Final Cut Pro vs Adobe Premiere: What Software is Better

Naming the winner in the Final Cut Pro vs Adobe Premiere comparison isn’t a simple task, so I decided to study the topic in more detail.

Final Cut Pro is a professional program for directors and animators. It has been used while creating many famous films, such as "The Simpsons Movie" and "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo."

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the leaders among professional video editing software. The program allows you to edit video, apply transitions and special effects, add texts, sound and animation.

Both programs seem to be a really good investment, but there are certain differences that may affect your choice.

What Is Final Cut Pro?

Final Cut Pro is one of the best video editing software for Mac. Users appreciate this software for its video editing speed, a wide range of tools, the quality of the final result and the possibility to level up its functionality with third-party plug-ins.

Final Cut Pro: Strengths and Weaknesses

Amazing magnetic timeline. Comparing Adobe Premiere vs Final Cut Pro, we can see that this tool is one of those things that make a difference between beginner and professional software. With the Magnetic Timeline, you can move or trim clips if necessary and not affect the rest of the video. You can also use color-coding to find and identify the content with ease.

100% well-organized. With Final Cut Pro all your media files are organized. The program offers a very efficient system with tags you can assign to the clips or their portions so that you can retrieve them any time you want. This will help you cut down on the time looking for what you need and give you more time to actually work on your video project.

Work with VR. If you want to create VR videos, Final Cut Pro will help you with that too. Being one of the best free 360 video editing software, it has a 360-degree viewer so that you could see how a video looks from different angles. You can also add text, blurring or some other effects. There are also some simple tools you can use to change video if you need to.

Quick background rendering. Final Cut Pro renders all the changes made to the video in an auto mode, thus protecting your computer from overload. If you make extra edits, the software pauses and continues to work once you are done. Thanks to this mechanism, you can preview the edited clips in a full quality and without freezes.

Accurate color curves. Color Curves resembles similar features in Photoshop or Lightroom and operates on the same principle. It is a go-to tool for many videographers, who want to adjust colors in a quick way without dragging numerous sliders.

Perfect sound editing. In case you need to change audio, you don’t have to look for another program for such a task. Final Cut Pro video editing software offers everything you need to alter audio, remove the background noise and optimize sound levels. Editing audio and video at the same time allows you to create more dynamic videos.

Not as popular as Adobe Premiere Pro. You can find tutorials and other learning content for Final Cut, however, compared to the number of learning resources for Premiere, it is a very small selection.

No numerical adjustment of color correction. The main inconvenience of the color correction tool in Final Cut is that all the adjustments are made with a mouse. You simply cannot enter any parameters from the keyboard. So, when you need to make the slightest change, you need to perform very precise manipulations with your mouse.

Mac-compatible only. Unfortunately, Windows owners can’t feel the power of this video editing software. It is designed specifically for Mac users, however, not everyone can afford to buy decent Apple laptops as the price goes far above average.

What Is Adobe Premiere Pro?

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the best video editing software for Windows with a primary focus on non-linear video editing.

Adobe Premiere Pro: Strengths and Weaknesses

20-layer projects working. The design of the user interface is convenient and understandable, so you work as efficiently as possible. The timeline will magnetize only when you actually need it, and if you don’t, you will be able to space out video clips as you wish. It is also quite flexible, allowing you to work on up to 20-layer projects.

Amazing scalability. If you are just learning the ropes of this program, you can conveniently examine each tool until you figure out what is what. Once you feel more confident at what you are doing, you can step up your game and use more profound instruments.

100% popularity. The programs developed by Adobe have surpassed their competitors in terms of popularity. There are millions of tutorials, literature, and other learning resources. If you want to increase your program’s capabilities, you can buy or download free plug-ins or LUTs for quick color correction. By the way, you can get Adobe Premiere Pro free.

Creative Cloud integration. As part of Adobe’s Creative Cloud, Premiere Pro will work with other software. It means that you will be able to move data from program to program in case you need to make some additional edits. This guarantees a seamless uninterrupted workflow that will result in a great product.

More than 15 supported formats. Adobe Premiere Pro supports many video formats, such as MP4, MPG, AVCHD, MOV, FLV, and AVI.

Terrific VR support. The 2024 version of Premiere Pro boasts lots of cool features that expanded the range of users even more. The most notable advancement is the section for work with VR content.

Besides, the developers added the support for Spatial Markers, so you can find a particular point in the space and change or replace it. This is a very handy feature that can speed up the video editing process in many situations. Besides, now users can enjoy the Theater Mode and support for 180 VR, which implies export in the Google VR180 format directly to YouTube.

You can edit several videos simultaneously. The program is unrivaled if you need to edit multiple clips at the same time. Thus, you can easily skip from one video to another and shift clips from different projects. But remember that this feature is available only if you use an official version of the program instead of widely-popular and very dangerous Adobe Premiere Pro Crack or Adobe Premiere Pro Portable.

Frequent crashes with complex projects. One of the biggest disadvantages of the program, which, unfortunately, is quite common and known to all its users, is that it can crash unexpectedly. Even if you have a relatively powerful device, the chances that Premiere will freeze and then crash when you are making an important edit are very high. With every update, developers are trying to resolve the issue, however, it still happens more often than with other programs that are currently available.

Bulky platform. The platform itself is so large that it takes up the majority of a user’s hard drive. You will also need space for Media Encoder and all your files.

Clips freeze during preview. When working with high-definition clips, like 4K or RAW, I have noticed that in the preview mode the video consistently freezes or can even skip frames. The only way out so far is considerably decreasing the preview quality. This problem can occur when you work with different layers of effects or color grading.

Final Cut Pro Vs Adobe Premiere: Price

Price makes the choice between Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere really difficult. Naturally, both programs are expensive with a difference that Adobe Premiere is distributed by subscription only. You can buy Premiere Pro through monthly or yearly plans, while Final Cut Pro requires a one-time payment.

• Final Cut Pro - $299;
• Adobe Premiere Pro – $20.99/month – includes 100GB Cloud storage + Premiere Rush

If you have read the comparison and decided that you don’t need professional video editing software, but you still want to try something similar, you can get simplified versions of Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere. You can either download iMovie for free from AppStore or purchase Premiere elements with a one-time payment.

Final Cut Pro vs Adobe Premiere – Who Wins?

If you are a newbie, who is selecting a video editing software for gaming, go with Adobe Premiere. The biggest advantage of Premiere is its extensive resource library and tools. In other words, this software has been available long enough to offer a big library of tutorials and video guides. Moreover, you may use Premiere Pro templates from various sites to boost your productivity.

Final Cut Pro, on the other hand, is less demanding in terms of computer requirements, so, you will be able to edit even if your laptop is not too powerful. If you need to work on and render long and complex projects, Final Cut will be faster and more reliable.

However, take into account that temporary files will occupy much disc space. I would recommend allocating a separate hard drive section for this purpose not to fill up the system drive, which can happen really fast.

Another point to consider is that, unfortunately, Apple provides a rather limited selection of codecs to export video, which is not really convenient. You will only be able to enlarge it with additional software. Adobe, however, provides a wider choice.

Freebies for Final Cut and Adobe Premiere

Both Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro support using LUTs for fast and convenient color correction. I have collected several LUTs that you can download absolutely free of charge!