Skip to Content

Is Adobe Premiere Pro A Good Video Editing Software? (2023 Review)

Adobe Premiere Pro has been an industry-standard video editing software for decades. Hobbyists and enthusiast-level editors use it for editing movies, short films, commercial videos, and more. The program features a nonlinear editing interface, seamless integration with Adobe Creative Cloud apps, and amazing collaboration tools to outperform most of its competition.

Top editors and video production companies around the world trust Adobe Premiere Pro. Many popular Hollywood movies like Deadpool and The Florida Project are edited using this noble software.

If you have just started a YouTube channel or edited a few videos earlier, Adobe Premiere Pro is the name you might have heard frequently.

In this article, we will dig deep into the awesomeness of this program while highlighting the most useful features. Adobe’s Creative Cloud apps pack tremendous power and abilities, which are impossible to discuss even in a lengthy review like this. But we tried our best to cover everything that will help you make an informed decision.

Adobe Premiere Pro Review: Editor’s Summary

Source: Adobe Premiere Pro Pricing Page, dated 18th December 2022

Overall Rating – 4.5/5 Stars
Price – $31.49/month or $20.99/month for an annual plan
Basic Editing, Effects, and Libraries – Adobe Premiere Pro’s raw video clip management, trimming tools, and color enhancement abilities are excellent. It comes with many audio, video, and text effects suitable for beginners and experts.
Ease of use and learning – In the beginning, things may be a little overwhelming due to lots of professional-grade tools that the editors rarely use. But an intuitive user interface and workspaces will bring peace. Also, learning Adobe Premiere Pro is no big deal because there are a plethora of videos available on YouTube by experts. Moreover, the brand offers in-app guides and how-to videos which are easy to understand and follow.
Performance – The software is upgraded continuously by Adobe. There are certain issues with the performance but make sure that you have a high-end setup at your disposal. In our experience, we found that a few effects and lots of raw video clips slow down the preview and rendering performance.
Support – Adobe’s team is responsive and knowledgeable. The brand undoubtedly offers excellent support for its global customer base.

Adobe Premiere Pro packs a big punch of features for professional-level and casual video editing. The integration with Adobe Creative Cloud suite is the selling point of this program.

Every creative person has heard this name at least once in their lifetime through their friend, colleague, or favorite YouTuber.

It has a huge fan base and has been used for editing movies, short films, YouTube videos, and highly converting marketing videos since 2003.

When it comes to team collaboration, there is no other program in the market that can outcompete Adobe Premiere Pro. Users are raving about the Adobe Dynamic Link, a workflow integration between Premiere Pro and After Effects that lets them create and share files in real-time. The brand has taken team collaboration to the next level by acquiring Frame.io and integrating it with Adobe Premiere Pro. If team collaboration is your top priority, then the Frame.io integration will greatly help you.

This complex program is not compatible with the average laptop or desktop system. You need a high-end device that may cost thousands of dollars to run this program smoothly without any lag or sudden crash.

What has impressed us so far?

Premiere Pro’s basic editing tools are great, but the collaborative workflows and integration with Adobe Creative Cloud apps are unrivaled. After purchasing the Creative Cloud Apps subscription, the brand offers special photo, video, and audio editing software. They can be integrated to enhance productivity and take video production to the next level.

What could we love to see in the latest updates?

Though crashes and unexpected shutdowns are common with video editors, Adobe should improve the program’s stability. Few enthusiast-level video editors, such as Final Cut Pro, outrank Adobe Premiere Pro when it comes to rendering and performance. For motion tracking, users need to rely on After Effects. It would be good to see this basic feature in Premiere Pro itself.

What’s new in Adobe Premiere Pro 2023?

Source: Adobe Premiere Pro Official Website, dated on 18th December, 2022

Captions to Graphics: This is a new way to make your captions more engaging and viewer-friendly. Use Speech to Text to generate captions and then animate the text with the “Upgrade Caption to Graphics” feature.

Sequence Locking: Adobe has taken one more incremental approach toward collaborative editing. It automatically locks the sequence you are currently editing to avoid conflicts and duplicates.

Advanced Masking: Use multiple masking points and various other options to quickly mask the objects.

Adjustable Fades for Audio Ducking: Adobe Sensei AI technology automatically adjusts background audio for dialog or voiceovers. For further refinement, use the Fade Position Slider and have more control over the fade behavior.

GPU-accelerated Effects: Most of Premiere Pro’s effects are GUP-accelerated for better performance while editing and exporting the final video. In 2022, they have enabled GPU acceleration for Unsharp Mask, Magnify, Replicate, Spherize, Wave Warp, and Posterize Time Effect.

Proxy Workflow Improvements: Proxy files are now set to default to ProRes format. Users can easily distinguish between Proxy and Source Media while editing.

Import and Export Interface Changes: Adobe has simplified the import and export interface to make it more beginner-friendly. Meanwhile, the pro editors need not worry because the simplified interface comes with lots of dropdowns for advanced control.

Team Collaboration with Frame.io Integration: Adobe has purchased Frame.io online video editing collaboration service and integrated it within Premiere Pro. Users will get a free account and 100GB of Frame.io cloud storage to share files with team members.

Pricing

Adobe Premiere Pro

Monthly Subscription – $31.49
Yearly Subscription – $20.99/month or $239.88

Adobe Creative Cloud All Apps

Monthly Subscription – $82.49
Yearly Subscription – $54.99/month or $599.88

Adobe offers a subscription-based service. You need to pay $31.49 per month for Premiere Pro, which is quite a huge amount, but no worries because with an annual commitment, the price will be lowered to $20.99 per month. Moreover, long-term users can pay $239.88 and save around 5% by choosing a yearly subscription.

Premiere Pro is available as a part of Adobe’s Creative Cloud suite, so we have also listed the pricing plans for it. Opting in for Adobe’s complete suite is a wise choice because, apart from Premiere Pro, you will get access to fantastic creative cloud apps, including Adobe After Effects, Adobe Audition, Adobe Photoshop, and more.

Adobe’s monthly subscription-based pricing plans are a big advantage if you are trying out different video editors to figure out the best fit.

They have different pricing for business customers, but the additional charges offer enhanced support, management, and collaboration options.

Windows and Mac Compatibilty

Adobe Premiere Pro is available for both Windows and Mac users. As most of the creative audience prefers to work on Mac, it is obvious that the brands should have robust Mac-compatible software.

Though the native support is missing, users can leverage Rosetta 2 to run Adobe Premiere Pro on Apple’s M1-based computers.

Premiere Pro is worth giving a try. If you don’t have it yet, consider downloading the 7-day free trial version. But remember, the program packs a lot of juice which is nearly impossible to explore within seven days. However, this time is enough to launch your first short video and understand the program’s compatibility.

Click here to download 7-day free trial.

The program will consume 8GB of available hard-disk space. Make sure you have enough space available before installing the software.

Interface

Adobe Premiere Pro’s editing dashboard is considered the Standard user interface in the community. It is a simple and easy-to-use interface that aims at breaking down complex video editing workflows.

If you have used Adobe apps before, you will find that they keep the navigation, icons, and colors identical across all of their apps. The only thing we felt missing was the Premiere Pro search box that lets users find the commands, help, and tools.

Once the program is launched, you will notice four sections: Control Panel, Preview Panel, Media Panel, and Timeline Panel.

Let us quickly understand the purpose of each panel,

#1 – Control Panel: From the name itself, it is pretty explanatory. This section allows users to configure each asset they will be working on while editing the video.

#2 – Preview Panel: In this section, you will see live playback of the changes you have made to your raw video clips. There are a bunch of control buttons available by default. To simplify the interface, Adobe has removed many control buttons because most editors rely on keyboard shortcuts like J, K, and L to navigate the project preview.

#3 – Media Panel: Import and organize source files in this area. You can drag-n-drop photos, audio, and video files in this section. For an instant preview, hover the mouse pointer over the raw video clip, and the program starts to scrub through the video.

#4 – Timeline Panel: Also known as the Timeline Tracks, in this section, you will be applying effects, transitions, color changes, and more to your raw video clips. This is the section where editors spend most of their time editing videos.

To simplify the video editing workflows, Adobe offers predefined workspaces for various scenarios such as Assembly, Editing, Color, Effects, Audio, Graphics, and Libraries. These workspaces are nothing but the rearrangement of the panels corresponding to the task under progress. You can also create a custom workspace as per your need. All panels can be resized, moved, and even pulled off to let them float in one corner.

Starting A New Project

Importing video, audio, and photo files is a breeze in Adobe Premiere Pro. The program supports a wide range of file formats. You will rarely face errors such as file format not being supported.

The welcome screen is quite neat and clean. It gives you several options to start. You can either select a previous project and start editing, initiate a new project from scratch, or use Adobe stock footage to kickstart a new project.

Once you launch your new project, start importing media files. A pro tip is to keep your audio, video files, and photos properly organized in the media panel. This will ensure that you find the desired files quickly throughout your editing.

Adobe Premiere Pro supports resolutions of up to 8K and raw files from professional-grade cameras such as Arri Alexa, Canon Cinema EOS C300, and Red Epic.

Basic Video Editing Tools

Adobe Premiere Pro is a huge program with lots of powerful tools. For basic-level video editing, it offers remarkable tools and performance compared to most of the rivals in the market.

Trimming, Slicing, and Joining Videos: When it comes to importing, trimming, and joining video clips, the Premiere Pro is a breeze. It includes several editing modes that are known as Roll, Ripple, Slide, and Glide. Each editing mode can be accessed from the left of the timeline and has a different purpose. Before getting the raw video clips into the timeline, you can select the media thumbnail and use the scrubber bar to mark the start and end points.

Removing Backgrounds: If you haven’t heard it yet! Then to remove backgrounds, editors use a popular tool called Chroma Key. All you need to do is use the green screen while recording the video.

To use Chroma Key feature in Premiere Pro, head over to Effects and select Video Effects. Then under the Keying, you will find the Ultra Key option to help you remove the background from the video. Use the eyedropper tool from the control panel section to select any color from the video and replace it with the background of your choice.

Color Adjustments: Adobe’s powerful color adjustment capabilities are well-appreciated by its users. The brand has introduced Lumetri Color Tools, which put Premiere Pro in the league of Photoshop when it comes to color adjustments. You can play around with brightness, exposure, white balance, shadows, saturation, vibrance, sharpness, and more. Each adjustment can be triggered with the help of a keyframe at a specific instance.

Effects and Transitions: A handful of transitions are available by default in Adobe Premiere Pro. You might have to install separate plugins to leverage additional transitions and effects. Most beginner-level programs like Filmora include hundreds and thousands of effects and transitions. However, Adobe knows that the pro-level editors rely on their creativity and support from other creators rather than being dependent on default templates by the program.

Premiere Pro packs the most popular video effects like Lighting, Warp Stabilize, Colorizing, Keying, Transforming, and more. Use the search box to find the desired transition or effect.

All of the effects and transitions are triggered at specific instances with the help of keyframes. In contrast to its rivals, the Premiere Pro offers full control over the configurations and behavior of each effect.

Text Editing: Design engaging text animations using plenty of popular fonts (including Adobe TypeKit) and then apply strokes and shadows. You can set texture, opacity, rotation, crawling, kerning, rolling, and more. The program allows you to import or export text files in XML and SRT format. Remember that Adobe doesn’t include ready-made templates that you can directly use in your video by replacing the text. Many contributors and creators sell text animations through third-party websites; you can try them if you want to save time creating text animations from scratch.

Stabilization: Nowadays, many videos are recorded using Drones and Action Cameras. Sometimes such videos are full of shakiness which needs to be settled down while editing. Premiere Pro uses the Warp Stabilize feature to smooth out such footage with just one click. There are two options inside this feature: Smooth Motion and No Motion. The latter didn’t work well for us, but you can try it.

Slow Motion: Spicing up the videos with slow or fast motion is the old but gold strategy. Use Premiere Pro’s rate stretch tool to do the same. It is the simplest way of slowing down or speeding up the clip, but you can use more advanced techniques, such as Speed Ramping or the Timewarp effect.

Motion Tracking: This feature is missing in Premiere Pro. However, if you bought a Creative Cloud Subscription, send your files to Adobe After Effects through Dynamic Link to track the motion. We know this is quite a lengthy process compared to what the rivals offer, but for now at least, Premiere Pro lacks this functionality. You need to rely on either Adobe After Effects or Adobe Premiere Elements.

Multicam Editing

In contrast to Final Cut Pro, which supports up to 64 camera angles, Premiere Pro supports unlimited camera angles.

Multicam editing in Adobe Premiere Pro is a breeze. Just import your videos shot from multiple angles with different cameras and start synchronizing them with a few simple clicks. The program uses the audio to sync and create multi-cam sequences.

Once the sequence is created, you can sit back and scrub through the video to select the proper camera angle at the desired instance as per your wish.

This tool is particularly helpful in the case of professional interviews shot from different cameras.

Team Collaboration

Adobe Premiere Pro is the best choice if you are looking for a video editor with excellent collaboration tools.

You can store and organize your files in Creative Cloud Libraries. Later, they can be shared with the team members to collaborate in real-time. All project settings are synced with the Creative Cloud to allow users to work from different PCs and locations. You can assign multiple users to a project and collaborate with them in real-time. In the recent update, the program locks the sequence you are editing so that others cannot create any conflicts or duplicates.

Frame.io

The brand has recently purchased Frame.io and integrated it into Premiere Pro.

Frame.io is a top-notch video collaboration platform. You will get a free account and 100GB of cloud storage to share your files and collaborate with colleagues.

When you try to take your project to Frame.io, a popup panel will appear, which you can open in a web browser for full control. It allows a bunch of options to share the project with other team members: Share as Presentation, import and download files, and publish to Vimeo or Dropbox.

There is a lot to talk about Frame.io video collaboration, but it is beyond the scope of this article. It is a great tool that will take your team collaboration to the next level, so don’t forget to explore it.

360-degree VR Video Editing

The program is capable of editing angles and field of view of 360-degree VR video. Though we didn’t edit any 360-degree footage before, Premiere Pro smoothly handled the test footage from our new Insta360 X3. For the sake of testing, we took the same footage through Corel VideoStudio. In our experience, both of them did a decent job.

Premiere Pro allows you to tag videos as VR so that YouTube will understand the video as 360-degree content while uploading.

Few users are raising complaints regarding the support for the various 360-degree video file formats shot from different cameras. As per the documentations, the program supports the most common and popular file formats, so you don’t need to worry.

4K Video Editing

As technology is growing, 4K is becoming the new standard for video quality. And today, smartphones have evolved enough to let users watch 4K and 8K videos on the go.

Adobe Premiere Pro comes with 4K and 8K video editing capabilities without compromising performance. You just need to ensure that your system configurations are sufficient to withstand the video needs.

We have seen that consumer-level video editors are subjected to sudden crashes or lag while 4K video playback and rendering. But, on the other hand, most enthusiast-level video editors can preview, import, and render video content of up to 8K resolution without compromising performance.

For uninterrupted video editing experience, Adobe has enabled hardware encoding for DCI 4K and 8K HEVC exports.

Transcription Tools

Use the Speech to Text tool to automatically generate captions for your videos and save hours spent on manually typing and synchronizing text.

Adobe offers a powerful transcription tool that supports 14 languages and voice detection. The program scans the entire sequence and generates a caption for you. Searching for a phrase or word is a breeze; just type in a few words, and the software will take you to the specific point in the video where the words were spoken.

Exporting and Sharing

A couple of years ago, the Premiere Pro exporting dashboard was full of unnecessary details that the editors rarely used. So it was pretty obvious for the brand to make the export interface beginner friendly and less complex. Since our last review, we have seen many small and big changes in the overall interface and export and import dashboard.

Meanwhile, enthusiast-level video editors need not worry because Adobe didn’t eliminate the technicalities; instead, they have simplified the interface by hiding options such as bit rate, color space, and frame rate under the respective dropdown.

The program allows users to share their masterpiece projects on YouTube, Vimeo, Twitter, Facebook, Behance, and Adobe Creative Cloud. We tried uploading our final project to YouTube, and the process was straightforward; it only took a couple of minutes.

Premiere Pro comes with Adobe Media Encoder that enables additional file formats support while exporting. You can enable batch processing while exporting for multiple online and broadcast channels.

Rendering Speed

When it comes to performance, Premiere Pro dominates most of the rivals out there.

As per the PCMag Video Editor Rendering Speed Test, Adobe Premiere Pro ranks 6th with a rendering time of 1 minute 40 seconds for a 5-minute long video.

To test things on our end, we worked out a project that included several HD and 4K video clips shot from a drone camera. We did everything, applied some nice and heavy effects and transitions, along with a bunch of color adjustments, and used a few text animations. Adobe Premiere Pro took a total of 1 minute and 20 seconds to render this project which was 4:34 minutes long.

I ran this rendering test on my office desktop, which is a Windows 11-based workhorse with 6th generation Intel 3.4GHz Core i7 CPU, 16GB RAM, and Nvidia 4GB Graphics Card.

When I rendered the same project on my Apple Macbook Air, it took 2 minutes and 33 seconds. There is a difference of around 60 seconds between the rendering performance of Windows and Mac.

System configuration is one of the main aspects that decide the rendering as well as the overall performance of the video editor. Adobe’s Premiere Pro is truly power-hungry software that requires a high-end laptop or desktop setup.

All these investments are necessary if you want to be a professional video editor.

Support

Adobe Premiere Pro was launched in 2003, and since then, the program has served millions of users. It is one of the highly popular programs that every video editor may have already used or wish to give a try at least once.

The brand is known for its industry-leading software for creators, such as Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, XD, Substance, InDesign, etc.

Without any doubt, Adobe is offering excellent customer support over the years. You can get in touch with their responsive and knowledgeable customer support team through phone, chat, and forum powered by many expert contributors.

Moreover, Adobe’s in-app guides and how-to videos will kickstart your editing journey.

Adobe Premiere Pro Review: Ratings

Performance – 3.5/5

The overall performance, rendering, and startup time are all in the respectable range. Users must ensure their system compatibility and minimum configurations. Premiere Pro is going to slow down or even completely shut down while applying a few heavy effects, so be prepared accordingly.

Price – 4.0/5

For beginners, Adobe Premiere Pro is definitely a huge investment. It is a highly-priced software compared to its rivals. The program is designed to capture a bigger picture, it is built for editing movies, TV shows, and more, which requires high-level collaboration and a video production speed boost through a suite of creative apps.

Learning Curve – 4.3/5

Premiere Pro has a steep learning curve. You must make consistent efforts and invest significant time to master this program. It mainly focuses on editing full-length movies, TV series, commercials for marketing purposes, and more. There are lots of resources available on YouTube and third-party websites that will help you a lot.

Effectiveness – 4.8/5

When it comes to ease of use and beginner-friendly user interface, Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the best software out there. However, it includes lots of rarely used tools and may feel overwhelming initially. Everything is possible with Adobe Premiere Pro, from short videos for Instagram to full-length 4K movies.

Best Alternatives to Adobe Premiere Pro

Many video editors are available in the market with their own pros and cons. And rivals like Final Cut Pro outcompetes Adobe Premiere Pro when it comes to performance.

Let’s discuss the top alternatives to Adobe Premiere Pro.

#1 – Final Cut Pro

This software is available for Mac users only. It is fast and smooth compared to Adobe Premiere Pro. It is available at just $299.99 for a lifetime. The one-time payment makes this software a better choice because you don’t have to worry about monthly or yearly payments in the future.

#2 – DaVinci Resolve

A large portion of video editors has already switched from Adobe Premiere Pro to DaVinci Resolve due to its state-of-the-art color grading abilities. The program is available for free, yes, but not completely. A few tools and features are available for paid users only, for example, filters, HDR scopes, and 3D tools. It is becoming a popular video editing software amongst YouTubers. You can purchase this software by paying a one-time fee of $295.

#4 – Adobe Premiere Elements

Adobe Premiere Elements is the perfect choice for beginners who don’t want a professional-grade video editor full of fancy tools that may never be used in the beginning. Consider it as a lighter version of Adobe Premiere Pro. The program includes all the basic video editing tools and powerful features like Chroma Key, PiP, Motion Tracking, Stabilization, and more. It is available for a one-time fee of $99.99.

Is Adobe Premiere Pro A Good Video Editing Software: Conclusion

Premiere Pro aims to simplify video editing workflows for professional-level editors. It packs a big punch of features that allows users to edit movies, TV shows, commercials, YouTube videos, and more within the shortest possible time.

It is made for teams that work in close collaboration with each other to deliver the final project. The community highly appreciates Adobe’s team collaboration and integration abilities.

Adobe should consider improving the program’s performance and stability in upcoming updates because lag and sudden crashes are diverting many users towards the more stable Final Cut Pro and DaVinci Resolve. However, IMHO, performance issues are inevitable with video editors, and in the case of Premiere Pro, if you use a high-end desktop system, the problems would be less noticeable.

FAQ

Q. Is it the best Video Editor?

Without any doubt, Adobe Premiere Pro is the best choice for video editors of all levels. The program packs powerful tools for editing movies, TV shows, marketing videos, high-end commercials, YouTube videos, TikTok shorts, and more. Premiere Pro’s integration with Adobe Creative Cloud apps and collaboration tools is remarkable.

Q. Is Adobe Premiere Pro free to use?

Yes, it offers a 7-days free trial. You can download the free trial version from the official website. You need to specify the preferred subscription plan and provide the credit card details.

Q. What is Premiere Pro?

Adobe Premiere Pro is a popular video editing software. Top-level video editors, YouTubers, Social Media Influencers, and production companies use this program. Excellent team collaboration tools and Adobe Creative Cloud apps integration gives this software a competitive edge.

Disclosure: This page may contain a few affiliate links, which means if you buy something through them, we may get a commission (without any extra cost to you).