6 Alternatives To CapCut For Mobile Video Editing

Smartphones have been improving steadily with every launch, with the latest from Samsung and Apple boasting impressive cameras and giant displays. While most of us might appreciate the gains in photo and video quality, not many realize that these smartphones are now more than powerful enough to edit the videos they capture in full resolution.

Yes, the default editing tools in your photo gallery app come in clutch when you need to trim a video or add a filter to your selfie, but the app store on your phone is home to countless hidden gems that enable greater possibilities. One such video editing app that rose to popularity, largely thanks to TikTok and Instagram Reels, is CapCut. There are some incredibly handy features in CapCut — some even assisted by AI. That said, overreliance on a single popular video editing tool isn't ideal, especially for an app like CapCut that has been facing regulatory scrutiny. 

CapCut was banned in the US recently, though the app has resumed its operations and is back on the App Store and the Google Play Store — at least until the next time TikTok finds itself in another controversy in the United States. Thankfully, there is no shortage of feature-packed video editing apps on mobile, which is exactly what we will be diving into today. 

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the most popular professional-grade video editing apps — and has been used to edit several blockbusters such as "Avatar." The program is available on desktop computers running Windows and macOS. Premiere Rush is Adobe's offering in this domain of mobile-friendly video editing apps and is available on Android and iOS.

Though it's a significantly watered-down version of its desktop counterpart, Premiere Rush has a decent selection of editing tools that can help you create videos that don't immediately give away that they were edited on a smartphone. Premiere Rush isn't exactly marketed as a video editing solution to your average Joe — so you'll definitely benefit from going in with a little experience beforehand. 

You can create your first project by choosing media files from your phone and selecting your desired aspect ratio. The app features a timeline, which contains your audio and video clips. You can add more of these tracks and layer your clips with precision. Premiere Rush comes with a couple of free graphical elements, including titles, transitions, and video overlays. 

One of my favorite things about the app is the ability to tweak the colors in your video clips using simple sliders. Alternatively, you can choose from one of the many built-in color presets to add some punch to your footage. While the free version is decent enough for quick edits, you will need to upgrade to the premium subscription to export in 4K. Plans start at $5 per month.

KineMaster has been around for ages and remains one of the most feature-packed video editing apps you can use on Android or iOS. If you're familiar with editing videos on desktop programs like Premiere Pro or DaVinci Resolve, you will feel right at home with the familiar layout of KineMaster. 

The media picker does a good job of displaying photos and videos and sorts them based on the albums on your phone. You can also filter to find just photos or videos. Tapping on any media files will immediately throw them into your video timeline. Selecting a clip on your timeline will bring up the utilities tab on the right, which houses your usual set of editing tools and effects.

Like any video editing app, KineMaster lets you quickly trim, splice, and merge audio and video clips. You can add effects, stickers, and text to your clips. There's also a huge library of royalty-free background music, which is great for those looking to edit and publish videos on platforms like YouTube that let you monetize your content. KineMaster works in the landscape orientation, which gives you a lot more room to manage things on your timeline — especially when editing 16:9 videos. 

KineMaster's free version does let you export in 4K, but you'll need to upgrade to the premium version to get rid of the watermark, which costs $9.99 a month. This also enables cloud storage, gets rid of ads, and unlocks all premium assets in the app.

Available for both Android and iOS devices, Wondershare's Filmora has a comparatively easier and more modern user interface compared to Premiere Rush or KineMaster. With so many AI apps available on phones, it has become next to impossible to find one that doesn't feature AI in some form or another — and Filmora is no different. 

From simpler utilities like an AI remover to get rid of photobombers from your clips to a full-blown text-to-video AI generator, Filmora isn't shying away from incorporating next-gen intelligence in its app — for better or for worse. Even if you decide to completely ignore the AI features, Filmora offers a complete fleet of video editing tools, including a timeline view where you can layer your clips with greater freedom and add seamless transitions. 

Filmora also makes using certain features like keyframe adjustment and speed curves a lot easier, especially for beginners who aren't familiar with these controls. What surprised me was the ability to track objects in clips, which can then be applied to stickers or text that follow the subject through the frame.

Filmora has a huge library of effects and transitions — most of which are unfortunately restricted to the $8.99/month pro version, which you will need to remove the watermark and unlock AI credits. The free version is also limited to 720p exports, which can be a dealbreaker for many.

Available for Android and iOS, Splice is the most user-friendly app I've tried for editing videos. On the first launch, the app asks you a few questions, including your video editing experience — and tailors the options that fit you the best. Like other apps on this list, Splice makes it easy for you to find and select media files from your gallery. Once imported, you get the option to edit your video manually or use the AI Compilation feature that syncs your clips to a matching beat. The app also walked me through all the available video editing tools and interactive elements. 

You can create different layers by simply long-pressing and dragging your clips onto a different track. There are handy volume and speed control sliders at the bottom that let you even out the sound across all clips or slow down footage for a dramatic feel. The built-in filters are easy to pick and adjust, but the premium version of the app lets you manually tweak the colors in your clips. There are a few other features like subject cutout, animations, and masking tools that are locked behind the paywall — but the majority of regular video editing tools are free. 

If you try to export a video that has pro effects applied, Splice will actually list all premium elements so you can go back and remove them. The free version lets you export videos up to 1080p. However, at $9.99 per week, Splice is quite an expensive video editing app.

InShot has a staggering 4.9-star rating on the Google Play Store, with over 500 million downloads — making it one of the most popular apps on this list. The app is geared towards those who want to perform quick video edits on their Android or iOS smartphone, which explains the easy-to-use interface and playful icons. Multi-track editing is also possible, but it only shows up when you have an effect applied over a clip. Audio tracks can be edited separately, and InShot has an expansive library of background music you can add to your videos — or you could record a few lines of your own.

There are several built-in color filters that can switch the look of your clips in an instant, but you can manually tweak all parameters, such as brightness, contrast, saturation, and tint, for individual clips. InShot has a bunch of quick video cropping options that let you match the aspect ratio to post quality content on Instagram Reels, TikTok, or even a wider 2.35:1 CinemaScope format. 

Surprisingly, the free version lets you export in 4K resolution, albeit you do have to deal with (an easily cropable) watermark. In my time testing, I found InShot to be one of the best free video editing apps. Short of a few AI editing tools and transitions, you have a variety of features at your disposal. If you do decide to pay for the premium version, it will cost you $4.99 a month or $49.99 for a lifetime license. 

If you are an iPhone user and aren't looking for an app as advanced as Premiere Rush or KineMaster to edit quick and fun videos, the built-in iMovie app is worth checking out. It's devoid of any ads and doesn't bother you with hiding features behind a paywall. More importantly, it's designed to be user-friendly and accommodating to those who aren't familiar with editing videos, especially on the smaller screen of an iPhone. 

There are a handful of templates that help you get started, and titles and transitions that you can add within a project. The editing experience is largely clutter-free, but you do get a timeline to better manage your audio and video clips. The iMovie app is also available on iPad and Mac, and you can AirDrop project files directly across your devices to pick up edits where you left off.

We also checked out the Clips app on iPhone, which offers a more fun way to capture and edit videos on your device. The app uses your iPhone's LiDAR sensor to add a touch of AR (Augmented Reality) to your videos. You can scan your surroundings and add cool effects that wrap around the walls and objects in your room. In this world of short attention spans, Clips is the perfect way to add some flare to your TikToks or Instagram Reels — something that would've taken ages to motion track and edit in After Effects.

With cameras that can zoom beyond 100x and processors capable of rendering high-quality 3D games, both the Play Store and the App Store are packed with video editing apps. As someone who has intermediate experience editing videos on desktop-grade apps such as Premiere Pro, I was intrigued to see just how close their mobile counterparts have come.

For each app on this list, the feature set and ease of use were considered. We've also made sure that the free versions of these apps provide enough functionality to edit a video from start to finish — though you might want to stick to the ones that offer full-resolution exports. Apps like KineMaster and Premiere Rush are designed for those who are familiar with video editing, while options like InShot and Splice create an easier entry point for those new to content creation.