The Adobe Suite is a mainstay of creatives everywhere, and one of the most common apps is Adobe Premiere—the video-editing software. However, I’ve switched to an open-source alternative, and I don’t regret it for a moment.
What Video Editor Features Do I Need?
Many of the complaints about open-source alternatives to premium software like Adobe Premiere boil down to one thing: they lack features.
In searching for a Premiere replacement, my only real criteria were that the app must work on both Linux and Windows and that it must provide a majority of the features that Premiere does. It didn’t need to be perfect, just “close enough.”
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Most of the options I tried actually worked reasonably well and had the features I was looking for, but Kdenlive stood head-and-shoulders above the rest of the pack.
Kdenlive Is Feature-Packed and Reliable
In the time I was initially testing Kdenlive—maybe two hours total—it didn’t experience any major hiccups or hang during normal editing, which is impressive considering I was running it on what is now an older laptop.
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Nor did it crash once, even when I started pushing it by loading in ridiculously large files, stacking and layering effects in absurd ways, and otherwise attempting to break it. My laptop—if it could speak—would have been complaining loudly, however.
Otherwise, editing was smooth and error-free. Most of the user interface was extremely intuitive, especially if you’re familiar with video editors in general.
Nor did I find myself reaching for specific features only to find them missing. A common complaint about open-source projects in general is that they often lack many of the important features.
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That wasn’t the case with Kdenlive coming from Premiere.
Every filter or effect I wanted to test out was available, and I didn’t find any of them particularly cumbersome to use. They’re not identical to Adobe Premiere, but they’re not different enough that they’re difficult to learn.
Luckily, they’re not buried anywhere strange either, and there is a convenient search function.
Even relatively complicated features, like motion tracking, ran well.
The only complaint I have, and it is admittedly small, is that the color grading tools don’t quite feel as nice as some other apps I’ve used. This isn’t a complaint specifically about Kdenlive either; Premiere also feels lacking compared to DaVinci Resolve, which has famously great color grading tools.
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I’ll stick to DaVince Resolve for the rare instances where I want to do color grading, but otherwise, I’ve been completely happy with my transition to Kdenlive.
As an added bonus, Kdenlive is pretty much identical on Windows, Linux, and macOS, which means I don’t need to relearn a new tool when I switch between devices.
Professional Video Editing Software Is Expensive
Adobe Premiere, depending on which license you pursue, costs anywhere between $23 per month for the individual program or 70 dollars for access to the whole Creative Cloud package. Other professional video-editing software available for Windows is comparably expensive.
If you’re a professional or a freelancer that makes use of it, that sort of monthly fee is probably relatively easy to accept. However, I (and most other digital weekend warriors) only occasionally need to edit video files.
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That makes the $300 annual cost of Premiere pretty unpalatable. Even Vegas Pro, which is much less expensive at about $100 per year, is a steep ask for intermittent use.
That makes Kdenlive a no-brainer for me, and it should be one if the first applications you try before you actually pay for video editing software. In a worst-case scenario, it doesn’t work out and you simply uninstall it. In a best-case scenario, you could save yourself hundreds of dollars.
Not only is Kdenlive completely free, it is also open source, which gives you as much control over the app as you want. If you don’t want to update, you don’t have to. There isn’t any DRM to worry about.
If the project is ever abandoned by its current developers, it’ll likely be picked up by others and carried forward.
The combination of the open-source model, the superb features, and the cost makes Kdenlive an instant install on every PC I own, regardless of the operating system or my intended use. It is just a great tool to have on hand.
