So you’re looking for your new favorite screen recorder?
Whether you’re a beginner who needs a simple solution or an expert who needs more advanced features, we’ve got you covered.
Research found that people value professional-style graphics and edits in the instructional or informational videos they watch. Public-facing videos must carry a basic level of editing and polishing so viewers regard them as highly valuable.
Camtasia and Clipchamp offer differing features for their users depending on their individual needs. It’s time to figure out which editor is right for you.
Screen & camera recording
Camtasia: high-quality no matter what
Camtasia comes standard with the best screen recorder in the industry. Powerful, precise, and easy to use, Camtasia’s screen recording abilities are unmatched.
Record your full screen, a window, or a custom size as needed. Plus, record your camera, system audio, and microphone, or your choice of them.
Traditional screen recorders burn everything together, but Camtasia records all of your screen’s elements, camera, screen, mic, cursor, and audio, on separate tracks. This saves you time since you won’t need to re-record burned content and it gives you precise control over the final product. Camtasia gives you all the tools you need to create easily-editable videos.
Clipchamp: a basic screen recorder
Clipchamp has tools a beginner video creator needs. A downside is that the free tier includes lower-quality recordings, with the option to upgrade to 4k recording for a fee.
Clipchamp offers a built-in teleprompter that can be used while recording, which can come in handy occasionally. While these are useful for beginner video creators, more advanced creators tend to edit post-production since this allows for a higher level of detail.
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| Record full-screen or window | ✅ | ✅ |
| Record custom dimensions | ✅ | ❌ |
| Multistream recorder (records elements separately for precise editing and control) | ✅ | ❌ |
| Record webcam | ✅ | ✅ |
| Capture system audio and microphone | ✅ | 🆗 (Only full screen) |
| Capture 4k | ✅ | ❌ (With premium) |
| 60FPS | ✅ | ❌ (With premium) |
| Picture-in-picture recording | ✅ | ✅ |
| Built-in teleprompter during recording | 🆗(Web cam only; does not work with screen recorder) | |
| Custom cursor editing | ✅ | ❌ |
Winner: Camtasia
Camtasia’s screen recorder is top-of-the-line and unmatched compared to Clipchamp. The screen recorder’s ability to separate layers is incredibly useful for easy editing, which saves you time in the long run.
Video editing capabilities
So you’ve got your video recorded and you need to make a few edits? Let’s go over your options.
Camtasia: for beginners and professionals
Camtasia Essentials has everything a beginner video editor needs to create professional videos for every occasion. Basic edits, transitions, cropping, and other effects are available to every Camtasia user. Custom animations, motion paths, and behaviors make elevating those edits to a professional, polished level possible.
With Audiate, available as part of Camtasia Create and Camtasia Pro, it is incredibly easy to edit videos using only text. Eliminate ums, ahs, and other hesitations with the click of a button, and edit your video by trimming out any unnecessary words. The text will automatically sync to your video and trim it for you. It’s like magic!
Plus, Camtasia has dynamic captions for visual effects and a closed captions generator with an SRT file for accessibility purposes. Camtasia has your bases covered!
Clipchamp: the very basics
When it comes to video editing, Clipchamp has the basic tools. Trim, split, and crop your videos and add effects and filters to your liking. In this regard, Clipchamp and Camtasia are similar.
Like Camtasia, you can remove the video background and create fun GIFs for your team! Even though Clipchamp’s editing capabilities are suitable for beginners, they lack the complexity advanced video creators may seek in their tools.
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| Core editing: trim, split, crop… | ✅ | ✅ |
| Multi-track timeline | ✅ | ✅ |
| Picture-in-picture | ✅ | ✅ |
| Cursor Effects | ✅ | ❌ |
| Custom animations | ✅ | ❌ |
| Transitions, filters, effects, etc. | ✅ | ✅ |
| Crop & resize video | ✅ | ✅ |
| Video background removal | ✅ | ✅ |
| Text-based editing | ✅ (With Audiate) | ❌ |
| Media library | ✅ | ✅ |
| GIF creation | ✅ | ✅ |
| Quick-edit keys | ✅ | ✅ |
| Auto subtitle generator with SRT file | ✅ | ❌ |
| Dynamic Captions | ✅ | ✅ |
| Cursor Smoothing | ✅ | ❌ |
| Cursor Scaling | ✅ | ❌ |
| Hide Cursor | ✅ | ❌ |
Winner: Camtasia
Camtasia has everything you need whether you’re a beginner or an advanced video creator. With Camtasia Create and Pro, text-based editing takes Camtasia to an incredibly easy video editing level. Additionally, custom animations and behaviors add a level of polish to videos that Clipchamp ultimately lacks.
Audio editing
Although video edits are incredibly important, clean, clear audio recording is crucial for any video, whether casual or professional.
Camtasia: enhanced editing & text-based add-ons
Camtasia Essentials has basic and advanced audio editing available. Change clip speed, fade your audio, and make it dance with audio visualizers!
However, with Camtasia Pro and Create you get Audiate, an incredible tool for more advanced audio editing and improvement. Eliminate hesitations at the click of a button, create text-to-speech automatic voiceovers, and eliminate annoying background noise. Plus, you can generate a script to kick-start your video creation process using Audiate’s Script Generator.
Clipchamp: basic audio editing
Clipchamp is similar to Camtasia Essentials in its basic editing capabilities. However, there is no direct text-based editing like Audiate provides.
Clipchamp has ASL characters that can help create an accessible environment for ASL users. These ASL characters do not translate your video. There are only 16 phrases to choose from, such as “welcome” and “congratulations.”
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| Change clip speed | ✅ | ✅ |
| Fade in and fade out | ✅ | ✅ |
| Audio visualizers | ✅ | ✅ |
| Text-to-speech with automatic voiceovers | ✅(With Audiate) | ❌ |
| Silence removal in recordings | ✅(With Audiate) | ❌ |
| Hesitations and mistake removal | ✅(With Audiate) | ❌ |
| Background noise removal | ✅ | ❌ |
| 16 phrases ASL characters | ❌ | ✅ |
Visual effects
Effects and edits are key to creating a video distinguishable from the rest. People even prefer high production value in informational and instructional videos, as per this TechSmith study. Effects are not something you want to overlook!
Camtasia: more effect options
Camtasia Essentials offers a huge array of visual effects, transitions, and behaviors.! It has the basics, such as blurring your video, tints, and templates to help you get started, but so much more.
Add cursor effects to your recordings to help highlight what’s important, or add a spotlight to important information to draw their attention. You can even freeze regions and mask others to create a polished, professional video that everyone will want to watch.
Plus, if you need to follow brand guidelines, you can easily do so by establishing a brand kit and theme for your team.
When you need to use stock options, Camtasia has a ton of options for you. And if none of them fit your needs, no worries! With Camtasia’s new AI image generator, you can create the perfect images to use in your videos.
Additionally, you can unlock millions of assets in Camtasia’s asset store at any time. You’re sure to find what you need with Camtasia’s extensive asset library.
Clipchamp: limited effect options
Clipchamp offers basic effects but doesn’t venture far beyond. Stock media is limited for the basic user, and unlocked with a premium subscription as are filters and other effects.
You can also create a brand kit with Clipchamp, but that sits beyond a paywall.
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| Cursor effects | ✅ | ❌ |
| Spotlight, glow, or vignette | ✅ | ❌ |
| Device frames | ✅ | ❌ |
| Freeze region, mask, or media mattes | ✅ | ❌ |
| Tint, colorize, filter | ✅ | ✅ |
| Blur the screen | ✅ | ✅ |
| Pre-built templates | ✅ | ✅ |
| Stock media: images, audio, music, and graphics | ✅ | ✅ |
| Create and share brandkits or themes | ✅ | ✅ (with Premium) |
Winner: Camtasia
This one is an obvious one. Camtasia has far more capabilities for video effects than Clipchamp and definitely takes the win.
Sharing & collaboration tools
So you have your video, now what? Let’s see what sharing options you can choose from.
Camtasia: taking collaboration to another level
Camtasia’s Pro plan is all about communication and collaboration through your videos. Whenever you need feedback or are ready to share your video with a team, Camtasia’s Screencast integration allows you to do that seamlessly.
Just click the Screencast option and the link to your video will be automatically copied to your clipboard. Then, comment, react, and converse in the link with anyone! It makes collaboration super easy. You can also batch export and convert your videos to save time. Instead of exporting one video at a time, you can make it happen all at once. Talk about a time-saving feature.
Clipchamp: lots of sharing options
Clipchamp has countless share options for users. You can export your video to TikTok, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and more. Plus, you can share the link to your viewers too, but they can’t react and comment it like they could using Camtasia.
The premium Clipchamp version also has cloud backup of projects, which can come in handy.
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| Cross-platform compatibility | ✅ | ✅ |
| Download or web | ✅ | ✅ |
| Mobile app | ❌ | ✅ |
| Shareable link with option to review/comment | ✅(With Screencast) | ❌ |
| Batch export | ✅ | ❌ |
| Export to social media | ❌ | ✅ |
| Export to Google or YouTube | ✅ | ✅ |
| Cloud backup of projects | ❌ | ❌(With Premium) |
Winner: It’s a tie!
Both tools have standard share-out options, and with Camtasia’s collaboration capabilities and Clipchamp’s social media export capabilities, this one is a tie.
Performance, support, and learning
Now for the technical stuff. It can end up in the back of your head, but it is an important part of choosing the tool that is right for you.
Camtasia: going above and beyond
Camtasia’s performance and stability are incredible. It offers GPU acceleration, proxy video editing, and offline activation for easy access to your projects.
Most importantly, Camtasia is fully invested in your success. With free monthly webinars, certification courses, and tutorials in multiple languages, Camtasia has a ton of resources for users who want to discover every nook and cranny of the tool.
And, if trouble does arise, our technical support team is the best in the business.
Clipchamp: basic support
Clipchamp only checks a few boxes. It tends to push its users online, which can detract from the video editing experience.
However, Clipchamp has a collection of tutorials in multiple languages as well to support its customers in their video-creation process.
| Feature | Camtasia | Clipchamp |
|---|---|---|
| GPU acceleration for faster rendering | ✅ | ✅ |
| Proxy video editing | ✅ | ❌ |
| Offline activation and no user account options | ✅ | ❌ |
| Tutorials in multiple languages | ✅ | ✅ |
| Free monthly webinars | ✅ | ❌ |
| Certification courses | ✅ | ❌ |
| Priority technical support | ✅ | ❌ |
Winner: Camtasia
Camtasia’s customer support and outreach are unmatched and create an environment where creators are free to learn at their own pace.
Pricing options
Choosing a pricing option depends on the cost to benefit ratio of a product and how that product can best serve you.
Camtasia: a tiered approach
Camtasia offers several plans to offer users more choices depending on their needs and budgets. There are three plans: Camtasia Essentials, Camtasia Create, and Camtasia Pro, with each offering more features than the previous.
Notably, Camtasia Essentials is truly anything a video creator needs. Camtasia Create includes Audiate, which facilitates text-based editing, a broad portfolio of audio editing effects, and more. Camtasia Pro offers, in addition to Audiate, Screencast integration and Asset integration, which unlocks access to millions of audio, video, image clips and more for its users.
If you’re curious about Camtasia, there is a free trial to get you started and exploring.
The best video editor out there
Camtasia has everything a beginner or advanced video editor needs!
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Clipchamp: free vs. paid
Clipchamp comes with one huge upside: the basic plan is free. However, the basic plan is very limited.
A lot of advanced features are behind the premium paywall, which leaves video creators with the option to suffer through sub-par options or upgrade for more. This very black-and-white approach may work for some, but it does not offer the variety of options many users crave.
Overall winner: Camtasia
Clipchamp is fine for basic video creation as it is simple and free.
However, it is limited and does not offer the video creation expertise that Camtasia offers. Camtasia’s features are suitable for anyone from beginners to advanced creators, which makes it a tool that grows with you. Its intuitive interface makes it easy to get started, and it has all of the tools to keep you going.
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