Apple announces Clips: a fun video editing tool for iPhone and iPad

Alongside the new Product Red iPhone 7 and 7 Plus and the new 9.7-inch iPad, Apple today unveiled a new video editing tool for iOS, called “Clips”. The new app allows users to create mash-ups of video clips, images, and sound, and share the results on iMessage, Instagram, Facebook, and other social networks.

As it is, Clips stands somewhere in between iOS 10's automatic slideshows and the much more dedicated iMovie. The app was made with short videos in mind and offers users a wide variety of built-in image filters to toy around with, as well as the so-called Live Titles, which are basically animated (and optionally user-voiced) captions to go along with the videos.

“Clips gives iPhone and iPad users a new way to express themselves through video, and it’s incredibly easy to use,” said Susan Prescott, Apple’s vice president of Apps Product Marketing. “The effects, filters and amazing new Live Titles we’ve designed for Clips let anyone make great-looking, easily sharable videos with just a few taps.”

Clips can be used to record videos from within the app, although users can opt to choose from already recorded videos, as well as other media from their iPhones or iPads.

Clips will be available as a free app on the App Store, starting in April. It will be compatible with the iPhone 5s and later, the newly unveiled 9.7-inch iPad (of course), all iPad Air and Pro models, the iPad mini 2 and later, as well as the iPod touch 6th gen.