Projects, Autosave & Snapshots in Zella

Animated stack of Zella project autosave snapshots

Quick answer: Zella autosaves your project as you work, so you can close and reopen with every edit — cuts, captions, titles (text + style + color), color, callouts, keyframes, speed, and reframe — restored identically. Versioned snapshots let you roll back to an earlier state. If Zella is interrupted, crash recovery offers to rescue your in-progress recording on the next launch, and project files are written atomically so a crash never corrupts them.

On this page: what’s saved · autosave · snapshots · reframe persists · recovery · moving projects · habits · impact · FAQ

What gets saved in a project?

Everything you’ve done: clips and their order, cuts and ripple deletes, captions (text, style, color), color grades and effects, titles (text, style, color, anchor), callouts, transform keyframes, zoom blocks, speed regions, reframing/platform choice, and audio overlays.

How autosave and reopen work

Your edits autosave as you work — there’s no “save or lose it” cliff.
Close and reopen and all edits are restored identically: same cuts, captions, titles (with their colors), reframe, and platform.

This includes the things historically easy to lose — title text + style + color survive a reopen reliably.

How to roll back with versioned snapshots

Zella keeps versioned snapshots of your project so you can restore an earlier state:

Use the version history to return to a previous snapshot.
Useful when you’ve made a series of changes and want to compare or revert to “before I started grading.”

Does my reframe and platform choice persist?

Yes — your reframe (aspect, Fit/Fill, crop offset) and platform selection are saved and survive a reopen. You won’t have to re-pick TikTok and re-nudge the crop every session.

How crash recovery works

If Zella is interrupted — a crash, force-quit, or power loss:

In-progress recordings are written safely; on the next launch Zella offers to recover the unfinished recording rather than leaving a broken file.
Project files are written atomically, so a crash mid-save won’t corrupt the project — you reopen to the last good state.

After an unexpected quit: relaunch → accept the recovery prompt if it appears → continue editing.

How to move or back up a project

The original source/recording files are referenced by the project. Keep them in place, or use the relink flow if you move them.
To archive a finished piece, keep the exported file (chapter 21) — it’s self-contained and needs no project.

Good habits for not losing work

Reframe and finalize titles/callouts before exporting so anchors are set for the final aspect.
Snapshot before a big change (a heavy grade, a major recut) so you can roll back.
Keep your source recordings until the piece is fully shipped.

What impact reliable persistence has

For content creators and video editors, “never lose work” is not a luxury — it’s the difference between trusting a tool and abandoning it:

Confidence to experiment — snapshots mean you can try an aggressive grade or recut knowing you can roll back.
No catastrophic failures — atomic writes + crash recovery mean the single most demoralizing event in video work (losing a recording or a day’s edit) essentially doesn’t happen.
Resumable work — autosave lets you close mid-edit and pick up later, fitting editing into real schedules.

Animated stack of restorable Zella autosave snapshots

Projects FAQ

Do I have to manually save my project? No — Zella autosaves; close and reopen and your edits are intact.

Can I undo a whole session of changes? Use versioned snapshots to roll back to an earlier state (beyond the live undo stack).

Will my titles and captions survive a reopen? Yes — text, style, and color persist.

What happens if Zella crashes mid-recording? Relaunch and accept the recovery prompt to rescue the in-progress file.

Does my TikTok/16:9 choice get remembered? Yes — reframe and platform persist with the project.

Pro tips & gotchas

Every change autosaves — there’s no Save button to forget.
Versioned snapshots let you roll back to an earlier state if an edit goes wrong.
Reopen any project from the Library (⌘L) — your timeline, overlays, and settings come back intact.
Keep source media in a stable location so reopened projects can still find their files.