How to use ScriptCut

This guide is the fastest path through ScriptCut. It covers the five stages every project moves through, in order. Each stage has its own chapter later in this manual with the full detail; this is the map.

Before you begin

ScriptCut runs entirely in your web browser at app.scriptcut.io. There is nothing to install. You will need a transcript of your recording with word-level timecodes (most editing software can export one), and, if you want to hear your picks inside ScriptCut, the matching audio file.

Step 1 · Create your account

Go to app.scriptcut.io and choose Create one on the sign-in screen, or sign in with Google. Your dashboard opens empty, ready for your first project. A short guided tour offers to walk you through each page; you can follow it or skip it at any time.

Step 2 · Start a project and import

Click New Project, give it a name, and pick the workflow that matches your editing software. ScriptCut then walks you through a short import wizard: optionally attach your video or audio, upload your transcript (or use Transcribe for me), optionally attach the timeline XML, and tag your speakers. When you press Start, your transcript opens in the editor.

Step 3 · Clean up, then select

On the Cleanup page you fix any transcription typos and split run-on lines so the script reads clean. On the Select page you mark the moments worth keeping: click a line once for Must have, twice for Maybe. You can even drag across just the words you want.

Step 4 · Arrange the story

On the Arrange page you drag your selected lines into the order that tells the best story, and optionally group them into acts or chapters. The runtime at the top tells you exactly how long your cut will be.

Step 5 · Review, share, and export

The Review page shows your finished selection as a clean read. Share a link so your client can approve it, then export: a formatted PDF, a timeline (XML) that rebuilds your cut in your editor, subtitles, or the spliced audio.

The dashboard is the first thing you see after signing in. Every project you create lives here, and the left sidebar gives you one-click access to everything else in ScriptCut.

The top bar

Three buttons sit at the top right of the dashboard:

New Folder

Create a folder (called a “group” in the interface) to organize related projects.

Transcribe

Upload audio or video and let ScriptCut generate a word-level transcript for you, with speaker detection.

New Project

Start a new project. This opens the workflow picker covered in the next chapter.

View, sort, and search

Below the title you can switch between grid and list view, change how projects are sorted, and search by name. ScriptCut remembers your choice.

Project cards

Each project shows as a card. Small icons tell you what it contains at a glance: a transcript icon, a timeline (XML) icon, and an audio icon when one is attached. The version chip (for example V1) shows which saved version you are looking at.

Click a card to open the project. Click the ⋯ menu on any card for per-project actions:

Create Review Link

Make a share link for this project without opening it.

Open

Open the project.

Rename

Change the project name.

Duplicate

Make an independent copy.

Edit Transcript

Jump straight into Cleanup.

Change Image

Swap the cover photo.

Move to Folder

File it under a group.

Notifications On

Turn email alerts for this one project on or off.

Delete

Move it to the Archive (recoverable for 30 days).

Social Clips projects, right here too

A project you started as a Social Clips workflow now shows on this main dashboard as well as inside the Social suite, so you always have one place that shows everything. It carries a small indigo Social chip on its thumbnail; click it exactly like any other project to open straight into the Social suite. A filter above the grid (All / Editing / Social) narrows the view to one kind; it is not remembered between visits, so the dashboard always opens showing everything.

Folders (groups)

Folders keep related projects together, for example all the episodes of one series. Create one with New Folder, then drag projects into it or use a project’s Move to folder action. Open a folder to see only its projects; a Dashboard icon in the sidebar takes you back to the top level.

Deleting and the Archive

Deleting a project does not destroy it. ScriptCut moves it to the Archive, where it stays recoverable for 30 days before it is permanently removed. You will find the Archive in Settings. Empty folders are removed immediately.

The left sidebar

The sidebar follows you everywhere. From top to bottom:

Dashboard

Return to your projects.

Social

Open the Social Clips suite (ProAI): AI-generated vertical clips, captions, covers, and download links. See the Social Clips chapter.

Activity

A live feed of client actions: approvals, notes, and messages.

Shared Links

See and manage every share link across every project in one place.

Tutorials

Short how-to articles and videos, filtered to the page you are on.

What’s new

The latest ScriptCut updates.

Feature requests

Tell the team what you would like to see.

Account

Your initials, at the very bottom. Opens a menu with Settings, the dark/light mode toggle, and sign out.

When you click New Project, ScriptCut asks one question first: how are you working? Your answer tailors the whole experience, the import steps, the export options, and the tutorial tips, to your editing software.

The workflows

Blank Project

Start from scratch and import any supported transcript later. The most flexible option.

Transcribe

Upload audio or video and ScriptCut generates the transcript for you, word by word, with speaker detection.

DaVinci Resolve

Optimized for Resolve’s subtitle export and XML roundtrip. The import tips name the exact Resolve menus.

Adobe Premiere Pro

Optimized for Premiere’s transcript JSON and XML roundtrip.

Final Cut Pro & Avid Media Composer

ScriptCut works with both. What is coming soon is only their own start-here tile in this picker, with its guided roundtrip. Today you start from Transcribe or Blank and export the Timeline (XML), which opens in Avid and Final Cut like any other editor.

Social Clips (ProAI)

Skip the transcript workflow and go straight into the Social Clips suite: upload a video and start building short, vertical, AI-reframed clips. See the Social Clips chapter.

Reuse one transcript across projects (master transcripts)

Working on a series? You never need to import or transcribe the same recording twice. Put the project that has the transcript inside a folder: it becomes the master. Then create a New Project inside that same folder and choose Source from master transcript instead of starting fresh. The new project opens linked to that transcript and goes straight to Select, so it makes its own picks, arrangement, and versions from the same words.

Fix a word or rename a speaker in the master and every linked project updates automatically. A linked project shows a small note that its transcript lives in another project; clicking it opens the master. To hand ownership to another project, use Move master transcript in the owner card’s ⋯ menu.

Naming and the cover image

Type a project title, then click Create Project. You can also drop in a cover image (PNG, JPG, or WEBP, any size, ScriptCut auto-compresses it); it shows on the project card and on the page your client sees, a nice touch that makes a share link feel finished.

Transcribe a recording

If you do not yet have a transcript, the Transcribe shortcut on the dashboard (and the Transcribe workflow) does it for you. Upload your audio or video, and ScriptCut returns a word-level transcript with speakers detected, ready to clean up and select. Transcription minutes are part of your plan; see Settings > Transcription. The Language dropdown auto-fills from a quick background check of your recording; override it if it guesses wrong. Once transcription finishes, a Who Is Who? step lets you name each detected speaker, with a short sample of their voice you can play to tell them apart.

After you create a project, ScriptCut opens the import wizard. The steps you see depend on the workflow you chose; the DaVinci Resolve workflow shown here walks through video or audio, the transcript, the timeline XML, and roles. Every step but the transcript is optional, and you can move forward and back at any point.

Step 1 · Video or audio for playback (optional)

Attach your recording’s video or audio (MP4, MOV, MP3, WAV, or M4A) and ScriptCut lines it up with your transcript so you can watch or listen to every line and every selection, while you work and on the share link. On the Free plan, media uploads happen through the Transcribe flow; attaching video or audio to other projects is a paid-plan feature. A video file gives you picture, not just sound: it plays throughout the editor on Starter and ProAI, and in Cleanup only on Free. ScriptCut automatically compresses whatever you upload to a small, efficient size.

Importing from Frame.io, Dropbox, or Google Drive

Instead of dragging a file from your computer, you can pull it straight from a connected cloud account. Connect Frame.io, Dropbox, or Google Drive once in Settings > App Integrations; after that, a matching icon appears on the Video/Audio step so you can browse your folders, search by name, and import directly, no download-then-upload round trip.

Step 2 · The transcript

Drag your transcript file onto the upload area, or click to browse. ScriptCut accepts .srtx, .srt, and .vtt subtitle files, as well as Premiere’s transcript JSON. The on-screen instructions name the exact export settings for your editing software.

As soon as the file is read, ScriptCut confirms it and tells you whether it detected word-level timecodes and speakers. A clean file needs no further action: the step turns into a green check and the wizard moves you straight on.

Step 3 · The timeline XML (optional)

If you exported a timeline XML from the same sequence, add it here. ScriptCut reads the sequence’s frame rate and start timecode from it so your exported cut lines up perfectly with your original footage. You can skip this and still export a timeline; the XML simply makes the match exact.

Step 4 · Roles

ScriptCut lists the speakers it found and asks you to tag each one: Interviewer, Interviewee, or Crew. Tagging the interviewer (or crew) lets you keep their lines out of the way later with a single click, and it styles questions and answers correctly in your exports.

These labels work for any non-scripted format, not just interviews: for a podcast or panel, tag the host as Interviewer to get the same one-click filtering and formatting.

When everything is tagged, press Start. Your transcript opens on the Cleanup page, and you are ready to work.

Cleanup is the first editing page. It reads like a document: every line is editable text. Here you fix transcription typos, split run-on lines, and remove filler sounds, so that when you move to Select, the script is clean and easy to skim.

Editing a line

Click into any line to fix a typo. Press Enter in the middle of a line to split it into two rows at the cursor, useful when the transcriber ran two sentences together. Typing a full stop at the end of a sentence splits the row there on its own, and pressing Backspace at the very start of a row joins it back to the row above. The runtime and word state stay aligned automatically.

Deleted rows are never gone for good: they land in the Trash drawer (in the page ⋯ menu), where Put back restores a strip and Put all back restores everything. This works on every editing page.

Remove fillers

Open the Tools menu (the grid icon), then click Remove fillers to find the hesitation sounds, um, uh, hmm, and the like, across the whole transcript. ScriptCut shows you exactly what it found and asks you to confirm before anything changes. Numbers and measurements such as “35mm” are never touched. The same Tools menu also holds Manage speakers, Check spelling, and Remove pauses.

Once confirmed, those words are dimmed and struck through. A small amber dot marks any row that has filler cuts, and they read clean everywhere downstream: on Select, in Review, in the PDF, and in your timeline export. A Reset fillers option in the row menu restores them.

Remove pauses

The same Tools menu holds Remove pauses, ScriptCut’s version of a silence remover. It finds every gap between words longer than a threshold you choose, 1, 1.5, 2, or 3 seconds, and lists each one as a small chip, for example 2.4s. Click a chip to keep that pause instead of cutting it. ScriptCut never cuts back to back; half a second of natural breathing room always stays. The cuts flow into playback, your exports, subtitles, and runtime everywhere, and you can undo the whole pass or bring a pause back at any time.

Check spelling

Open the Tools menu and choose Check spelling. ScriptCut scans the whole transcript against a dictionary built into the app, so it is free and never uses AI credits. A review window lists each suspect word once, with up to three suggested corrections and the sentence it appears in; picking a correction fixes every occurrence at once, and nothing changes until you press Fix. It deliberately skips names, brands, ALL-CAPS words, and anything with a digit, so the list stays short. Add to dictionary teaches it a word for good on your account, and a Your dictionary section lets you edit the saved words. A correction always swaps one word for one word, so your timecodes never shift.

Spelling underlines are on by default: misspelled words get a red wavy line right in the transcript, exactly like a word processor. Hover one (tap it on a phone) to see its corrections and fix it on the spot. The transcript stays fully typable while underlines are on. Turn them off with the Underline mistakes toggle inside the Check spelling window; your choice is remembered.

Find and replace

Click the magnifier (or press Cmd/Ctrl + F) to find any word, with Match case and Whole word options and next/previous arrows. Replace swaps the current match and Replace all fixes every one in a single move. On a phone, Find and replace is the first item in the Tools menu.

AI cleanup

On a ProAI plan, AI cleanup reads the transcript and proposes tidier wording, fixing obvious transcription errors and smoothing awkward breaks, while always keeping your words and timecodes in sync. It is optional and fully reviewable.

The Cleanup menu

The ⋯ menu in the header holds the rest of the controls:

Text size

Choose Small, Default, or Large for the transcript text.

Timecodes

Show or hide the per-row timecode.

Strip number

Show or hide the row numbers (#1, #2, …).

Select is where you build your edit by reading. You mark the lines worth keeping, trim them to the exact words you want, and watch a running total tell you how long your cut will be. Nothing here changes your transcript; you are choosing, not cutting.

One click, two clicks, three

Click a line to choose how it carries forward:

1. One click marks it Must have (green): the moments that are definitely in.
2. Two clicks marks it Maybe (yellow): a moment worth keeping in reserve.
3. Three clicks clears it.

Keep only the words you want

Do not love the whole line? Click and drag across just the words you want, and only those carry forward, trimmed to the exact frame. It is the fastest way to whittle a rambling answer down to the gold.

The running total

The orange timer at the top is your live runtime: the exact length of everything currently selected, accounting for any word-level trims. The footer breaks it down into Must have and Maybe totals.

Select all / Deselect all

Mark or clear every line at once.

Deselect interviewer

Instantly clear every line spoken by whoever you tagged as the interviewer, handy for keeping just the answers.

Select a whole run at once

To grab many lines together, drag a box across them, let go, and a quick menu lets you play them, mark them all Must have or Maybe, favorite them, change their speaker, or unselect them, in one move.

Notes and bookmarks

Every line has a note icon. Leave a note for yourself or your client, a direction, a question, a reminder, and it travels with that moment, even into your editor as a timeline marker. A bookmark marks your place so you can jump back to it later.

Favorite a line

Click the star icon on a row to mark it a Favorite, a hard must-keep. A small yellow star badges the row, and every AI tool, Select, Story, and Clips, always keeps a Favorited line, even when trimming down to a tight target runtime. Favorites export as their own yellow marker in your timeline XML, and you can favorite several lines at once from the marquee or multi-select menu.

Who did what

Hover a Must have, Maybe, or Favorite marker to see who made that pick, you or a client on a share link, and when. This attribution travels with the project, so nothing gets lost when more than one person is reviewing.

Find and full screen

Use Find (the magnifier, or Cmd/Ctrl+F) to jump to any word in the transcript. The full-screen button gives you a distraction-free reading surface, ideal for a long first pass. Full screen is available on every editing page: Cleanup, Select, Arrange, and Review.

Playback options

If audio is attached, the page menu lets you choose whether playback plays all lines or highlighted only, so you can listen back to just your selection. The same menu holds View order, which reads the transcript either As arranged or Chronological.

Hide everything you have not picked

An eye icon in the Select toolbar (desktop) toggles Hide unselected: turn it on and every line you have not marked Must have or Maybe disappears from view, so a long transcript reads back as just your cut. It only changes what you see; nothing is edited, moved, or exported differently. It never remembers your last choice, either: every time you open Select it starts showing everything, so a transcript can never appear to have gone missing because this was left on.

Arrange shows only the lines you selected, and lets you reorder them into the sequence that flows best. This is where a pile of good moments becomes a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end.

Drag to reorder

Grab any line by its handle (the ≡ on the left) and slide it up or down until the story lands right. The runtime at the top always reflects the current order and length.

Group into acts and chapters

Select a run of lines (drag a box across them), right-click, and choose Group selected to gather them into a named group, an act, a beat, or a chapter. Rename the group to whatever the section is about. Groups carry into your editor as named timeline markers, and into your PDF and Review as chapter headings.

The right-click menu

Right-clicking in Arrange opens a menu to play the selection, group it, or deselect it. Right-clicking a single line selects just that line first.

Resetting

The page menu offers Reset arrange, which clears all groups and returns your lines to their original order while keeping your selections intact. Use it to start the arrangement over without losing your picks.

Review presents your selection as a clean, readable script, exactly what your client will see on a share link. From here you share for approval and export to your editor.

Filters and runtime

The total runtime sits at the top. The filter buttons let you read All selects, Must have only, or Maybe only, the same filter that decides what each export contains. Each group shows its own runtime beside its heading.

Notes on a sentence

A sentence with a note carries a small purple dot. Hover it to open a short thread beside the line, with a reply box, so a back-and-forth with your client or editor stays right where the note was left.

Editor notes

Below the script is an Editor Notes section you can expand. Anything you write here travels with the project: it appears in the editor download and the PDF, a single place to leave overall direction for whoever finishes the edit.

Beside Share sits Social, which carries this project straight into the Social Clips suite so you can cut short vertical versions of the same material. See the Social Clips chapter.

Sharing for approval

Click Share to open the shared-link settings. Copy the link and send it to your client; they can review and approve without an account. The Sharing chapter covers permissions and the client experience in full.

Exporting

The Export menu is how your work leaves ScriptCut. The filter (All / Must have / Maybe) decides what is included. Audio and video downloads are grouped into two rows, each opening a small panel of choices, your edit first and the whole file second.

Formatted PDF

A polished, branded script document, ideal for clients and producers.

Editor download

A plain-text rundown of every selected line with timecodes, for your editor.

Timeline (XML)

The big one: a real timeline that rebuilds your entire selection, in order, trimmed to the frame, with your groups as markers, ready to open in your NLE.

Subtitles

An SRT or WebVTT file of your selection.

Send to your NLE

DaVinci Resolve or Premiere Pro, if you have paired that editor's panel (Settings > App Integrations): sends this timeline straight into your project with its footage already linked.

Edited Video

An MP4 that renders your cut exactly as Review plays it, your selection, order, and word trims, as a real video file. It renders the moment you click it, so it is always current.

Edited Audio, High Res

The same cut as a lossless audio file, taken from your original uploaded audio master rather than the everyday compressed copy, for podcast-quality delivery.

Audio

A single MP3 of just your selected moments, spliced together.

Subtitle options

Choosing Subtitles opens a dialog with the format (SRT or WebVTT) and a broadcast standard (Netflix, YouTube, EBU, and more). ScriptCut can automatically split long lines to fit the standard you pick, and tells you how many cues already fit.

Audio options

Choosing Audio lets you keep the natural pauses between sentences (one continuous clip, exactly as spoken) or remove the gaps for a tight, back-to-back cut. ScriptCut uses your word timecodes to splice only the spoken parts.

Download the whole transcript

Separate from the selection exports, the download icon in the editor header (on any tab) exports the entire transcript: Text (.txt), PDF, Word (.docx), Subtitles (.srt/.vtt), or a word-timed transcript (.json). A Version switch at the top of the menu chooses what goes in the file, and it applies to every format including subtitles. Corrected, the default, is your transcript exactly as it reads in Cleanup with every edit applied: spelling fixes, splits and merges, removed filler words, removed pauses, AI Cleanup and word trims. Original is the transcript as it arrived before any edits, and it also includes the lines you deleted. To choose which filler words come out, use Cleanup > Tools > Remove fillers, which gives you per-word control; the download follows whatever you left behind there. On Free, projects that were not transcribed in ScriptCut export as .txt only; the other formats come with a paid plan.

Versions

The version chip (V1) in the header and on the project card holds a dropdown: switch versions, create a new version to explore a different cut without losing this one, delete a version, or lock one. Compare versions shows a redline of two versions: what was added, removed, re-prioritized, or reordered. When a client approves, the approved version locks; you can unlock it to keep editing.

Downloading the files we store

The Export menu also hands back the media itself, exactly as we hold it. Compressed Video appears when a video is attached, Compressed Audio when audio is attached, and High Res Audio when we still hold your original audio file. A line only appears when that file actually exists, so nothing here can lead to a dead end.

When you attach audio during import, ScriptCut lines it up with your transcript so you can listen to exactly what you are reading, frame-accurate and trim-aware. It is the fastest way to judge tone and pacing without leaving the page.

Play a single line

Every line on Cleanup, Select, and Arrange has a small play button. Click it to hear just that line. While it plays, the button becomes a stop control and the line is highlighted.

The media player

Playing anything opens a floating media player capsule: a scrubber, elapsed and total time, a live equalizer, volume, and a speed control (1x, 2x, 4x). On the Review page the player capsule is always open so you, and your client, can play the whole cut from the top. If a video was attached, a separate floating, draggable, resizable video window docks alongside it on Starter/ProAI (Select, Arrange, and Review); Free gets video playback in Cleanup only.

Play your selection or a group

Beyond single lines, you can play an entire selection or a whole group back to back, so you can hear how a sequence flows before you commit. On Review, the player plays the full edit, and clicking any line plays from that point. Word-level trims are respected: playback skips the words you trimmed, exactly as your export will.

On the ProAI plan, ScriptCut’s AI tools read your entire transcript and propose a finished selection or story, which you are always free to refine. They are a starting point that can save hours, not a replacement for your judgment.

The shared brief

Each AI tool opens with a short brief: the platform you are cutting for, your goal (convert, educate, or entertain), a target runtime, and an optional prompt where you can say exactly what you want. ScriptCut remembers the brief across the project.

AI Select

AI Select reads the transcript and marks the strongest moments for you, on topic and never over your target runtime. It selects in place, so you can adjust every pick afterward on the Select page.

AI Story

AI Story goes further: in one pass it designs the finished edit, which lines to keep, the order they should play in, sentence-level trims, and even an optional cold-open hook. When it finishes, it drops you on the Arrange page with the story laid out. For a long-form piece, the story arrives broken into chapter groups you can see and reorder, and each chapter carries its own Rebuild with AI button, so you can regenerate just one part without starting the whole story over.

AI Clips

AI Clips turns a long recording into several short, social-ready clips. You choose how many; ScriptCut first assesses how many genuinely strong clips the material can support and recommends a number, then builds each one as its own story. Each finished clip carries its own score, so you can see at a glance which are the strongest before you build them out further in the Social Clips suite.

AI Arrange

On the Arrange page, AI Arrange takes the lines you have already selected and orders them into a coherent story, optionally grouping them into titled acts. It works from your picks rather than choosing for you.

Cutting style: natural, balanced, or tight

AI Story, AI Select, and AI Clips share one setting for how many small internal edits they make inside a line you keep: Natural flow makes the fewest cuts for the smoothest-sounding result, Tight makes the most for the shortest and punchiest one, and Balanced sits in between. It lives in each window's Advanced options, remembers your last choice, and is hidden on AI Clips when you pick “Trim ends only,” since that mode makes one continuous take with no interior cuts to style.

Keeping the interviewer out

“Don't include Interviewer” now works the same way on AI Story and AI Clips as it always has on AI Select: with it on, the AI still reads the interviewer's questions to understand the conversation, it just never uses their lines in the finished result. It is off by default, since a short setup question is sometimes the only way to make an answer make sense on its own.

AI credits

Each AI run uses a number of AI credits, weighted by its real cost. Your ProAI plan includes a monthly allowance (1,500 credits by default), and you can see your balance and top up in Settings > AI Credits. Pricing for top-ups is current at the time of writing and is subject to change.

Undo an AI run

The moment Story, Select, Arrange, Clips, or AI cleanup finishes, a small box offers a one-click Undo back to how the project looked right before that run (on a phone, it is the top item in the ⋯ menu instead). It disappears as soon as you make your own edit. For an older rollback, use Settings > History.

AI Translate

Open AI Tools > AI Translate from the Cleanup page to translate the whole transcript into one or more other languages, so you (or a client) can read and select in a different language even though the recording was spoken in another. Pick one or more languages from a searchable list; each one runs with an automatic proofread pass. Once done, a small globe button appears in the Select, Arrange, and Review headers (clients see it on a share link too) to switch between Original Language and any translation. Playback, timecodes, and the exported timeline always stay in the language that was actually spoken; the Text, PDF, and Word downloads follow whichever language the globe is set to. Hover a language in the globe menu to reveal a trash icon and remove it; you cannot delete Original Language or the language you are currently viewing. Pricing is shown before you run it and is charged in AI credits, based on the transcript's length.

Social Clips is ScriptCut’s clip suite: it turns a long recording into short vertical videos for Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts, auto-reframed, captioned, and covered, ready to share or schedule. It is a ProAI feature (also open to trial and beta accounts); Free and Starter do not see the Social icon, unless the account previously made Social clips on ProAI, in which case it can still open Social to view that past work (posting and creating anything new stay locked).

Opening Social

Click the Social icon in the main sidebar, or start a new project with the Social Clips workflow. Inside, your clips organize into projects and folders just like the main dashboard.

Uploading your video

Drop your video on the first screen (or import it from Frame.io, Google Drive, or Dropbox) and everything else runs on its own. You are not asked whether to transcribe: the screen simply shows you where it is up to, first Uploading video, then Processing video, then Transcribing, and moves you on when the transcript is ready.

Building clips

Use AI Clips (see the AI Tools chapter) to generate several short clips from your transcript in one pass, each with its own strength score, or hand-pick a span yourself. Every clip opens in its own editor for framing, captions, and cover.

On the results grid, click any card to watch that clip before you decide about it. The badge in the top-left corner is its strength score out of 100, green for strong, amber for middling, red for weak; hover it to see what the AI made of that clip. Keep locks a clip, so running AI Clips again leaves it exactly as it is, and that lock is saved with your project. The bin discards a clip.

Auto reframe and split screen

Every clip is automatically reframed from your source’s original aspect ratio into a vertical 9:16 frame (1:1, 4:5, and 16:9 are also offered), following whoever is speaking, shot by shot. Per shot you can adjust Camera movement (Calm, Normal, or Active) and, on a multi-person shot, Layout (Track the speaker, Keep both in frame, or Split screen). You can also force a 2-way, 3-way, or 4-way split screen on any shot, even a single-person one, and drag each panel into place. The Split screen menu has two columns: Standard, whose panels are plain rectangles, and Creative, whose panels are not. Creative offers a diagonal split (2-way) and slanted bands (3-way). Each panel still drags, zooms and re-times exactly like a rectangular one, and the finished video is cut to the same shapes you see in the preview.

Timing: show a different moment of your video

A Position / Timing switch sits beside each shot's other controls. Position is ordinary framing of the current moment, everything above. Switch to Timing and dragging the picture left or right instead shows an earlier or later moment from anywhere in your original video, so a split-screen panel can pair the interview with a piece of footage from elsewhere in the same recording. A small badge marks a shifted panel so it is never a surprise later, and the sound always keeps playing normally: only the picture moves.

Fine-tune on the timeline

The Video step has a real timeline. Add a cut at the playhead with C, set a keyframe with K, zoom the timeline with + and −, and drag any cut or edit point a frame at a time. In a split screen, drag each panel into place and zoom panels individually. Every change has undo and redo, and what you see in the preview is exactly what renders.

Subtitles

ScriptCut can burn your captions directly into the clip, styled and timed word by word to your transcript, so it is ready to post and understood with the sound off. Choose from ready-made styles (None, Clean, Karaoke, Boxed, Bounce, Word by word, Bold pop, Neon, TikTok, Beasty, Gradient, Typewriter), then pick your own font color and highlight color; drag the captions anywhere on the preview to place them. This step needs a word-level transcript, so transcribe the project first if it does not have one.

Cover

The Cover step has four modes: Pick a frame (use a video frame as-is), Frame + AI (restyle a frame you picked), Generate (AI builds a cover from a prompt, already aware of the clip's topic and words), and Upload (bring your own image). In Generate mode, three Creativity levels trade restraint for attention: Conservative is polished and tasteful with one subtle accent, Moderate is bold and freely designed, and Creative is the loudest, most eye-catching option, built for maximum click-through. The Real Host toggle keeps the actual person's face while placing them inside a brand-new AI-generated scene: scrub to a clear shot of their face, tap Use this frame, then Generate. Anything you type in the prompt always outranks the automatic choices, and your chosen color filter is remembered per cover image.

Description

The Caption step (labeled Description in the clip workspace) writes a platform-native post description, for Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, LinkedIn, or Facebook, with an option to include hashtags, for about 1 AI credit each. You can just type your own instead.

Accounts and the calendar

Connect every social profile you post to in the Social sidebar's Accounts page, several per platform if you need them; a client's own folder can be tied to specific accounts so its projects always post to the right place. The Calendar shows every scheduled and posted clip by month, week, or day, filterable by platform, status, account, or project; drag a post to another day to reschedule it, or click one to change its time.

Downloading and sharing

Download a clip on its own, or create a download link so a client can grab the whole batch, video, captions, and covers included, without an account. Manage every download link from the Download Links icon in the Social sidebar; the download page shows readiness (“5 of 7 ready”) and refreshes itself while anything is still rendering.

Editing one clip from the main dashboard

A Social project also shows on your main Dashboard now, wearing a small indigo Social chip; open it from either place. From a clip's card menu on the results grid, Edit clip jumps straight into the Select page focused on just that clip, with the rest of the transcript visible but dimmed, so you can adjust its picks without losing the surrounding context. Right-click a shot on the timeline for Reset selected clip to put its framing back to fully automatic, without touching its cuts, trim, or captions.

ScriptCut is built around the back-and-forth with a client. You share a link, they read the selection, leave notes, and approve, all in their browser, with nothing to install and no account to create.

Creating a share link

On the Review page, click Share. Copy the link and send it. You can protect it with a password, and under Advanced settings you control exactly what this client can do: export, rename speakers, or use AI. These per-project permissions sit on top of your account-wide defaults in Settings > Client view.

Presentation links and multi-stage sign-off

Two extras live in the share link settings. Presentation link shows your client only the polished Review page, nothing else. Multi-stage sign-off (under Advanced settings) turns one approval into a chain: Producer, then Client, then Legal/Comms, each approving in order, with a separate named sign-off link created for Legal/Comms. The project locks when the chain completes.

Chat with your client

Every project has its own chat, in the bubble at the bottom right. It connects you, your team, and your client in one thread, and the whole conversation can be downloaded as a text file.

Managing all your links

The Shared Links icon in the main sidebar lists every review link across every project in one place; open it from inside a project and it filters to just that project. Each row shows who the link is for, how many times it has been opened, and when it was last viewed. Use the row menu to rename, password-protect, or revoke a link at any time. Social’s own Download Links icon works the same way for client download links.

What your client sees

When a client opens the link, ScriptCut asks for their name (and optionally a company and email) so you can track whose feedback is whose. Then they land in a clean, branded version of your project.

The client view mirrors your own, minus anything you have not permitted. They can read the Select and Arrange pages and the polished Review, play the audio, and leave notes on individual lines.

Approving

When the client is happy, they Approve the selection. Approval locks the project so it cannot be changed by accident, and notifies you straight away in the Activity feed and by email. If you need to make a change afterward, you can unlock it.

Notes, support, and tutorials

Clients get their own slim sidebar: tutorials to help them review, a theme toggle, and a Support button that reaches your team. Any note they leave on a line shows up in your Activity feed and travels into your exports.

Open Settings from the Account menu (your initials, at the bottom of the sidebar). A list on the left groups everything by area; the most-used panels are covered below.

Personal & Appearance

Personal settings holds your name, email, password, and the option to take the guided tour again. Appearance switches between dark and light mode and toggles the small help tooltips that appear on hover.

Notifications

Choose which email alerts you receive, client approvals, new notes, messages, and how often. You can also opt out of marketing emails here.

Client view

Set the account-wide defaults for what clients can do on every share link: allow exporting, speaker renaming, and AI. Any project can override these in its own share settings. You can also turn the client onboarding tour on or off, and preview it.

Plan

See your current plan and compare Free, Starter, and ProAI side by side. Each plan lists what is included (orange checks) and what is not (grey crosses). A monthly/annual toggle shows the annual saving.

Billing

Manage your subscription, view invoices and transaction history, redeem a promo code, and buy more transcription minutes or AI credits as you need them.

Storage

Shows how much of your plan's storage you have used, and how much is left.

App Integrations

Connect Frame.io, Dropbox, or Google Drive so you can import media straight from those services when starting a project. Underneath, an NLE Plugins section offers a Download for a small companion panel for DaVinci Resolve (Mac only, needs Resolve Studio) or Premiere Pro (Mac or Windows, 2025 or newer): install it once inside your editing software, and it lets you send clips to ScriptCut straight from Resolve or Premiere, then bring your finished edit back already linked to your media, instead of relinking every clip by hand. The same two options also appear as their own Send to your NLE row in the Export menu.

Transcription & AI Credits

Transcription shows how many transcription minutes your plan includes and lets you buy more. AI Credits (a ProAI feature) shows your AI allowance, what is left this cycle, any credits you have purchased, and an optional auto top-up.

Branding

On ProAI, add your own logo and accent color so every share link, PDF, and email your clients see is yours, not ScriptCut’s.

Archive

Archive holds deleted projects for 30 days, where you can recover them or remove them for good. Automatic restore points live with the project itself, on the version chip in the editor header, not in Settings.

Under the panel list, two links sit on their own: User Manual opens this manual, and Legal Notices opens the terms and privacy policy.

Support

Reach the ScriptCut team directly from the Support panel. Send a question and you will get a reply by email, with your whole conversation kept together.

ScriptCut on your phone

ScriptCut works in your phone's browser too, no app to install. Cleanup, Select, Arrange, and Review share one compact header, with a bottom tab bar for quick moves between pages. Swipe a row to reveal its quick actions, and look for the ⋯ menu for anything that does not fit on screen, including Search and Undo/Redo.

ScriptCut’s keyboard shortcuts are guarded so they never fire while you are typing in a text field. On a Mac, use Cmd; on Windows, use Ctrl.

Everywhere

Enter

Confirm the primary action in a dialog (delete, approve, plan change, and so on).

Esc

Close the open dialog or menu; on the dashboard, clear the current selection.

On the dashboard

Cmd/Ctrl + A

Select all visible projects.

Cmd/Ctrl + D

Duplicate the selected projects.

Delete / Backspace

Move the selected projects to the Archive (still asks you to confirm).

Cmd/Ctrl + click

Add or remove a single project from the selection.

Shift + click

Select a range of projects.

In the editor

Cmd/Ctrl + Z

Undo your last edit.

Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + Z

Redo.

Cmd/Ctrl + F

Find a word in the transcript.

Enter (in Cleanup)

Split the current line in two at the cursor.

B

Add or remove a bookmark on the current line.

Cmd/Ctrl + D

Duplicate the selected line(s) (Select and Arrange).

Cmd/Ctrl + B

Group the selected lines into a titled group (Arrange).

Social clip editor (Video step)

C

Add a cut at the playhead.

K

Keyframe the current shot (or delete the selected keyframe).

+ / −

Zoom the timeline in / out.

Delete

Remove the selected cut or keyframe.

Audio playback

Space or K

Play or pause the current selection.

L / J

Speed up / slow down playback.

Left / Right arrow

Jump to the previous / next clip while playing.

That is the whole tour. Whenever a page has more to offer, look for the ⋯ menu, the Tutorials drawer, and the help tooltips. Happy editing.