Getting started
Klyssa is a local-first video editor. Your media and projects stay on your machine — nothing is uploaded and you don't need an account to start editing.
Klyssa is a desktop app (macOS on Apple Silicon and Windows 10/11 today, Linux later). Export is powered by bundled FFmpeg on your machine.
The window is split into the media panel (left), the preview (center), the inspector (right), and the timeline (bottom).
Importing media
Click Import in the media panel to add video, images, or audio, or drag files in. Imported clips show in your library with a thumbnail and duration.
Adding to the timeline
- Click an asset (or press Enter) to append it to the end of its track.
- Drag an asset onto the timeline to drop it at a specific spot.
- Use the insert (
,) and overwrite (.) actions on the asset card — or the keyboard — to place the selected asset at the playhead.
For large or 4K sources, Klyssa can generate a 720p proxy so scrubbing stays smooth; your export still uses the full-quality original.
Timeline editing
The timeline is multi-track, with typed lanes for video, overlays, text, and audio. Drag clips to move them, drag their edges to trim.
Core moves
- Split a clip at the playhead with
S, or toggle the blade tool withB. - Snapping aligns edges and the playhead; the magnetic timelineripples later clips so gaps don't open.
- Reverse and freeze framelive in the Inspector's Clip tools (and the clip's right-click menu). Reverse re-renders the clip backwards; freeze frame holds the current frame as a still.
- Cropa clip from the Inspector's Crop section — the kept region is reframed to fill the canvas.
- Compound clips — select two or more adjacent video clips on one unlocked track, then Create compound clip from the context menu. Double-click to edit the clips inside; Decompose compound splits them back.
- Loop — in the Inspector, set a clip to repeat, crossfade, or boomerang so it fills its timeline slot.
Animate position, scale, rotation, opacity, and color with keyframes, and drag the transform handles right on the preview.
Text & captions
Press T to add a text clip, then style it in the Inspector — font, size, alignment, outline, background, and shadow.
The text library also includes style presets (neon, subtitle, lyric, and others). Apply one, then keep editing font, size, and color.
Captions are generated on-device with Whisper: Klyssa transcribes your audio locally and drops editable caption clips on the timeline. You can also export an SRT or VTT sidecar.
Effects & color
The effect library offers 25 stackable looks — B&W, Vintage, Cinematic, plus animated glitch, VHS, light leak and more. Stack, reorder, and tune them per clip; the preview always matches the export.
- Color: brightness, contrast, saturation, white balance (temperature/tint), plus grayscale and sepia.
- Transitions: crossfade/dissolve plus motion transitions (slide, push, wipe, iris, zoom).
- Stabilization: smooth camera shake with a two-pass analysis (desktop).
- Compositing: blend modes, chroma/luma key, and a blurred background fill for verticals.
AI tools
AI in Klyssa is something you direct. Much of it runs on-device (captions, background removal); the rest is pay-as-you-go — top up Klyssa credits or plug in your own provider key. There is never a subscription.
- AI assistant — edit your timeline with natural language; it acts through tool-calls.
- Generation— images/stickers, voiceover, and music & sound effects, placed straight into your project.
- Video generation — text-to-video and image-to-video, placed into the library.
- Logo / watermark removal — still images only.
- Background removal — real-time, on-device segmentation via ONNX + WebGPU.
- Silence removal and Auto-Shorts — trim dead air and turn long recordings into vertical highlights.
Exporting
Open the export dialog to render your project. Klyssa exports WebM (VP9/Opus) by default and offers hardware-accelerated H.264, with clean 1080p presets and no watermark.
- Export a specific timeline range, or an optimized animated GIF.
- Export with transparency (ProRes 4444 / VP9) for overlays.
- Normalize loudness to ~-14 LUFS for TikTok, Reels, and Shorts.
Export runs in the desktop app, powered by bundled FFmpeg. Because the preview pipeline mirrors the export filtergraph, what you see is what you get.
Keyboard shortcuts
The essentials — press ? in the app for the full list.
| Shortcut | Action |
|---|---|
| Space | Play / pause |
| S | Split at playhead |
| B | Toggle blade tool |
| I / O | Trim clip in / out to the playhead |
| , / . | Insert / overwrite selected media at the playhead |
| T | Add a text clip |
| M | Add a marker at the playhead |
| ← / → | Step one frame back / forward |
| Delete | Delete the selected clip |
| Cmd/Ctrl + Z | Undo (Shift to redo) |
| Cmd/Ctrl + S | Save project |
| ? | Show all keyboard shortcuts |
FAQ
Do I need an account?
No. You can download and edit with zero sign-up. An account is only needed for optional Klyssa AI credits.
Is my footage uploaded anywhere?
No. Klyssa edits files where they live on your disk. On-device AI stays local; only the optional cloud AI features send the specific request you make.
Is there a watermark or export limit?
No watermark and no locked resolution. What you make is yours.
Which platforms are supported?
The desktop app is out now for macOS on Apple Silicon and Windows 10/11. Linux may follow later.