How to turn a long video into a Short or Reel

Attach the long video and tell Recut which part you want, either by time or by what is said in it ("the bit where I explain pricing"). Recut can look up where those words are in the speech, cut that part out, fit it to a vertical 9:16 frame and add captions, as one plan.

Just need to do it once? Try the free video resizer and trimmer: it runs in your browser, with no sign-up and no upload.

Step by step

1. Attach the long videoAdd the podcast, webinar, stream or recording to a Recut project.
2. Say which momentGive the times if you know them, or describe what is said. Recut can read where the words are, phrase by phrase with times, to find the moment.
3. Say where it's goingName Shorts, Reels or TikTok so the clip is fitted to a 1080×1920 frame, capped to the preset's length and set to the right loudness.
4. Review the plan and runRecut lists the steps (find the moment, trim, export, captions) before running. Check the start and end times, then run it. Repeat for the next clip.

What Recut does

Recut breaks the job into steps and passes each result to the next: the trimmed clip goes into the platform export, and the exported clip into the captions. The trim, the export and drawing the captions run on your device; finding the words and timing the captions use a transcription model, a fraction of a cent each.

Because every result is kept, you can go back to the trimmed clip and make a second version with a different crop, caption style or platform without starting again.

Tips

• Describe the moment with words that are actually said in it; it makes the moment easy to find.
• Speakers off-centre in a wide shot? Keep the whole picture with blurred bars instead of cropping.
• Save the plan as a template once you like it, and use it for the next episode.

What it doesn't do

• Recut doesn't watch a long video and pick the most shareable moments for you, or score clips. You choose the moment; Recut does the cutting and finishing.
• The crop is centred and doesn't follow the speaker.
• Long, high-resolution files are processed on your device, so they take longer on a slower machine.

Related guides

• How to trim the start or end of a videoTell Recut the times to keep, or say "cut before the first words", and it trims the video on your device in seconds, with no upload to an editor.
• How to resize a video for TikTok, Reels and ShortsAsk Recut to export a video for TikTok, Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts: a 9:16 frame at 1080×1920, 30 fps and even loudness.
• How to add captions to a video automaticallyAttach a video, type "add captions" and Recut times each word to the speech and burns captions in, styled to read on a phone.
• How to transcribe a video to textAttach a video and ask for a transcript: Recut takes out the sound and runs a speech-to-text model such as ElevenLabs Scribe or Whisper.