Introduction
A video editor that runs in a browser used to mean a toy: one track, a few filters, a watermark. The Video Workstation is built on the same studio foundation as ToolBuddy's Audio Workstation, with a real timeline, a control panel that edits the selected clip, and an export engine that renders on your device with the browser's own hardware encoders.
This overview lists what the workstation does today and explains the design choice behind it: processing on your device instead of on a server, so there is nothing to upload, no queue and no plan tier.
If you want the step-by-step version, read the guide to editing a video online; this page is the feature catalogue.
Timeline and editing
Video, text and audio tracks with thumbnails and waveforms; add tracks from the timeline. Tools: Select, Blade, split, delete, ripple delete, duplicate, undo, redo, snapping and full screen, with zoom from the View menu and the keyboard.
Edits: split, trim, ripple delete, roll, slip, move across tracks, markers, copy and paste, nudge, I/O range, and a ⌘K action search that also jumps to a time. Clips carry speed (0.1× to 4×), freeze frames, detached audio, crop and flip.
- Import many files at once, in sequence on the main track or each on its own track.
- Files handed over from the other video tools or opened from the system (installed app).
- A project saved on this device with Resume and Discard; missing files are listed for relinking before an export.
Motion, looks and text
Keyframes for position, size, rotation, opacity and volume with easing, auto-key, diamonds on the timeline and drags in the preview that write keys. Nine motion presets (zoom in, zoom out, pan and zoom, pans, pop in, fade in and out) create ordinary keys you can then adjust.
Colour: brightness, contrast, saturation, warmth, tint, hue, faded blacks, vignette, grain and blur; 20 filters; 18 colour-grading presets with a strength slider and split toning; a blurred-background fill. Text: 19 fonts, size, colour or gradient, caps, underline, letter spacing, line height, outline, shadow, box, 13 animations and 14 presets.
- 27 transitions: crossfade, dips, flash, blur, slides, pushes, wipes, clock, splits, blinds, circles, diamond, zooms and spin, per cut or on every cut.
- Fades on every clip kind; blurred-background fill for vertical video in a horizontal frame.
- Project frame presets for YouTube, Shorts, Reels and square posts.
Captions on your device
Automatic captions use a speech model that runs in the browser (English, word timing, five-minute windows), so the audio of a two-hour recording never leaves the machine. Import SRT or VTT, edit cues in a list with find and replace and shift, and pick one of eight styles with word highlight, pop or karaoke.
On export, captions are drawn into the picture or left out and downloaded as SRT, VTT or TXT.
Export engine
Export renders every frame on your device and encodes with WebCodecs: MP4 (H.264, HEVC, AV1) or WebM (VP9, AV1), up to 4K on desktops and 1080p on phones, by quality or by target file size. Presets cover best quality, web 1080p and under-25 MB or under-10 MB files.
Before an export starts, the workstation probes the browser for the exact size and bitrate; when the chosen codec cannot encode them it falls back to another codec or to WebM and says so in the result. Progress shows the time remaining and the page warns before you close it mid-export. The finished file downloads or hands over to the Compressor, Converter, Watermark or GIF tools.
- A file that cannot be read when the export starts is named at once, with a Choose file button to relink it, instead of failing minutes later.
- Export only the in-to-out range when you need a section.
- Export a frame as PNG to the Image Workstation, or audio media to the Audio Workstation.
Why on-device processing
Uploading footage costs time twice (up and down), puts your files on a third-party server, and ends in a watermark or a paywall. Rendering on your device removes the upload entirely, keeps the footage private, and uses the hardware encoder your laptop or phone already has.
The trade-off is honest: the limits are your machine's memory and browser codecs. The workstation works within them (proxies for 4K previews, 1080p on phones, codec fallbacks) rather than pretending they do not exist.
Written by
Ankit Kumar
Senior Software Engineer & Founder at ToolBuddy
Engineering browser-first utilities with zero upload requirements using WebAssembly, Web Audio, and Canvas technologies.
