{"slug": "kdenlive", "name": "Kdenlive", "category": "media", "category_name": "Media and creative", "description": "", "recommenders": 4, "commenters": 13, "warners": 1, "score": 4.832, "rising": 0.02, "first": "2026-01-01", "latest": "2026-10-19", "why": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 4, "neutral": 7, "compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 3, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive.", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://kdenlive.org", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Kdenlive"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 792130882, "item_id": 49508180, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49508180", "by": "Matl", "date": "2026-08-31", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "If you want a step above that and still FLOSS then Kdenlive is a better choice.", "excerpt": "I use and pay for DaVinci Resolve Studio on Linux myself, so yes I have tried them and yes, they're obviously more feature packed and polished than OpenShot is. OpenShot is however significantly easier to use and does what you need for casual editing. If you want a step above that and still FLOSS then Kdenlive is a better choice. What makes your original comment useless is that it reads like an American saying, 'I be", "context": "", "use_case": "FLOSS video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "OpenShot 4.0 \u2013 Open-source video editor"}, {"id": 766309970, "item_id": 47894373, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47894373", "by": "chancitag", "date": "2026-04-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Recently started using Kdenlive and it is awesome.", "excerpt": "Love OBS and Blender. Recently started using Kdenlive and it is awesome. Big fan of OpenSCAD[1] and solvespace[2] for making functional 3D prints. I'm going to branch out a bit here and say GrapheneOS is my favorite thing going on right now. [1] https://openscad.org/ [2] https://solvespace.com/index.pl", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are your top open source apps/software?"}, {"id": 765063872, "item_id": 47816492, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47816492", "by": "yesimahuman", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Kdenlive is amazing.", "excerpt": "Kdenlive is amazing. As someone that learned basic video editing through cracked versions of Premiere growing up, I love that a completely free tool can do everything I need for editing without the nonsense of basic editors or tools like Clipchamp that lock ffmpeg flags like 4k rendering behind paid gates. My only issue with the tool right now is crashing and corrupted backups which happened a few times on the video ", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}, {"id": 765046528, "item_id": 47815408, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815408", "by": "aleda145", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive.", "excerpt": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive. Lots of features, I still feel like a beginner, which is such a fun feeling! I'm using it together with OBS to post short demo videos of my side project. I could use Loom I guess, but I prefer to keep my tech stack FOSS when I can. Creating \"non standard\" video resolutions is a bit of a pain though. But I've solved that with an ffmpeg", "context": "prefers FOSS stack", "use_case": "demo videos for side project", "switched_from": "Shotcut", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 769407808, "item_id": 48087988, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48087988", "by": "zeta0134", "date": "2026-05-10", "stance": "warn", "quote": "kdenlive has some limitations with its layering implementation", "excerpt": "Still chugging away at my NES rhythm game. Currently, in addition to climbing the content mountain (so, SO much pixel art and music needs to be made) I'm also slowly learning video editing workflows. I was able to put together a brief gameplay trailer this last week: https://store.steampowered.com/app/4129270/Tactus/ Right this second I'm looking for an alternative to After Effects that runs on Linux systems, as kden", "context": "NES rhythm game developer on Linux", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (May 2026)"}]}], "who": [{"by": "oflebbe", "context": "Linux user on Debian or older Ubuntu LTS", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50150535", "date": "2026-10-19"}, {"by": "aleda145", "context": "prefers FOSS stack", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815408", "date": "2026-04-18"}, {"by": "googie", "context": "Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47762973", "date": "2026-04-14"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["video editing", "video editing via flatpak", "floss video editing", "video editing on linux", "demo videos for side project", "simple video editing"], "compared": [{"slug": "davinci-resolve", "name": "DaVinci Resolve", "co": 2, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ffmpeg", "name": "ffmpeg", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "obs-studio", "name": "OBS Studio", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "blender", "name": "Blender", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "codex", "name": "Codex", "co": 1, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "capcut", "name": "CapCut", "co": 1, "switched_from": 1, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815118", "title": "State of Kdenlive", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50148601", "title": "Flatpak \u2013 An Insecurity Nightmare (2023)", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49946895", "title": "The work by Valve's Timur Krist\u00f3f on improving old AMD GPUs on Linux", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49507822", "title": "OpenShot 4.0 \u2013 Open-source video editor", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49421554", "title": "Coding expertise is going to collapse from AI reliance", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48759634", "title": "PeerTube is a free, decentralized and federated video platform", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 3, "compare": 1}, "2026-05": {"warn": 1}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"neutral": 2}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802408563, "item_id": 50150535, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50150535", "by": "oflebbe", "date": "2026-10-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Running up-to-date desktop apps like synology-drive, prusa slicer, keepassxc, kdenlive or even Steam", "excerpt": "Flatpak is now an indispensible part of my linux setup on debian or an older ubuntu LTS: Running up-to-date desktop apps like synology-drive, prusa slicer, keepassxc, kdenlive or even Steam at the same time without any conflicting dependencies and configurations tainting the distribution. And if you do not want to use it any more, you can simply remove it with little or even no traces left behind. I love the experien", "context": "Linux user on Debian or older Ubuntu LTS", "use_case": "video editing via Flatpak", "switched_from": "", "story": "Flatpak \u2013 An Insecurity Nightmare (2023)"}, {"id": 799474262, "item_id": 49967141, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49967141", "by": "nickserv", "date": "2026-10-05", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "light video editing (OBS, Kdenlive)", "excerpt": "I use it for a bit of everything: dev work (InteliJ), basic 3D modeling/printing (freeCAD, Blender, Orca), light video editing (OBS, Kdenlive), gaming (wine) ... Could probably go with an Arch based distro, but the Ubuntu/Debian base is useful for the good compatibility.", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "The work by Valve's Timur Krist\u00f3f on improving old AMD GPUs on Linux"}, {"id": 792130882, "item_id": 49508180, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49508180", "by": "Matl", "date": "2026-08-31", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "If you want a step above that and still FLOSS then Kdenlive is a better choice.", "excerpt": "I use and pay for DaVinci Resolve Studio on Linux myself, so yes I have tried them and yes, they're obviously more feature packed and polished than OpenShot is. OpenShot is however significantly easier to use and does what you need for casual editing. If you want a step above that and still FLOSS then Kdenlive is a better choice. What makes your original comment useless is that it reads like an American saying, 'I be", "context": "", "use_case": "FLOSS video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "OpenShot 4.0 \u2013 Open-source video editor"}, {"id": 790762882, "item_id": 49422680, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49422680", "by": "mentos", "date": "2026-08-24", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use Kdenlive 90% less", "excerpt": "How many programs can dispense with 50% of their complexity by just offering an API for LLMs to execute? By way of example I use Kdenlive 90% less and just use Codex to issue the ffmpeg CLI commands directly when I want to crop/format video on my PC.", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Coding expertise is going to collapse from AI reliance"}, {"id": 780223425, "item_id": 48763964, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48763964", "by": "raphinou", "date": "2026-07-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "(on Linux, obs, kdenlive)", "excerpt": "I am currently recording tutorial videos for an open source project. It's produced fully with Foss software (on Linux, obs, kdenlive) and about an open source project, so I wanted to host it with peertube (though YouTube might be used later on for its network effect, it was easier to publish with peertube as yt required an video of me and my ID). It's going fine until now. I don't host peertube myself though, I use a", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "PeerTube is a free, decentralized and federated video platform"}, {"id": 769407808, "item_id": 48087988, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48087988", "by": "zeta0134", "date": "2026-05-10", "stance": "warn", "quote": "kdenlive has some limitations with its layering implementation", "excerpt": "Still chugging away at my NES rhythm game. Currently, in addition to climbing the content mountain (so, SO much pixel art and music needs to be made) I'm also slowly learning video editing workflows. I was able to put together a brief gameplay trailer this last week: https://store.steampowered.com/app/4129270/Tactus/ Right this second I'm looking for an alternative to After Effects that runs on Linux systems, as kden", "context": "NES rhythm game developer on Linux", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (May 2026)"}, {"id": 766309970, "item_id": 47894373, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47894373", "by": "chancitag", "date": "2026-04-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Recently started using Kdenlive and it is awesome.", "excerpt": "Love OBS and Blender. Recently started using Kdenlive and it is awesome. Big fan of OpenSCAD[1] and solvespace[2] for making functional 3D prints. I'm going to branch out a bit here and say GrapheneOS is my favorite thing going on right now. [1] https://openscad.org/ [2] https://solvespace.com/index.pl", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What are your top open source apps/software?"}, {"id": 765157809, "item_id": 47822363, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47822363", "by": "timonoko", "date": "2026-04-19", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Only recently it started to be a worthy competitor.", "excerpt": "I have I have been using Cinerella for about 30 years. I asked Gemini about it and it told me there would be nothing new or exciting in Kdenlive. Only recently it started to be a worthy competitor.", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}, {"id": 765063872, "item_id": 47816492, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47816492", "by": "yesimahuman", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Kdenlive is amazing.", "excerpt": "Kdenlive is amazing. As someone that learned basic video editing through cracked versions of Premiere growing up, I love that a completely free tool can do everything I need for editing without the nonsense of basic editors or tools like Clipchamp that lock ffmpeg flags like 4k rendering behind paid gates. My only issue with the tool right now is crashing and corrupted backups which happened a few times on the video ", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}, {"id": 765055617, "item_id": 47815976, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815976", "by": "vladde", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "compare", "quote": "has someone here moved from DaVinci Resolve to Kdenlive? how was that experience?", "excerpt": "has someone here moved from DaVinci Resolve to Kdenlive? how was that experience? i just was a bit shocked to find out Resolve didn't support h.264 on their free tier on Linux, and i don't want to re-encode all my footage to AV1", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "video editing on Linux", "switched_from": "", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}, {"id": 765046528, "item_id": 47815408, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47815408", "by": "aleda145", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive.", "excerpt": "I recently switched from Shotcut to Kdenlive. Kdenlive's UX is much more intuitive. Lots of features, I still feel like a beginner, which is such a fun feeling! I'm using it together with OBS to post short demo videos of my side project. I could use Loom I guess, but I prefer to keep my tech stack FOSS when I can. Creating \"non standard\" video resolutions is a bit of a pain though. But I've solved that with an ffmpeg", "context": "prefers FOSS stack", "use_case": "demo videos for side project", "switched_from": "Shotcut", "story": "State of Kdenlive"}, {"id": 764207569, "item_id": 47762973, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47762973", "by": "googie", "date": "2026-04-14", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "For now I use Kdenlive, which is nice for simple editing, but feels unfinished", "excerpt": "I wish they (authors of DaVinci Resolve and the Photo Editor) paid more attention to Linux platform. Theoretically DaVinci Resolve runs on Linux, but getting it run is a very bad experience on Ubuntu/Kubuntu 24.04. I even paid for the DaVinci license, as I read somewhere that for Linux it's necessary in order to have all codecs supported. It did not help. Fortunately there were no problems with refund. There are whol", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "simple video editing", "switched_from": "DaVinci Resolve", "story": "DaVinci Resolve releases Photo Editor"}, {"id": 743338242, "item_id": 46458640, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46458640", "by": "mlacks", "date": "2026-01-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Getting the hang of KDENlive", "excerpt": "I moved to linux this month for good once i realized I no longer needed microsft services (Excel for example \"runs on Mac\" but is missing important features). I chose redhat because its what I've been using for over a decade at work and feels like home. Only thing I miss is Capcut as that workflow was pretty ironed out. Getting the hang of KDENlive", "context": "", "use_case": "video editing", "switched_from": "CapCut", "story": "Linux is good now; to feel like you actually own your PC, put Linux on it"}]}