VEGAS Edit vs. Filmora X Reviewed Price, Features, Ease of Use Side-By-Side Comparison

What you’ll learn:

• Comparison table - VEGAS Edit and Filmora X
• Features in-depth - VEGAS Edit and Filmora X
• Conclusion - Which software is right for you?
• Filmora X alternative

A flat purchase price will be a lot more than a monthly fee at first, but monthly fees may add up to the purchase price. (Annual subscription fees may work out to a lower price than monthly payments.) Also, with a flat fee, the software is yours to keep and you don’t lose it as you would if you stop your subscription. But subscriptions also allow you to access software you otherwise might not be able to afford, or allow you to use software temporarily for a project. 

A subscription plan also often means that you get an update to new versions and features for no extra charge, whereas you’ll usually pay extra if you upgrade your perpetual license to the next version.

VEGAS Edit can be yours forever for a one-time price of $249 or for a subscription price of $12.99 a month. Filmora X is available for a one-time fee of $69.99 or by subscription at an annual fee of $39.99. 

The way you work in any app.  Does the workflow help with productivity, or does it hinder you, making things more difficult or slower than it should be?

VEGAS Edit is designed to be intuitive, to work the way the user wants to work rather than locking the user into a way of working. VEGAS Edit gives you many different ways to accomplish most tasks, so whatever you prefer, you can do it. 

That kind of flexibility makes VEGAS Edit easy to learn. Filmora X includes a Quick Start tutorial, but its workflow is very different from most other video editors and only lets you do things in certain, non-intuitive ways.

A pro editor needs a flexible and quick timeline, that will take any file format, can be arranged however the editor wants, will play back video smoothly without many dropped frames, and won’t bog down the editor with difficult-to-use tools or unnecessary steps.

The VEGAS Edit timeline enables editors to work the way they want. The entirely customizable interface can be spread over multiple screens. Editors can arrange and rearrange tracks at will and mix and match file formats on the same tracks. Simple touches like automatic crossfades on overlapping video make defining transitions almost instant, instead of having to pull the “handles” common in other editing apps – though trim handles are available if you prefer it. You can also drag media from folders into the Project Media window or directly to the timeline instead of going through an import process, saving you lots of time. Filmora X doesn’t allow you to drag-and drop media from folders into either the media pool or the timeline, forcing you into an import process. When you drag media to overlap clips on the timeline, the new clip will overwrite any portion of a previous clip the new clip overlaps instead of creating an automatic crossfade between them. You then need to re-trim existing clips to recover the parts overwritten or to create a transition.

Different editing tasks, like cutting on the timeline, adding effects, adding transitions, and exporting require different sets of tools. Customizable window layouts give you different interface configurations highlighting the tools you need for the task at hand.

VEGAS Edit offers a set of pre-built window layouts for adding media, adding graphics, adding text, adding transitions, adding FX, and more.

You can also define and save your own custom interface configurations. Filmora X switches between modes when working with different task, but its interface is not reconfigurable.

One of the first steps in the editing process is making a rough cut. Storyboards make this a lot easier, letting the editor select, arrange, and experiment with the order of clips in the project’s media pool just like arranging photos on a desk. It’s a quick and intuitive way to make an initial rough cut before ever going to the timeline.

VEGAS Edit offers multiple storyboards for as many separate sequences as you’d like to storyboard for the project. They’re quick and easy and allow for a playback preview of a sequence right from the media pool without having to go to the timeline. 

The main storyboard contents also appear and update immediately on the main timeline, so you don’t have to drag the sequence to the timeline. VEGAS Edit also updates the main storyboard every time you change the timeline. Filmora X does not offer storyboards.

Useful Tips: Storyboard Creation – craft your vision like the pros

Effective and engaging video often involves the use of text and titles, to provide credit to people involved or to give the viewer extra information. VEGAS Edit features a professional title generator with a library of slick, professional presets you can customize to fit your project’s needs. Filmora X employs a basic titler, but also comes with a suite of professional-looking, customizable title presets.

If you’re working with a pre-rendered video file and you want to make cuts at scene changes, VEGAS Edit applies AI technology to automatically detect scenes instead of making you scrub through and finding each scene manually. 

VEGAS Edit then makes splits or subclips or inserts keyframes in the video file at the scene changes, saving you tons of time. Filmora X doesn’t offer automatic scene detection.

A good editing app gives you an array of tools to correct and control your color to fix problems, and also to create stylistic looks to enhance mood or atmosphere.

VEGAS Edit employs a full suite of built-in professional color correction and color grading tools, and allows you to grade or correct color in High Dynamic Range (HDR). It also offers the Unified Color Grading panel, which gives you advanced color curves, HSL adjustment, color wheels, color sliders, and other tools right at your fingertips, all in a single panel. VEGAS Edit also offers HDR-ready video scopes so you can precisely measure your color correction work. Filmora X offers basic tools for adjusting and rebalancing color for fixing problems and creating styles, but does not support HDR.

Useful Tips: A Guide to Color Grading Your Video With the Powerful Unified Color Workflow

While beginner-level software tends to offer only basic color-correction tools, they still include filters for achieving many popular looks.

VEGAS Edit now includes a set of built-in Camera LUTS and Look LUTS, as well as full import and export of 3D LUTs — so you can download and import many free (or paid) LUT looks, as well as export any manual color grading you do as a LUT. Filmora X offers a library of adjustable color and film-style looks filters, plus a set of 3D LUT filters, but does not offer true import of LUTs.

How you apply filters to your footage can make a difference in your editing efficiency.

In VEGAS Edit you can apply filters and effects to your media clips on the timeline, to the track, to the whole project, or to media the media clip itself, so the filters stay applied to the media when you move it around. In Filmora X, filters go onto the video track(s) above your media, so they are not directly applied to the clips themselves, but affect any media (or other effects and filters) below them. If you move a clip on the timeline, you can lose the effect, but in some cases it makes it easier to apply the same effect to multiple clips. Some users may find this approach more intuitive.

One of the most time-honored VFX techniques around, chromakey lets you remove a solid-colored background and replace it with whatever you want, so you can put your actors on other planets, devise epic space battles, or combine with CGI to create a virtual set – or anything else your imagination fancies.
VEGAS Edit comes equipped with a chromakey plugin which lets you remove any color background. Filmora X also comes equipped with a chromakey tool.

Useful Tips: The Ultimate Guide to Chroma Key and Green Screen

When adding visual effects, sometimes it’s easier to apply the same effects to the contents of multiple video tracks so that all of your image layers take on the same look.

With Adjustment Tracks in VEGAS Edit, you can apply a chain of effects to a dedicated track, thereby applying those effects to the contents of all the tracks underneath. Filmora X offers similar functionality with effects filters placed on tracks instead of on clips.

For cool new visual effects, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI) means a faster, more powerful, smoother workflow.

VEGAS Edit employs Deep Learning modules to enhance its already powerful visual effects. Colorization brings new life to archive or other monochrome footage, and Style Transfer applies filters in styles like Picasso or Van Gogh. Filmora X does not offer AI functionality.

Ever have to deal with shaky footage? It’s not always the end of the world. With video stabilization, you can often fix wobble and get smooth video.

VEGAS Edit offers advanced professional video stabilization, letting you salvage footage you thought you couldn’t use. Filmora X comes with a basic video stabilization tool.

Slow motion is a bedrock effect for adding drama, tension, or excitement to a scene. Some of the best slo-mo effects allow the ramping of speed down and up for spectacular temporal transitions.

Useful Tips: Video Effects Every Editor Should Know: Add Essential Effects to Your Videos

VEGAS Edit lets you manually change the speed of a clip – just enter the value into the media properties. It also offers Optical Flow Slow Motion, which analyzes footage and creates new frames in order to get glass-smooth slow motion in footage of any frame rate. Filmora X lets you enter the playback value to control a clip’s speed.

In order to achieve great audio, you need meters so you can objectively determine the volume of your sound to make it consistent throughout your program, instead of relying only on your ears.  You also want warnings if your audio is too loud and may distort.

VEGAS Edit gives you professional meters for each channel of stereo sound, visible while you edit and play back your program. VEGAS Edit offers meters on each audio track. Filmora X only provides meters while editing audio clips. 

Great sound requires a set of effects tools for a robust soundtrack.

VEGAS Edit puts a huge collection of professional customizable audio effects and tools at your fingertips, like EQ, compression, and reverb, which you can apply to your audio for sweetening and special effects. 

You can apply the FX to individual clips, whole tracks, or over multiple or even all tracks. Filmora X offers a library of sound effects, but no tools for enhancing your audio.

Useful Tips: Adding Audio Effects to Your Video for Professional-Level Sound Editing

Envelopes let you control audio properties like volume and stereo panning on the fly, creating keyframes so your audio changes dynamically as the timeline plays.

VEGAS Edit offers cutting edge GPU acceleration for encoding into AVC and HEVC formats, slashing render times up to half. Filmora X also leverages the GPU for rendering and encoding video.

With many video editing apps, you need to go to outside software if you want a really comprehensive audio edit beyond basic or intermediate sound mixes. Those outside programs are known as digital audio workstations, or DAWs.

VEGAS Edit comes equipped with a built-in full DAW right there on the editing timeline, with many advanced professional tools ready and waiting, and no need stop editing and go elsewhere.

Delivery of video these days can be in a number of different formats.  Some of the most common are AVCHD, MP4, and H.264.  A robust editing app gives you the choices you need to deliver the formats clients and platforms require.

Both VEGAS Edit and Filmora X offer export to a wide variety of formats, with customizable templates. VEGAS Edit offers export to a collection of professional formats as well, including HEVC 10-bit 4:2:2, Sony XDCAM and XAVC, Blackmagic RAW, RED RAW, and Panasonic P2.

Useful Tips: Best Video Formats: Choosing What's Best for You

Export and rendering take time, especially from complex projects. If you can leverage your graphics card to help carry some of the load, so much the better.

VEGAS Edit offers GPU acceleration for encoding into AVC, and VEGAS Edit adds GPU encoding for HEVC formats, cutting render times up to half. 

Filmora X also leverages the GPU for rendering and encoding video.

Today’s video delivery world involves streaming video on popular sites like YouTube and Vimeo and on social media like Facebook and Instagram. Each platform has specific format and upload requirements.

Instead of forcing you to manually export to platform requirements and then manually upload the file, VEGAS Edit makes it much easier to cut through all the red tape, exporting your project straight from the timeline to the correct format for YouTube, Vimeo, and Facebook, and then automatically uploading the video to your account.

Filmora X offers the same functionality for YouTube and Vimeo, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.