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Make your first cut

This guide takes you from an empty project to an exported video. Everything here uses the free editor; the only optional credit spend is automatic captions.

1. Create the cut​

From Home or the Cut tab, click the New cut card. You'll land in the editor with an empty timeline. Corte autosaves as you work and syncs the project to the cloud, so there's no save button to worry about (though ⌘S works if it makes you feel better).

2. Import your media​

Press ⌘I (or File → Import Media…) and drop in video, audio, or images. Files land in the Media panel on the left. You can also pull from your Library — anything you've generated in Studio — or straight from a connected Shopify, Squarespace, or Dropbox account.

app.corte.so
Add mediaUploadLibraryShopify
GeneratedUpload0:14GeneratedUpload0:06
The media picker — Upload, Library, and any connected integrations appear as tabs.

3. Build the timeline​

Drag clips from the Media panel onto the timeline. A few edits cover most of a first cut:

  • Trim — drag a clip's edges, or park the playhead and press Q (trim start to playhead) / W (trim end to playhead).
  • Split — ⌘K cuts the selected clip at the playhead.
  • Ripple delete — ⇧⌫ removes a clip and closes the gap.
  • Rearrange — drag clips along or between tracks; new tracks appear as you need them.
app.corte.so interactive
00:0000:0500:1000:1500:20
T1 · TextTitle — “Fall drop”Captions
V1 · Videointerview.mp4broll-01.mp4product-detail.mp4
A1 · Audio
Selected: talking-head⌘K splitQ trim startW trim end⇧⌫ ripple delete
Try it: click a clip to select it, exactly like the real timeline.

Undo is always ⌘Z — experiment freely.

4. Add captions​

Open the transcript tools and choose Add captions. Corte transcribes your audio (word-accurate, 72 credits per hour of audio) and lays a styled caption track over the video. Pick a style and an animation — captions stay editable text, so fixing a word is just typing.

Prefer manual titles? Drag a Text element in from the Media panel instead — those are free.

5. Export​

Press ⌘E or click Export in the rail.

app.corte.so
Export
FormatH.264H.265FCPXML
Resolution1920 × 1080
Frame rate30 fps
WatermarkNever
CancelExport video
Export renders in your browser — no upload queue, no watermark, on every plan.
  • H.264 / H.265 — a finished video file, rendered right in the browser.
  • FCPXML / XML — hand the cut to DaVinci Resolve or Final Cut Pro to finish there.

Exports are free and never watermarked, including on the Free plan.

Keep going​