“AI video” covers three jobs that have almost nothing in common: editing footage you shot, generating a presenter you never filmed, and dressing up the result. Buying the wrong one is expensive. Here is the field sorted by what you are actually trying to make.
The field at a glance
| Descript | Synthesia | Canva | ElevenLabs | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Job | Edit real footage via the transcript | Presenter video from a script, no camera | Quick social video basics | Voiceover and dubbing |
| Entry price | Free tier; paid from about $12/month | From about $18/month, usage limits per plan | Free tier; Pro from about $120/year | Free tier; paid from about $5/month |
| Best buyer | Podcasters, interviews, talking-head video | Training and internal comms at scale | Non-designers on social schedules | Anyone whose video needs a voice |
Editing what you filmed: Descript
Descript’s premise still sounds like a trick: the transcript is the timeline, so cutting a sentence from the video is deleting a sentence from a document. For podcasts, interviews and talking-head content the speed gain is not incremental; it is a different job. Filler-word removal, studio sound and eye contact fixes run in a click, and Overdub patches a flubbed sentence without re-recording. Two honest limits: it does not replace a timeline editor on complex multi-cam productions, and heavy projects can tax the app, so export before it matters.
Video without a camera: Synthesia
Synthesia turns a script into an acceptable presenter video in minutes, and the same script into dozens of languages. Nobody watches these for pleasure. That is fine. For compliance training in five languages, or internal comms that would otherwise mean booking a studio, nothing beats the economics, and updating the video is editing text rather than reshooting. Keep it away from brand-level marketing (the avatars are fine for training, not for a launch film) and watch the per-minute limits, because real usage climbs into the bigger plans quickly.
The quick cut: Canva
Canva’s video features are convenience-grade, not frontier-grade, and that is exactly the point. A small business already paying about $120/year for Pro gets templated social clips, brand kits and basic editing in the tool the team already knows. If video is your product, Canva is not your editor. If video is Tuesday’s social post, it probably is.
The soundtrack: ElevenLabs
Half of what makes AI video usable is the audio. ElevenLabs sits at or near the top of the field for realistic voices and multilingual dubbing, with paid plans from about $5/month and usage-based pricing above. Pair it with Descript footage or a Synthesia script when the built-in voices fall short. One warning from our audio roundup: price your real character volumes honestly, because heavy usage climbs fast.
Our recommendation
- Podcaster or interviewer: Descript. Its free tier will convince you or not within a week.
- HR, L&D, internal comms, multilingual training: Synthesia. Size the plan to your real minutes per month before subscribing.
- Small business feeding social channels: Canva Pro covers you; revisit only when video becomes the product.
- Producing for clients: Descript for the edit, ElevenLabs for the voice, and a classic timeline editor still in the drawer for the complex jobs.