Exporting a captioned video at the right quality

The resolution buttons sit in the bar across the top of the editor: Original, 2K, 1080p and 720p. On a phone they move into the menu behind the three dots. Each figure is the short side of the frame, so 1080p for a vertical Reel means 1080 by 1920 pixels, and 720p means 720 by 1280.

Original keeps the size of the file you uploaded, up to your plan's ceiling. Free and Shuru export at up to 1080p; Josh and Superstar go up to 2K, which is 1440 pixels on the short side. On a plan capped at 1080p the 2K button carries a lock, and Original is held at 1080p rather than refused. The export never enlarges a smaller video, so a 720p source set to 2K stays at 720p.

The right figure depends on the source and on where the video is going:

The export is built to change as little as it can. It keeps the source's frame rate, so a 30 fps clip stays at 30 and a 60 fps one at 60. When the audio is already AAC, the usual format for phone video, it is copied across untouched; any other audio is re-encoded to AAC so that every app will play it.

The framing stays as you shot it unless you picked a different aspect ratio, in which case the video is cropped from the centre to fill the new shape. The captions, any text layers and, on Free, the badge are drawn onto the frames. Everything else about the picture is your original footage.

Press Export at the top right. A dialog covers the editor with a ring that fills as the work goes on, a percentage, and an estimate of the time remaining once the first frames are done. It ticks through four steps:

All of this happens on your own device, inside the browser. The original video is not uploaded for export, so your footage stays with you and there is no server queue to wait in, but it also means that closing the tab or the browser stops the render. While the dialog is up the editor cannot be touched, so a late change cannot sneak into a half-made file. Cancel export is the way back if you spot something.

A browser without a video encoder of its own has to record the clip in real time instead, which makes the export roughly as slow as playing the clip through once; the Export button warns you about this before you start. A single export can run to 5 minutes.

When the render finishes, the download starts on its own. The dialog stays open with the file's name and a button to save it, because some browsers quietly block automatic downloads; if nothing arrived, press that button. On Free the same dialog also offers Clean Export, which the badge guide explains.

For a separate caption track, use the SRT and VTT buttons in the top bar, or in the three-dot menu on a phone, which work on every paid plan. They build the files straight from your current captions with no render at all, and carry the words and timings but none of the styling. SRT, VTT or burned-in helps you decide when you need one.