Getting started with the Studio Editor

The Studio Editor is where you edit what you already have. You can cut a video, put several clips and photos together on one timeline, add text, captions, your logo and sound, and then publish. It opens full screen and saves as you go.

This guide covers the ways in, finding your way around, and the basics that work everywhere in the editor.

Open the editor

There are several ways in. They all lead to the same editor.

From AI Studio: Edit and finish

Use this when you want to start from something in your Library or a new upload.

1. Go to AI Studio and find Edit and finish.
2. Choose a tile:
   • A video to edit: cut, caption and add music to one video.
   • Clips to put together: several videos and photos on one timeline.
   • An image to edit: opens the image editor (see The image editor).
   • A long video to clip: finds the best short moments in a long video (see Finding shorts in a long video).
3. Pick what you want in the picker (below), then press Open in the Editor →.

From AI Studio: AI tools

Use this when you know the one change you want, such as removing a background or adding music.

1. In AI Studio, find the AI tools row.
2. Click a tool, for example ★ Change the picture · video, Remove background · photo, Clean up voice, Add AI music or Auto captions.
3. Pick the video or photo, then press Open in the Editor →. The editor opens with that tool ready.

From AI Studio: Pick up where you left off

Your most recent edit projects are listed under Pick up where you left off, with how many files they use, their length and when they were last saved. Click one to reopen it.

Good to know:

• This list shows your three most recently saved projects.
• To delete a project, click the bin at the end of its row and confirm with Delete project. Posts you made from it and everything in your Library are kept. Uploads that only that project used are removed after 7 days, like any unused upload.

From your Library

• One item: hover a video or photo and click Edit, or open its ⋯ menu and choose Open in the Editor.
• One change: open the ⋯ menu, choose AI tools ▸, then pick the tool.
• Several items: tick the box on each card in the order you want them on the timeline, then press Make a video from these in the bar at the top. You can tick up to 50.

If you've edited a video or photo before, your last project for it reopens where you left off.

From a post

On a post, click ✎ Edit to open its video or image. Once the post is linked to a project, the button reads ✎ Continue editing.

Use the picker

The picker opens from every AI Studio tile and tool.

1. Choose Library or Upload from device.
2. Type in Search your Library to find something by name.
3. Tap what you want. Each item shows its name under the picture, and its length (or Photo) in the corner.
   • For Clips to put together, each pick gets a number. That number is its place on the timeline. Tap again to remove it. You can also filter by Videos and photos, Videos or Photos.
   • For everything else, tap one item. It gets a ✓.
4. For Clips to put together, check Canvas in the footer. It starts at the shape of your first video, and you can change it here or later.
5. Press Open in the Editor →.

Good to know:

• The footer shows how many you've picked and, for clips, roughly how long the video will be. Photos count as 3 seconds each.
• An item marked Processing… can be picked as soon as it's ready. An item marked Original expired has to be uploaded again.
• After an upload, the picker switches back to Library when it's ready, usually in under a minute.

Find your way around

The editor has five parts.

• Top bar: the way back, the project name, the save status, Undo and Redo, the canvas shape, Preview as, Export and Publish →. The ? opens a short guide to the editor.
• Tools on the left: Media, Make, Text, Captions, Audio, Brand and Templates. Click a tool to open its panel. Click it again to close the panel.
• The player in the middle, at the true shape of your finished video. Under it are ⏮ (previous clip), play/pause, ⏭ (next clip) and the time.
• Settings on the right for whatever you've selected. With nothing selected, it lists the main shortcuts.
• The timeline along the bottom, with the toolbar above it.

On a phone: the player is at the top, then the timeline, then a bar of tools along the bottom. Tools and settings open in a sheet that slides up. See Editing on your phone.

Saving

There's no save button. Your edits save automatically about a second after each change. The status in the top bar tells you where things stand:

The project name is in the top bar. Click it to rename the project, then press Enter to keep the name or Esc to cancel.

Undo and redo

Click Undo or Redo in the top bar, or press ⌘Z and ⇧⌘Z (Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Shift+Z on Windows). A whole drag counts as one change. On a phone, Undo and Redo are the curved arrows in the top bar.

Good to know:

• You can go back up to 150 changes.
• Your undo history starts fresh when you reload the page.
• Renaming the project isn't an undo step.

Choose the canvas shape

The canvas shape is the shape of the finished video: 9:16 Vertical for Reels, TikTok and Shorts, 4:5 Portrait or 1:1 Square for feeds, 16:9 Landscape for YouTube.

1. Open the Canvas shape menu in the top bar. On a phone or small tablet, tap ⋯ in the top bar first.
2. Pick a shape.

Clips set to Fill re-frame themselves. Text and logos keep their places. You can undo a shape change.

Preview how it looks on each app

Preview as draws an app's own buttons, caption area and profile row over the player, so you can keep text and faces clear of them.

1. Open Preview as in the top bar. On a phone or small tablet, tap ⋯ in the top bar first.
2. Pick a platform. Only your connected platforms are listed.
3. Choose No platform guides to turn it off.

Keyboard shortcuts

Shortcuts don't fire while you're typing in a box.

If your workspace is read-only

If your subscription has ended, or your seat is suspended, an amber banner explains why. You can still open and play your projects, but you can't change, save, publish or export them.

Related: Cutting and arranging clips · Text, logos, stickers, templates and captions · Sound · AI tools for video · Editing a finished reel · Finding shorts in a long video · The image editor · Publishing and exporting · Editing on your phone · Troubleshooting