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IrelandAli Abdaal's AI editing lesson: stop asking for everything at once
His one-day experiment improves when he splits the job into smaller tasks, but a human editor's version sets the standard.
Ali Abdaal
Story of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 70,911 views a day, 7.7 times a normal first day on this channel (9,235).
I Tried Fully Automating My Video Editing With AI (RAW RESULTS)
Things we can learn from the video
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- 1:34Ali separates editing into speech cuts, B-roll, motion graphics, pacing and sound design.
- 15:12Early DaVinci drafts struggle with speech cuts and pacing; HyperFrames produces cleaner text-based visuals.
- 25:01He splits the workflow into cutting real footage and generating standalone animated graphics.
- 31:30Claude drafts a shorter script; Ali refilms it, then combines FireCut with manual trims.
- 34:55Parth's human edit provides a comparison for sound design, graphics and overall polish.
- 44:26Ali shows Izzy the final versions and concludes that the AI-assisted edits approach human quality.
The first cut fails. Ali Abdaal asks AI to turn raw footage into a finished video, then finds it struggling with something more basic than flashy graphics: cutting his speech together properly.
"It screwed up the A-cut. It's the basic A-cut. It just doesn't get it," he says while reviewing an early attempt.
That frustration becomes the useful turning point in "I Tried Learning AI Video Editing in One Day," which drew about 56,000 views in its first 15 hours, already well beyond his usual full-day audience.
The assignment is a promotional launch video for his own platform, CreatorGrid. The episode also includes a paid segment for the dictation tool Wispr Flow. Rather than simply demonstrating a finished workflow, Abdaal shows himself learning Claude Code, DaVinci Resolve, HyperFrames and Remotion while the work goes wrong.
His fix is to stop treating the whole edit as a single request. He separates cutting the filmed speech from making standalone animated graphics, which he calls "motion plates." He also gets Claude to draft a shorter script, films it again, and uses FireCut alongside manual trims to clean up the footage. The improved result involves changing his own material, not just finding a better prompt.
"Learn the words that the professionals use," he advises.
Abdaal eventually judges the AI-assisted results close to human quality, after reviewing his editor Parth's version for its sound design, polish and custom graphics. That is his assessment, and the route there includes plenty of human decisions and corrections.
Those corrections are part of the conversation underneath. Viewers describe their own experiences of spending hours trying to turn AI output into a usable edit; another asks for a comparison of total time to a publishable video, including every fix. Others want a follow-up showing how Parth actually works with AI.
Published on Trari
Where next?
What viewers say
This has been the same experience for us with editing. You hear all the hype that Claude can fully edit videos, you spend all day trying to get something useable out of it, and then you just end up doing it yourself lol.
@the_allens_See it on YouTubeThe useful comparison is total time to a publishable edit, including all the corrections. Would love to see that beside the human edit- not just the generation time.
@mugheesmehdiSee it on YouTubeThis reminds me of a good old Mike Boyd "learn quick" style video, I like it!
@itssselfSee it on YouTube
3 more comments
Next time you can give the AI your Whisper transcription as an srt or json dot file so the ai can match up the words with the video. It saves the AI having to do the transcription itself again.
@GwilymJamesSee it on YouTubeLike this video— Back to where you started. Many years ago. Making explainer videos, I really missed that from you. As always, Ali, great work; keep it up. Love your content.
@GadgetGavinSee it on YouTubeGREAT VIDEO! I loved this format. i watched the entire thing because this is something that ive been wanting to learn and do as well. NEXT VIDEO should be about what your editor Parsh uses and how he edits with AI tools. I personally would love to see that
@ItsTvangSee it on YouTube
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- Channel
- Ali Abdaal
- Subscribers
- 6,700,000
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 1,321,583
- Channel views, pace per day
- 287,289 (on a normal day: 177,311)
- Video published
- October 26, 2026
- Video views so far
- 56,451 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 70,911
The numbers
The editing experiment passed Ali Abdaal's usual first-day views before its first day was complete. Comments had also exceeded his typical full-day total.
💡 Test your knowledge
Which AI assistant drafts Ali's shorter script in this experiment?
Ali uses Claude to draft a tighter script before filming his talking-head section again.