Overall, it's one of the most mature and impressive graphic design packages with an open license. Check blender.org Oct 11, 2010 at 13:25
  • Too hard for just cutting a few videos. Mar 23, 2017 at 19:25
4
votes

DVBcut

Install via the software center

DVBcut is a Qt application that allows you to select certain parts of an MPEG transport stream (as received via Digital Video Broadcasting, DVB) and save these parts into a single MPEG output file. It follows a "keyhole surgery" approach where the input video and audio data is mostly kept unchanged, and only very few frames at the beginning and/or end of the selected range are re-encoded in order to obtain a valid MPEG file.

dvbcut

If you have a DVB recorder or a digital TV card and want to cut off some parts from your recordings (like commercials) frame-exactly without re-encoding the whole file, use DVBcut. Not suitable for most other purposes.

Documentation about how to use it you can find on it's homepage.

1
  • also, perfect for video.ts transport files
    – user47206
    Feb 21, 2013 at 9:46
2
votes

Other option that seems to be a professional option is novacut.

Find more info to install it here:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Novacut/HowToInstall

And here you go the official website for novacut:
http://novacut.com/
http://blog.novacut.com/

0
votes

"really good" is of course subjective and it depends on what you think of the interface and features.

Personally I like Openshot. Easy to use, nice itnerface, all the features I have ever needed.

enter image description here

sudo apt-get install openshot

Alternates include Cinelerra (not in the Ubuntu repos), Avidemux, Kdenlive, and Kino.

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