﻿So, you're looking to change video editors? Good choice! In 2024, there are so many amazing
platforms out there, and as someone who has used Premiere Pro for the majority of my 20 years
editing, recently my eyes were opened to DaVinci Resolve and CapCut. And now that I've seen them
and what they can do, there ain't no way I'm ever going back to Premiere. Never, ever, ever, never,
never, never, ever... or will I. I'm pretty sure I won't. So, which is the better editor of the two?
After using both DaVinci and CapCut for editing my YouTube videos, I've got some pretty definite
observations and insights that will help you make that decision. So, stick around to the end if you
want the full list. I won't cover every single feature, but I will share the main differences
between the two that I've noticed and ultimately who I think each software is for. DaVinci and
CapCut are completely free. You don't need to pay a cent to use either one, while they both
do have paid versions: DaVinci at $295 USD and CapCut at either $8 or $9 USD per month.
These really are optional and not essential for most use cases; therefore, pricing isn't really
a factor. How easy are they to use? Well, I'd say CapCut is probably the easiest software I've ever
used. I picked it up in literally 10 minutes. It has a very similar layout to other editors,
and they've really simplified the user experience. Most features are either drag-and-drop, or various
tools can very easily be found in the extremely simplified menus. Whereas, DaVinci Resolve... you
can't do the same thing. It's going to take a bit of time to learn it because it is a more complex
and nuanced software with a lot more features, therefore a lot more learning time. So, while you
can learn the basics in under an hour, to master the entire program, it's going to take quite a bit
longer. So what about basic trimming and editing of clips? While they can do the basics of trimming
quite well, one big downside I've noticed of CapCut is its inability to do multi-track
editing. Here's what I mean: So, I've got a clip here, which is easy enough to cut up. However,
when you add a second layer, here is a text layer. Let's say I want to delete left or Ripple trim,
which is one of the most common edits you make when you're cutting up dialogue. When I press Q on
the keyboard, it trims track one but not track 2, a.k.a. the text layer. This makes editing multiple
layers extremely frustrating because let's say I wanted to cut right through these two layers,
both the text and the A camera. Instead, I'm going to make a split in that clip, select the previous
clip, and delete it. Then, it throws track two out, so it's no longer in sync with the cut
point of the bottom track. And that just took me maybe 10 clicks. Here's the same thing in DaVinci:
press Q, and it Ripple trims both layers. So, I'd say if you're only planning on editing one
single video on one track, this won't be an issue. However, if you're like me and you like editing
with lots of tracks, this is going to be a big issue in CapCut and slow down your edits. I know
this sounds like a small thing, but you make cuts like this hundreds of times throughout a
video edit; therefore, it's going to add lots of little 2-3-5-second increments onto your overall
edit time.Here's another difference between the two: In DaVinci, let's say I want to move this
text down and center it. I'll select the text, go to settings, then position, and place it roughly
where I think it belongs, which is probably about there. That's fine. But in CapCut, watch this.
This is potentially the... or one of the best features of CapCut: the interactive viewer. I love
being able to drag and drop graphics so easily and have the blue guidelines guide you toward
the center of the frame, especially handy for symmetry freaks like me. I'm fairly sure DaVinci
doesn't have this feature. When I click and drag, nothing happens. What about adding an animation to
this text? So, in... it's pretty straightforward. Select the text, choose a transition you like,
drag and drop it on, and... yeah, that was pretty good. The transition isn't amazing, and a lot of
the DaVinci templates, while they're pretty fun, I wouldn't use the majority of them. In CapCut, to
do the same thing, you just select a text, head to animation, and here is a full library of different
text effects that you can click to preview, and these are actually, like, pretty good. I think
I'd use them. In fact, I'd definitely use them and have used them in my last few videos. So, I'd say
the inbuilt library of transitions and animations is definitely better within CapCut. This not only
applies to text but also other drag-and-drop effects where it's literally just one click of
a button, and it applies the effect, as well as silly sticker overlays like this, LOL. And while
DaVinci does have some effect templates that are honestly quite good, the program overall relies
more on you creating your own within the software, which can be done in the Fusion Tab. And this is
essentially like the After Effects of DaVinci Resolve, and it allows you to create effects from
scratch that are miles better than the ones inside CapCut. However, it does require you doing it
manually at first and saving it as a template for you to then use in the future, whereas, I don't
know, I kind of like having the presets in CapCut without having to make them from scratch. To me,
personally, a fast workflow is really important, which is why having a big library of templates
and effects is super valuable. So, I'd say I'd rate them about even for effects and templates,
with CapCut having more inbuilt and ready-to-go, and DaVinci having the ability to create more
advanced templates and effects, as well as import other effects that people have made and uploaded
to various websites like Motion Array, which is nice to have, but again, personally, I'd
kind of rather have the effects inbuilt to begin with just to keep things simple. Whereas, CapCut
doesn't allow you to import outside graphics into CapCut. What about color correction? Well, yes,
obviously DaVinci Resolve wins for this. It's the best software there is for color correction
and allows you to do anything your heart desires color-wise with your footage. They use DaVinci
Resolve in Hollywood, and it's really such a powerful tool for color correction, so hands down,
it wins. However, how does it compare to CapCut? This may shock you. So, I'm going to select a
clip and head over to adjustment. And CapCut has not just one but four tabs of color correction
options, including a color oscilloscope in the viewer because who doesn't like a good
oscilloscope? I know I do. Anyway, so it's got all the basics of color correction. This is the kind
of stuff you'll see in the Lumetri tab in Premiere Pro. Then it's also got HSL adjustments, so if you
want to isolate individual colors and work just on those, you can do that. It's got curves if
you like color correcting that way, as well as color wheels. So yeah, it's not DaVinci-level
color correction, but it's also not beginner-level color correction. There's quite a lot of options
here, so I definitely rate CapCut for color correction. I'd say it's for sure good enough
for most use cases. Not every single project needs Hollywood-level color correction when all you need
to do is just change a few sliders here and there and you're good. What about audio editing? Well,
unfortunately, this is another downside of CapCut. While you can edit audio and they do have some
filters that do it automatically, like loudness normalization, and if you do pay for the Pro
version, you can select enhanced voice and vocal isolation, which is a really good feature. Aside
from that, I've got to say I really don't like the audio editing of CapCut. The main reason being,
if your sound is embedded in your clip like this one is, the waveforms are so small you basically
need to get out a microscope to see them. Like, literally, if your clip is selected and the
white border is around it, it conflicts with the waveform so much that you're basically guessing
where to cut since more experienced editors cut based on the waveforms more than the actual clips.
So, I found when editing with CapCut, I have to actually deselect the clip then shuttle over frame
by frame... okay, there I can see is a waveform, so I'll make a cut there. And still, the waveforms
are so small, and keyframing the audio is equally hard because it's really so hard to see these
waveforms. Like when the peaks go into the orange zone, which is too loud, you've really got to
squint to see what you're doing. Whereas if they did have a dedicated audio track, which you can
create if you right-click and go extract audio, this does make it easier. But then it creates
other issues with the multi-track editing causing your clips to easily go out of sync. And yes,
while you can group a clip like this, it still just makes it really hard to edit this way. Like,
I'm trying to unselect one of these two clips, and it's not unselecting. Whereas in DaVinci,
there is a dedicated audio track which you can drag to be as big as you like, and it's really
easy to keyframe the audio as well. So, there in just a few seconds, I've isolated this part of the
audio to make louder or quieter. And this is the visual experience you want when editing audio. It
needs to be really big because clearer visibility translates to a faster editing experience. Also,
DaVinci has an entire tab dedicated to audio called Fairlight where you can do all kinds
of advanced stuff to your audio. So, without question, DaVinci Resolve beats CapCut for
audio editing unless you only need the absolute basics and you're happy for the auto leveler
within CapCut to do all the work, which can actually be okay if you recorded your audio
properly to begin with. But if it's a track that needs more individualized editing, then DaVinci is
going to be the better choice. Another strength of CapCut is the automatic captions option, which is
available in the free version. These captions are super stylish, and both the free and paid
versions come with a ton of templates that are great options for capturing short attention spans
on social media. Whereas with DaVinci Resolve, you need to buy the paid version to get automatic
captions, and if you only do the bare minimum of tweaks, they're not going to be on the level of
CapCut. What about more advanced features for more professional use cases? While CapCut does have
some advanced features, some of my favorites being Auto Cutout, where it automatically removes the
background even if you didn't use a green screen. Here's another cool one: it's called Relight,
where you're literally relighting your scene after the fact, and you can change the intensity,
the color of the light. This is literally acting like a light source in the scene; that is pretty
advanced. And there are a few other decently intermediate to advanced features in CapCut.
But they have built the CapCut Editor to appeal to a more beginner-friendly audience. Therefore,
you're not going to get anywhere near the amount of advanced features as you do in
DaVinci. DaVinci is without question the best option for advanced video editing since it has
multiple tabs dedicated to multiple steps within your video editing workflow. Each of which has
hundreds of potential customizations you can make to your video, including editing effects,
color correction, audio, and export. All of these act like their own software, yet it's built into
the one DaVinci Resolve software. Whereas you wouldn't say that about CapCut, these are just
like boxes you can tick yes or no. So, definitely, DaVinci wins for advanced features. Another place
they differ slightly is with mobile friendliness. With CapCut, you can edit on your computer, on
your phone, tablet, or even an internet browser. The best experience is obviously going to be on
a desktop where you've got a faster computer, but it does have an amazing mobile app which is great
for quick video and reels. DaVinci doesn't have a mobile app, but they do have an iPad app which is
kind of like a simplified version of the main software that still goes pretty advanced. But
personally, again, I'd recommend editing on a computer instead. The export settings of CapCut
leave a lot to be desired. The maximum resolution is 4K, and the other customization options are
really on the basic side here. There's really only a handful of basic options. Again, because
it's designed for a beginner-friendly audience. So, if export formats are important to you,
then you'll probably want to consider DaVinci. These are good enough, but due to there being
so few options, either you've got to sacrifice a little bit on video quality, or if you choose
something like Pro Res, it totally blows out your file size to 20 times what it should be. However,
for social media, you can get away with H.264 or HEVC for good enough video quality. With DaVinci,
you've got a lot more options here: H.264 and H.265. It's got presets for YouTube and
all the various platforms, and just a lot more individualization of your export settings that
you can take advantage of, and you're a lot less likely to end up with a low-quality video or a
video where the file size is way too big. It's important to know though that both platforms
have limitations when it comes to exporting: with DaVinci, the limit is 4K resolution, so if you're
exporting anything higher, you'll need to upgrade to the paid version, which allows you to export,
get this, up to 32K resolution, which I'm sure is very common. Yeah, and with CapCut, the export
limitation is 15 minutes; as long as your video is under 15 minutes, you can export it. If it's over,
you will need to upgrade to CapCut Pro. The final factor I'll mention that I have noticed
with both programs is performance speed. CapCut is undeniably fast, both for video editing even with
multiple tracks and lots of graphics, but also exporting, which takes literally minutes or less
even for a 10-minute video. And my Mac has not had any issues editing videos in CapCut. Whereas,
admittedly, I have had some crashes with DaVinci Resolve because I like doing multi-track editing
with lots of 4K clips. It does sometimes stress it out, especially when you're using graphics,
and the program can crash. Luckily, both of these programs have an automatic save feature,
so it doesn't matter. You're not going to lose work even if the software does crash. However,
one downside of the free version of DaVinci is this performance issue which is where upgrading
will fix that issue because the paid Studio version has GPU acceleration and allows you
to use multiple GPUs which inevitably speeds up the editing workflow significantly. So,
in conclusion, both CapCut and DaVinci Resolve are fantastic editors, and if you choose either one,
you'd be making a good choice since they are fully functional with the free version; you
don't need to upgrade unless you want those extra Pro features. But again, you really don't need to.
And while there are other free editors out there, nothing touches these two in terms of what you get
with the free version. So, if you're a complete beginner, you've just picked up video editing
and you want to start a YouTube channel and make your own content without a massive learning curve,
then CapCut is the obvious choice. It has a lot of fantastic features and is so easy to learn,
which makes it a no-brainer if you're a beginner who wants a fast workflow. Whereas if you consider
yourself a more experienced creator, you've used a few other programs before like Premiere Pro,
Final Cut Pro, Avid, and so on, and you're ready to upgrade to a more modern editor, something that
does all the things that the non-linear editors do, that After Effects does, that Audition does,
and also does world-class color correction, then DaVinci Resolve or DaVinci Resolve Studio
is definitely going to be the right choice since you can get way more customized edits in DaVinci,
the trimming workflow is much faster due to the multi-track editing, and you really can go quite
advanced with your graphics. So, DaVinci really could serve as the only editor you'll ever need,
whereas with CapCut, you probably wouldn't stay on CapCut forever. Eventually,
once you're getting good at making videos, you'd then upgrade to DaVinci. I can say personally,
and again, I've been editing videos for 20 years, I'm going to be using both. I think CapCut has a
place for simple videos for social media with cool graphics and automatic captions that are
really well optimized for social media, TikTok, reels, and so on. But my main editor is going
to be DaVinci Resolve because you can edit bigger projects much faster and it's got way
more advanced options for when I need them. So, even if you are an experienced editor,
I would suggest trying CapCut; you'll be able to pick it up like this, and you might even find that
you love it since it really does make video editing a fun experience. And unfortunately,
that was something that I completely lost with Premiere. Now, is there anything that you would
add to this comparison? If so, let me know down below. If you're going to give CapCut a go,
then be sure to download my free CapCut keyboard shortcuts cheat sheet if you want to edit 10 times
faster through using one-tap shortcuts on the keyboard. And now that this video has hopefully
helped you decide which of the two video editors to use, your next step is learning how to edit
with them. So, in these videos here, you'll find my complete beginner guides to DaVinci
Resolve and CapCut and how you can get up and running with them in less than 20 minutes.