Native macOS screen recorder + AI video editor for Beginners.
Menu bar.
No cloud.
No subscription.
The video editor you don't have to learn.
The polish of Screen Studio and the AI editing of Descript, but local, Mac-native, and free to start. Your files never leave your machine — and when you don’t feel like editing, you just tell the built-in AI what you want.
AUTO-POLISH · ONE TAP
One tap runs the whole retention edit.
Auto-Polish does the edit that keeps people watching — the silences and fillers go, cuts land every few seconds with a matched sound under each one, keyword captions pop with emoji, your voice gets the studio polish, the opening punches in on your face, and a mood-matched music bed ducks under every word. All on-device.
One tap on iPhone & iPad · the same passes, one click each, on the Mac · re-running never stacks doubles · every step undoable
How Auto-Polish works →CAPTURE ANYTHING
Capture anything on your Mac, exactly how you want it.
Full screen, a region, a single window, or camera-only — with a webcam bubble, clean backgrounds, and rock-solid long recordings that survive sleep and crashes.
- Full screen / region / window / camera-only capture
- Webcam bubble overlay with blur, AI background removal (RVM), solid or live backgrounds
- System audio + mic, with pause / resume mid-take
- Crash recovery and sleep-safe long recordings
- Runs native on Apple Silicon + Intel
ONE CLICK, READY TO POST
One click turns a raw take into a ready-to-post video.
Auto-Polish runs the moment your recording opens — captions, zoom-ins, a clean voice and colour, zero clicks. Want the full viral treatment? Make it Viral tightens the pacing and adds transitions, matched sound effects and a music bed in one tap. All on-device.
- Auto-Polish — captions, zoom-ins, voice & colour, and it auto-runs on every new recording
- Make it Viral — the whole ready-to-post pass in one tap: dead-air trim, punch-in zooms, transitions, SFX and a ducked music bed (keeps your original shape)
- Viral templates — Reel Pack, Hook Captions, Beat Drop, Cinematic Reel, Photo Cards, Reaction Split
- Auto-zoom that follows real cursor clicks — the Screen-Studio look
- Remove silences and filler words (um / uh / like), reviewed before you apply
- On-device auto-captions + neural noise removal — no upload, no transcript service
EDIT BY TYPING
Just tell Zella what to do. It does the editing.
Type what you want in plain English and Zella’s built-in AI assistant does it — cut the silences, add captions, make it vertical for TikTok, drop a whoosh on that cut, export in 4K. The whole toolset, driven by chat — and it’s free: bring your own key, and free providers work out of the box.
- Plain-English editing — "remove the dead air, add captions, and make it vertical" runs the whole chain for you
- Content-aware cuts — "cut the part where I fumble the intro" finds it in the transcript and removes it
- It can see your video — ask "is my face centered?" or "is it too dark?" and it checks the frame on-device
- Auto B-Roll — "add b-roll" places matching stock clips from your captions automatically (free Pexels key)
- Adds music, 30 built-in sound effects, titles, callouts and logos on command
- Bring your own key (Groq, Gemini, Cerebras and Ollama are free) — keys stay in your Mac’s Keychain, nothing is uploaded by Zella
PRO EDITOR, MENU-BAR SIMPLE
Final Cut logic. Menu-bar simplicity. Grows with you.
A real timeline that responds instantly — cut with B, ripple-delete gaps, drag to reorder, 50-level undo. An Advanced Tools switch reveals keyframes and a bezier curve editor when you are ready for them; until then they stay out of your way.
- Timeline with B-key cut, ripple delete, drag-trim, drag-to-reorder, 50-level undo
- Advanced tools switch — one toggle reveals motion keyframes, the bezier curve editor, live luma scopes, Color Match and effect masks
- Speed control — slow / fast / freeze / reverse free; ramps, blade-speed and instant replay with Pro
- J / L cuts for natural-sounding edits
- Per-clip volume, autosave with crash recovery, versioned project snapshots
EFFECTS & COLOR
Cinematic color and effects, no plugins required.
Grade with 28 built-in colour grades, stage your subject over an AI-replaced background with backlight and a contact shadow, and mask or blur anything to keep secrets out of frame.
- 28 colour grades across Cinematic, Film, Modern, Special and Vintage looks (3 Founder-exclusive) + intensity slider
- AI background removal with 40 built-in scenes (20 still, 20 animated) or your own image / video
- Subject staging — position, scale, a soft backlight glow and a contact shadow that grounds the subject on its new background
- Blur callouts and feathered rectangle / ellipse masks to censor faces, keys and secrets
- Vignette, glow, grain, pixelate, chroma, letterbox + exposure, contrast, saturation, temperature and tint
BACKGROUND REMOVE & REPLACE
Swap any background. No green screen.
Remove the background from your webcam and screen with on-device AI, drop in one of 40 built-in scenes or your own image or video, then stage your subject with a soft backlight and a grounding contact shadow.
- AI background removal (RVM) runs fully on-device — no green screen, no cloud, nothing uploaded
- 40 built-in scenes (20 still, 20 animated), plus blur, solid colours, or your own image / video
- Subject staging — position, scale, a soft backlight glow and a contact shadow that grounds you on the new scene
- Works on the webcam bubble and the main video, with a live preview while you record
- Defringe cleans colour halos off the cutout so edges stay crisp on solid backgrounds
CAPTIONS, TITLES & CALLOUTS THAT SELL
Captions and callouts that actually drive watch-time.
Nine viral caption presets with active-word highlight, twenty animated title styles, Text Behind Subject, and nineteen callout types to point exactly where you want attention.
- 9 caption presets — Word Pop, Hormozi, Karaoke, Pop Box, Neon Glow, Clean Minimal, Beast, Highlighter, Bounce
- Active-word highlight; custom font import for any language
- 20 animated title styles with gradient fills, stroke, shadow and box
- Text Behind Subject — titles that sit between your background and you, using the on-device subject cutout
- 16 overlay blend modes for titles and callouts — screen, multiply, overlay, soft light and more
- Anchored, responsive titles; canvas drag-to-edit for every callout
- 19 callout types — arrow, box, ellipse, label, keystroke, spotlight, number, blur, leader line, popup, magnifier, highlighter, underline, pixelate-censor, emoji, sticky note, scribble, timer, glitch region
SOUND THAT SELLS
Score it, punch it up, clean the voice.
Drop from 30 built-in sound effects, add music that ducks under your voice on its own, sweeten with 16 voice changers, and let Beat Sync pulse your edits to the music.
- 30 built-in sound effects — whooshes, pops, risers, impacts and UI clicks, no files to hunt down
- 16 voice changers (chipmunk, robot, echo, reverb, megaphone and more)
- Music with Auto-Duck — the track dips under your voice, then swells back automatically
- Beat Sync pulses zooms and effects to the kick, snare or hats, tuned per band
- Polish Voice with five studio tones — Natural, Warm, Bright, Podcast and Cinematic voicings on one broadcast-clean foundation
- Detach / reattach audio and J/L-cut timing
SHIP TO EVERY PLATFORM
Reframe once. Ship to every platform.
One-click reframe to 9:16, 1:1 or 16:9 with face-aware auto-tracking, then export to MP4, MOV, GIF or M4A at 1080p or 4K with platform presets baked in.
- One-click reframe to 9:16 / 1:1 / 16:9 (center-crop, manual offset, or Vision face-detection auto-track)
- Export MP4 / MOV / GIF / M4A at 1080p free — 4K and 8K with Pro
- Platform presets — TikTok/Reels/Shorts 1080×1920, YouTube 1920×1080, Instagram 1080×1350
- GIF with captions + zoom baked in
- Versioned project snapshots + autosave recovery
NEW · AUTO B-ROLL
Talking to camera? Zella fills the gaps with b-roll.
Zella reads your captions, finds the most visual word in each line, and drops in matching stock footage automatically — no searching, no downloading, no timeline busywork. Full-frame cutaways, spaced across your whole video, in one click.
- Reads your captions on-device — only the keyword is searched, never your video
- Free stock clips from Pexels or Pixabay (bring a free key, stored in your Keychain)
- Placed as silent full-frame cutaways — swap, trim or remove any clip
- Or just ask the AI Assistant: "add b-roll based on my captions"
THE WORKFLOW
Record. One click. Post.
Record
Hit the menu-bar icon. Full screen, a region, a window, or camera-only — with system + mic audio and a webcam bubble.
Auto-Polish (it runs itself)
The timeline opens and Auto-Polish runs automatically — captions, zoom-ins, a clean voice and colour, zero clicks. Want more? Tap Make it Viral for the full ready-to-post pass: tightened pacing, transitions, sound effects and a music bed.
Ship
Reframe to 9:16 / 1:1 / 16:9 with auto-track, then export MP4 / MOV / GIF / M4A — 1080p free, 4K/8K with Pro — with platform presets baked in.
WHO IT'S FOR
Built for people who ship video.
Founders
Record a feature walkthrough, let Zella zoom and tighten it, and post a polished demo to your launch thread in minutes — not days.
See the workflow →Creators
Captions, hooks, and color grade in one app. Reframe to 9:16, bake in viral captions, and export Shorts-ready video without round-tripping through CapCut.
See the workflow →Social & Reels
Kinetic captions, callouts, and auto-duck music are built in. Make a 9:16 reel from a screen recording in one pass.
See the workflow →Support & Dev-Rel
Blur sensitive keys, add keystroke callouts, and ship on-device captioned tutorials your users can actually follow.
See the workflow →HOW ZELLA COMPARES
Local. One-time price. Mac-native.
| Zella | Screen Studio | Descript | Loom | CapCut | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free plan with no watermark | ✓ | — | — | — | — |
| Runs 100% locally (files never leave your Mac) | ✓ | ✓ | — | — | — |
| One-time price for Pro (no subscription) | ✓ | ✓ | — | — | — |
| One purchase unlocks Mac, iPhone & iPad (Universal Purchase) | ✓ | — | — | — | — |
| Unlimited recording length on free | ✓ | — | — | — | ✓ |
| Mac-native app | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | — | — |
| AI cleanup — remove silence + filler words | ✓ | — | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| Auto B-Roll — stock clips placed from your captions | ✓ | — | — | — | — |
| Auto-zoom on cursor clicks | ✓ | ✓ | — | — | — |
| On-device captions (no upload) | ✓ | — | — | — | — |
| Color grade + LUT looks | ✓ | — | — | — | ✓ |
| One-click 9:16 / 1:1 / 16:9 reframe | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| No cloud account required | ✓ | ✓ | — | — | — |
ZELLA FOR IPHONE & IPAD · COMING TO THE APP STORE
The whole studio. In your pocket.
Record on the go, then cut, caption, grade and reframe entirely on-device — Zella's editor, rebuilt native for iPhone and iPad. No cloud, no account, nothing uploaded. One Zella Pro unlocks every Apple device you own.
- Record camera or screen on-device — blur, cut out or replace the background live while you film
- Auto-Polish in one tap — the full retention edit: silence & filler cuts, cut cadence with transitions and a matched SFX under every cut, Beast keyword captions with emoji, voice polish, a hook punch-in, emphasis zooms, a color grade and mood-matched music
- Make Vertical — face-aware 9:16 reframe for TikTok, Reels and Shorts
- Full Auto-Polish, AI background removal, captions and templates, all on the Neural Engine
- Hand a project to the Mac app as a .zella file — one Zella Pro unlocks every Apple device
ONE PURCHASE · EVERY DEVICE
Buy Zella Pro once. Own it everywhere.
Zella Pro is a Universal Purchase — buy it once and it works on your Mac today. The iPhone & iPad app is built too — the same on-device studio, coming to the App Store — so one payment unlocks every Apple device, synced by your Apple ID. No account, no subscription. Record on your phone, finish on your Mac. And Zella AI — hosted, no API key needed — is coming next.
PRICING
Start free. Own it forever.
Free plan is watermark-free & 100% local, with every AI tool and exports up to 2 minutes — Pro unlocks unlimited length, 4K/8K and the pro-depth toolset for a one-time price.
- No subscription — ever
- Free updates within the major version
- Sold and billed through the Mac App Store
- No cloud lock-in — your projects are local files
- Apple Silicon + Intel universal binary
FAQ
Questions, answered.
Is Zella free?
Yes. Zella Free is free forever — not a trial. It records unlimited length, runs 100% locally with no account, exports at 1080p up to 2 minutes with no watermark, and includes Auto-Polish, one-tap Make it Viral, on-device captions, AI background removal, the AI Assistant (with your own key), and the full editor. That is already more than Loom, Descript, or CapCut give you on a paid plan. Zella Pro ($89 one-time) lifts the length and 4K ceilings and adds the pro-depth toolset.
What is the difference between Zella Free and Zella Pro?
Free gives you unlimited local recording, the full editor, Auto-Polish + one-tap Make it Viral, on-device captions, AI background removal, the AI Assistant (bring your own key), all 25 transitions and 28 colour grades, and 1080p export up to 2 minutes — watermark-free. Pro ($89 one-time) removes the 2-minute cap (unlimited export length), adds 4K and 8K export, motion keyframes with a bezier curve editor, Color Match and live luma scopes, feathered effect masks, speed ramps, and per-drum Beat Sync. Zella Founder ($299) is an optional supporter tier on top of Pro: three exclusive cinematic color grades in the editor (Teal & Orange, Kodak, Noir), super priority support, early access, lifetime exclusive updates, and a thank-you spot in the Founder's Circle on zellahq.com.
Does Zella upload my recordings to the cloud?
No. Zella is local-only on every plan. Recording, editing, AI cleanup, and captions all run on your Mac — nothing is uploaded, and there is no account to sign into.
Is this a subscription?
No. Zella Free is free forever, and Zella Pro / Founder are one-time purchases with free updates within the major version. No monthly bill — unlike Loom, Descript, CapCut, and Camtasia, which are all subscriptions.
Where do I buy it, and who handles the payment?
Zella is distributed on the Mac App Store. You download it free, and Pro/Founder are in-app purchases billed by Apple to the card already on your Apple ID — Zella never sees or stores your payment details.
What do I need to run it?
macOS 14 Sonoma or later, on Apple Silicon or Intel. Zella ships as a universal binary.
Do the AI features need internet?
No. Auto-captions, filler-word removal, silence removal, and background removal all run on-device. The optional AI Assistant (free — bring your own key) is the one feature that calls out to a language model, and only if you add your own API key.
Can I get a refund?
Yes. Because purchases go through the Mac App Store, refunds follow Apple’s standard policy — request one at reportaproblem.apple.com. We’re also happy to help if something went wrong; see the contact page.
Which platforms can I export for?
Export MP4, MOV, GIF or M4A at 1080p (free) or 4K/8K (Pro), with one-click presets for TikTok/Reels/Shorts (1080×1920), YouTube (1920×1080) and Instagram (1080×1350).
From recording to ready-to-post — without becoming an editor.
All AI runs on your Mac. Nothing uploads. No subscription.
Get Zella — FreemacOS 14 Sonoma or later · Apple Silicon + Intel · Local-only · No cloud