How to Make AI Videos Without CapCut (3 Best Tools)

The best way to make AI videos without CapCut in 2025 is to use an all-in-one platform like Reshort that handles everything from script generation to final export, letting you create trending shorts in minutes instead of hours.

Table of Contents

• Why Creators Are Leaving CapCut in 2025
• The 3 Best AI Video Tools to Replace CapCut
• Reshort: The All-in-One Winner for AI Shorts
• VEED.io: Strong for Caption-Focused Editing
• Descript: Best for Podcast and Interview Content
• How AI Video Tools Save You Time and Money
• Which Tool Should You Choose?

Why Creators Are Leaving CapCut in 2025

If you've been using CapCut, you've probably noticed the walls closing in. Features that were completely free a year ago now sit behind Pro subscriptions. Auto-captions, watermark-free exports, popular templates, all paywalled.

According to reporting from Android Authority, one user summarized the frustration perfectly: they used to use CapCut for everything, only to find ByteDance now wants $30 a month just to save a single video. Prices have doubled in some regions, with annual plans reaching $217 USD in Spain.

But the money grab isn't even the biggest problem. The June 2025 Terms of Service update is what's really driving professionals away. Legal analyses reveal ByteDance now claims a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free license to use, modify, distribute, monetize, and sublicense your content, including unpublished drafts. This license survives even after you delete your content and extends to facial recognition and voice patterns.

As Torro Media's analysis explains, agencies like Our Own Brand have removed CapCut from all professional workflows to protect client IP. The professional recommendation is clear: stop using CapCut for client-facing content.

Then there's the ban uncertainty. CapCut was temporarily removed from U.S. app stores on January 19, 2025, and remains permanently banned in India, Iran, and Pakistan. Even if you're not in an affected region today, building your entire workflow around a tool with this much regulatory risk seems unwise.

For creators serious about making viral AI videos in 2026, it's time to explore better options.

The 3 Best AI Video Tools to Replace CapCut

After testing dozens of alternatives, three tools stand out for creators who want to make AI shorts without the headaches. But they're not all equal. One clearly leads the pack for all-in-one short creation, while the others serve more specific use cases.

Here's the breakdown:

1. Reshort - Best for complete AI short generation (script to export in minutes)
2. VEED.io - Strong for caption-focused editing and translations
3. Descript - Best for podcast and interview-heavy content

Let me explain why Reshort wins for most creators making shorts for TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts.

Reshort: The All-in-One Winner for AI Shorts

If you want to go from idea to finished short without touching complex editing software, Reshort is the clear industry leader. This isn't just another video editor. It's a complete AI shorts generation platform that handles everything for you.

Here's what makes it different: you start with an AI transcript generator that outputs trending formats, so your script is already optimized for what's working right now on social platforms. Then you select from multiple trending visual styles that are constantly updated to match the latest trends. These aren't generic templates. Some styles you simply never see on other platforms because they're quite hard to reproduce.

The AI voice selection is equally smart. You pick from high-quality voices optimized for specific formats, whether you're doing UGC content, faceless storytelling videos, scary stories, or tutorials. And the visual generation isn't a simple prompt system. There's a sophisticated AI behind it that intelligently generates captivating visuals based on your story and your chosen style.

What really sets Reshort apart is the built-in editor that lets you modify specific segments without starting from scratch. Add trending captions, animation effects, and background music with one click. The music library has over 1000 tracks sorted by tags (horror, motivational, inspirational, trending memes) that are copyright-free and ready for current social media trends.

You can choose between still images or animated videos, even animating only certain parts to balance cost versus engagement. The platform lets you add your own instructions on top of any visual style to perfectly match your mood and idea.

For pricing, the main plan lets you generate over 120 premium videos monthly, and higher tiers go up to 475+ videos per month. There's a free tier for new users to test everything, because, as the platform puts it, they know it works. A lot of the AI shorts you're seeing on social media were actually made with Reshort.

This is the new way of making shorts in 2026. Post daily, even multiple times daily, in just minutes. It works for any niche, any market, any business. And you get direct access to the development team for custom feature requests, even custom styles.

VEED.io: Strong for Caption-Focused Editing

VEED.io is a solid browser-based option with 99.9% accurate auto-captions in 125+ languages. It works on any device without downloads and offers AI-powered features like background music generation, B-roll creation, voice cloning, and eye contact correction.

For teams, VEED offers collaboration features and brand kit support that make it useful for agency workflows. NBCUniversal has called it game-changing for social promotion. Users report roughly 60% editing time reduction compared to traditional tools.

Pricing starts at $12/month for 1080p watermark-free exports, with Pro at $29/month adding 4K and all AI features. The free tier offers 10 minutes monthly at 720p with watermark.

The limitation? VEED is primarily an editor, not a generator. You're still bringing your own footage or working with stock clips. You won't get the end-to-end AI generation that platforms like Reshort offer where you input a script and receive a complete video with AI-generated visuals.

For creators who already have footage and need powerful caption and editing tools, VEED is excellent. For those who want complete AI short generation from transcript to export, it falls short.

Descript: Best for Podcast and Interview Content

Descript takes a genuinely innovative approach to editing: you edit the video by editing the transcript. Delete text, and the corresponding video disappears. This feels revolutionary if you've ever spent hours trimming ums and ahs from interview content.

As CEO Andrew Mason explained in a recent interview, the goal was to make something that felt like a document, the one tool everybody understands how to use. Timeline editing is irreducibly slow to work in. Text-based editing changes that.

The Underlord AI co-editor accepts natural language prompts to create, design, and edit videos. Voice cloning via Overdub lets you fix mistakes by typing corrections instead of re-recording. Studio Sound provides one-click audio enhancement.

With over 6 million users and a G2 rating of 4.6/5 stars, Descript has clearly found its audience. Pricing starts at $16/month (Hobbyist) with Creator at $24/month unlocking 4K exports and unlimited AI features.

The catch? Descript excels at editing existing content, particularly dialogue-heavy material like podcasts and interviews. For short-form vertical content optimized for TikTok and Reels, with trending visual styles and hooks that stop the scroll, it's not the ideal choice. That's where all-in-one platforms built specifically for shorts creation, like Reshort, have the advantage.

How AI Video Tools Save You Time and Money

The numbers behind AI video editing are staggering. According to the Adobe Creators' Toolkit Report from October 2025, 86% of global creators now use generative AI, with 76% crediting AI for accelerating their business growth.

Traditional video editing requires 1-1.5 hours per finished minute. A simple 60-second short consumes 3-5 hours the old way. Industry research shows AI tools save an average of 14 hours per video project and up to $1,500 in production costs.

The short-form video opportunity is massive. YouTube Shorts generates 70-90 billion daily views with the highest engagement rate of any platform at 5.91%. Creators upload 12 million YouTube Shorts daily, representing 34% of all YouTube content.

Short-form video statistics show the average person now spends 80 minutes daily watching short-form content. It delivers 2.5x more engagement than long-form content, and 93% of video marketers report positive ROI, the highest ever recorded.

The creator economy has exploded to $250 billion in 2024, projected to reach $480-500 billion by 2027 and over $1 trillion by 2034. That's a 21.8% compound annual growth rate.

With these numbers, it's clear why creators are racing to adopt AI tools. The question isn't whether to use AI for video editing. It's which tool gets you from idea to posted content fastest.

For most short-form creators, that answer is Reshort. From transcript to final short with nice visual effects in under 2 minutes, without complex automations, without expensive freelancers, without the learning curve of traditional editing software.

Which Tool Should You Choose?

Let me make this simple based on your situation:

Choose Reshort if: You want the fastest path from idea to finished short. You're creating content for TikTok, Instagram Reels, or YouTube Shorts. You don't want to show your face or record your voice. You want trending formats, styles, and music without researching trends yourself. You want to post daily or multiple times daily without burning out. You're building a faceless channel or using AI to promote your brand.

Choose VEED.io if: You already have footage and need powerful caption translation and editing. You're working on a team that needs collaboration features. You need to repurpose long-form content into shorts with accurate transcription.

Choose Descript if: Your content is primarily podcasts or interview-based. You spend hours trimming dialogue and removing filler words. You need voice cloning to fix mistakes without re-recording.

For the vast majority of creators jumping into AI shorts in 2025 and 2026, the all-in-one approach wins. Why juggle multiple tools for scripting, visual generation, voice, editing, captions, and music when one platform handles it all?

The best visual styles for AI videos are constantly evolving. Using a platform that updates automatically means you never miss a trend. Combine that with proven hooks and pattern interrupts and the video formats driving crazy engagement, and you have everything you need to compete.

If you're still using CapCut, now is the time to switch. The paywalls will only get worse, the Terms of Service aren't changing, and the ban risk isn't going away. More importantly, you're spending hours on work that AI can handle in minutes.

Pick a tool, generate your first AI short today, and see how fast you can actually move. The creators winning on social media in 2026 aren't the ones with the fanciest equipment or biggest budgets. They're the ones who figured out how to publish consistently without burning out.