Video-editing software: How we test video editing software

Software put through its paces

We test products using rigorous laboratory methods

Video editing has moved on from the days when we were happy if a program even worked on our computer. We still examine stability by testing the software on various machines of different specifications, but the main parts of our testing cover versatility and ease of use. Two testers rate each software package, one is a video-editing novice, the other has lots of experience.

Versatility

We examine the versatility of the software by assessing the range of functions it's able to perform. One of the ways we do this is to look at the amount of options in each area. For example, even the most basic software has special effects you can add to your footage, but some software has far more special effects to choose from. Taking this further some software allows you to download even more, or create your own. 

We also look at how finely you can make adjustments. The most basic software allows you to adjust sound volume up and down, but more advanced software offers a broader range of fine adjustments. You could be tinkering with treble and bass levels or setting volume levels when working with 5.1 surround sound, for example.

The testers go through 8 pre-defined editing scenarios to do all this, and this makes up part of the overall versatility score.

Ease of use

We place particular importance on rating how easy each software package is to use. Some software is fantastically feature-rich, but a possible downside of all this power is that the software can be harder to get to grips with. We examine this carefully paying particular notice of the experiences of our tester with little experience of video-editing.