Need to make easy edits to your video or audio? You’re in luck! All Wistia plans have access to editing right in Wistia. To get started, click into the media you’d like to edit and select “Edit.”

From here, you can play through your media, trim out content, stitch together intros or outros, add transitions or background music, and more.

The media you can edit depends on your permission levels. Account Owners and Managers can edit any media, and anyone with 'Can manage' permissions on a folder can also edit the media there. If a user has 'Upload' permissions in a folder, they can only edit the media they have uploaded. Check out our User Roles page for a breakdown on user roles and permissions.

Let’s start with some new terminology! The playhead is a visual indicator that shows where you are while playing back your media. As you play your media, the playhead will move across the timeline beneath the previewer, and the timestamp will give you a better sense of exactly where you are.

You can play and pause the media by clicking directly on the play button or by hitting the spacebar on your keyboard.

Need to make a precise edit? You can zoom in (or out) of the timeline by clicking the magnifying glass icons above the timeline.

To further tailor the timeline's appearance, click the "Timeline" button.

With the Timeline menu open, you have the ability to:

The height of the timeline can be adjusted by clicking and dragging the handle above the editor controls.

To edit or watch/listen to any point in the media, click anywhere on the timeline, and the playhead will jump to that spot. You can also drag the playhead to your desired location.

Alternatively, adjust the playback speed to quickly skim through your video.

Splitting media allows you to break up your video or audio into multiple clips, so that you can reach any part of the timeline to trim, rearrange, or delete.

To split your media, drag the playhead right to the point in the video or audio where you want to make edits, and then click “Split.” From here, you can split your media up into as many clips as you’d like. You can delete individual clips by selecting them and clicking “Delete.” Or, you can remove the beginning or end of a clip by clicking and dragging either end of a section to trim it.

Changed your mind or made a mistake? Click the backward arrow to undo until you feel better about your edits. If you go back too far, that’s okay! Click the forward arrow to redo.

Once you’ve split your content into clips, you can click on a desired clip and move it anywhere on the timeline: click on the clip, hold, and drag it anywhere you want.

Want to restart your edit session for a clean slate? Click the “Revert” icon. This action will take you back to the original state of your media for a do-over.

Globally resize your video to fit one of our defined aspect ratios. In the editor, click the "Aspect Ratio" dropdown above the video preview. You’ll have the option to adjust the aspect ratio to: Original, Horizontal (16:9), Square (1:1), or Vertical (9:16).

If there are multiple clips on the timeline, they will all adjust to the selected aspect ratio. Changing the aspect ratio will introduce letterboxing to ensure the video fits the new dimensions.

To resize individual video clips in the editor, start by clicking on the clip in the video previewer.

You’ll see a menu appear below the video and a bounding box around the video. You can drag the corners of the bounding box to resize the video clip and drag the video clip itself to reposition it.

The menu bar below the video provides options such as Fit, Fill, and Reset. It also displays the scale percentage.

The scale percentage indicates how much the video clip has been scaled up and can be dragged to resize the video.

Once you’ve completed your edits, select the “Finish & exit” button at the top right of the editor. You’ll have two different saving options.

The “Replace current video” option in the dropdown menu will update the existing media, replacing it with the edited version.

All player customizations will transfer over to the newly saved media. However, replacing the current video will also:

Click "Save as new video" to save your edits as a brand new media instance. The new, edited media will contribute to your media count and storage. Then, select an existing folder or add a new folder to save your content in.

And that’s it! You’ve just edited your media in Wistia.

With the click of a button, you can compile moments from your video to create engaging clips for social media. Check out our Social Clips guide to get started.

Have any questions? Don’t hesitate to reach out to our Support Team, and we’ll be happy to help!