Final Cut Pro vs. iMovie

Final Cut Pro

120 Reviews and Ratings

iMovie

98 Reviews and Ratings

Overview
Product	Rating	Most Used By	Product Summary	Starting Price
Final Cut Pro	Score9 out of 10	N/A	Apple offers Final Cut Pro, a video editing platform featuring optimized for a high performance machines and supporting a wide range of quality effects.	$299.99 per license
iMovie	Score10 out of 10	N/A	Apple offers iMovie as a video editing platform supporting video creators with high quality effects, support for 4k resolution, audio editing, and other features supporting the creation of videos and movies.	$0

Pricing

Final Cut Pro

iMovie

Final Cut Pro X: $299.99
per license

Free Tier: $0.00

Pricing Offerings
Final Cut Pro	iMovie
Free Trial
Yes	No
Free/Freemium Version
No	Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No	No

No setup fee

No setup fee

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Community Pulse
Key User Insights
	Final Cut Pro	iMovie
Considered Both Products	Apple François Lavallée president in Human Resources at Aliter Concept (Education Management, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro Adobe Premiere is similar to Final Cut Pro in terms of quality and usability. Several of my friends and partners use Adobe Premiere, and we all agree they are identical. The fact that I use Apple computers made the choice easy, as Final Cut is fully integrated with the other … Incentivized Helpful? Josh Meeder Owner in Marketing at Great Things LLC (Marketing & Advertising, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro iMovie is great for rapid editing of videos taken with your iPhone. It is lightweight, fast and simple. However it is extremely limited. You can not layer videos or images. The titles, Transitions and Effects are basic and there are only a few of them. You really can't … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Chose Final Cut Pro I've used iMovie and Final Cut Pro. Final Cut Pro is iMovie on steroids. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Chose Final Cut Pro I have used both Final Cut Pro X and iMovie and Final Cut Pro just seems to be my go-to. Final Cut Pro X just seems to have more tools, features, functionality, and more. It also integrates with Compressor which helps when reducing file sizes. There seems to be more extras that … Incentivized Helpful? Brendon Brown Marketing Technologist in Information Technology at Island City Media (Retail, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro I find that many users have some iMovie experience when approaching Final Cut Pro X, and thus segue quickly to it. Premiere is also a good product, timeline-based, with a very mature expansion market, possibly with a cluttered interface. DaVinci Resolve is the free product from … Incentivized Helpful? Rob Gokee Composer in Professional Services at Rob Gokee Music (Entertainment, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro Final Cut Pro X is basically the professional upgrade of iMovie - if you're familiar with that product, stepping up to FCPX is a natural progression. Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro are both industry standard products - in all honestly, if you're an editor, you … Incentivized Helpful? Michelle Green Arnson Marketing and Communications Manager in Marketing at Chicago Arts Partnerships in Education (Non-Profit Organization Management, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro I have hated iMovie since its inception. This probably says more about me, but I've never been able to figure out how such a simple piece of software can make me feel like such a dope! It's certainly improved over the years, and I have even used it in a pinch when I didn't have … Incentivized Helpful? Dan Talvi Teaching Assistant at GST BOCES (Primary/Secondary Education, 501-1000 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro When compared to other video editing software, Final Cut Pro X falls in the middle in terms of difficulty and functionality. iMovie (another Apple / Mac video editing software) provides many of the basic functions and features of Final Cut Pro X, while Adobe Premiere Pro CC … Incentivized Helpful? James Bishop Digital Media Specialist in Marketing at Union Gospel Mission (Non-Profit Organization Management, 51-200 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro I started video editing in 2005 on Adobe Premiere Pro. I used that software for 6 years, regularly every week. I found it to be extensive in the features and tools, but also confusing and cumbersome when it came to doing new things. It had a high learning curve and the editing … Incentivized Helpful? Andrew Peterson Digital Media Editor in Corporate at MAP II, LLC. (Consumer Goods, 10,001+ employees) Chose Final Cut Pro Final Cut Pro X is almost a direct upgrade to iMovie. iMovie is a very dumbed down piece of software. iMovie is good for very basic video editing needs, but it does not allow you to create a video exactly how you might envision it. Those familiar with iMovie will have a very … Incentivized Helpful? Shawngela Pierce Law of Attraction, Meditation & Spiritual Life Coach in Professional Services at Seek Within You (Professional Training & Coaching, 1-10 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro The user interface for Final Cut Pro X is way more intuitive. I have used and currently use a lot of Adobe products so I am very familiar with their interface, however, I am not a big fan of most of their design layouts. Their software is very powerful but not very intuitive, … Incentivized Helpful? Horacio Carcamo Product Development Asst. in Marketing at Myron Manufacturing (Marketing and Advertising, 201-500 employees) Chose Final Cut Pro I find that Final Cut Pro has a better way of understanding its feature. It is more user friendly when it comes to insert transitions or any other effect. Also, the price makes a difference compared to the others. The way you edit in Final Cut Pro is different than how you edit … Incentivized Helpful?	Apple Dan Talvi Audio / Visual Coordinator at GST BOCES (Religious Institutions, 11-50 employees) Chose iMovie While iMovie worked for our organization for a while, we eventually moved to other software to create our video media content. iMovie was a great fit for entering into the realm of video content creation, but lacked the functionality provided by Final Cut Pro X and Adobe … Incentivized Helpful? François Lavallée president in Human Resources at Aliter Concept® (Professional Training & Coaching, 1-10 employees) Chose iMovie iMovie produce professional quality video without the advanced but complicated features of professional softwares. OF course it has its limits compare to professional applications but the key here is when to use which application I use Final Cut frequently for larger video … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Chose iMovie Final Cut Pro can be expensive if you are not ready to fully divulge in video content for your brand/company. iMovie is a great starting place as it's easier to understand how to use it (in terms of UI/UX) and great for a team just starting out/figuring out a strategy for their … Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Chose iMovie Other tools are available but most of them are paid while iMovie is free. iMovie is easy to learn and anyone can get started quickly with it. Some built-in effects are available with one-touch import so you can import them and just needed to add context in it, you are ready to … Incentivized Helpful? Cedric Haynes Videographer at Lonell Multimedia (Media Production, 1-10 employees) Chose iMovie iMovie is just as good and a lot cheaper than the competition. For my simple projects, it works well. For more advanced tasks, I outsource the work to better video editors and they usually work with Final Cut or Adobe Premiere. There’s no need for me to upgrade to anything else … Incentivized Helpful? Joel McAfee Producer in Professional Services at lilDRAGON (Media Production, 1-10 employees) Chose iMovie iMovie is not a pro video editor like FCPX or Adobe - however if you are entry level and not looking to advance further, I'd recommend staying there. If you plan to get more experienced in the industry, I'd leave it behind in an instance and move on to a pro editor. Incentivized Helpful? Jackie Bassett CEO (Chief Executive Officer) in Corporate at NEJM Group (Hospital & Health Care, 11-50 employees) Chose iMovie iMovie has all the capability most video producers need. Great videos are made in the editing because the right content is already there. Adobe has a great product but their editing software doesn't have to be that intense, as when it is, it takes away from the great creative … Incentivized Helpful? Kenneth Hess Senior Systems Analyst in Information Technology at CymSTAR, LLC (Defense & Space, 201-500 employees) Chose iMovie iMovie compares very well with Premiere's and Final Cut's basic video and audio editing and for simple transitions. For the heavier lifting, you'll need a better application. iMovie isn't meant to be a Hollywood-level application but it can hold its own for most things. It's … Incentivized Helpful? Sam Jacob Dev UX Consultant in Product Management at Extended Stay America (Computer Software, 5001-10,000 employees) Chose iMovie Though iMovie lacked some features and functionalities compared to the competition, the main reason we went with this product was that it was totally free and our business had the ability to trial run and accomplish needed things for shorter projects. Compared to other products … Incentivized Helpful?
	Would buy again
	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
	Delivers good value for the price
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	Happy with the feature set
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	Lived up to sales and marketing promises
	No answers on this topic	No answers on this topic
	Implementation went as expected
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User Ratings
	Final Cut Pro	iMovie
Likelihood to Recommend	8.9 (34 ratings)	10.0 (32 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew	10.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Usability	8.6 (6 ratings)	10.0 (3 ratings)
Support Rating	8.8 (5 ratings)	8.1 (6 ratings)
In-Person Training	9.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Online Training	10.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Implementation Rating	10.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)
Configurability	10.0 (1 ratings)	- (0 ratings)