Adobe After Effects and Adobe Premiere Pro are two video editing software widely used in the industry. These two programs are both useful, but which software is best for you between After Effects vs Premiere Pro?

In this article, we're going to overview the main differences between these two professional video editing programs, so you can choose the one program that fits your need better.

Table Of Contents:

• What is Adobe After Effects?
• What is Adobe Premiere Pro?
• A comparison of After Effects vs. Adobe Pro
• Basic effects and tools for your videos
• Advanced visual effects for your videos
• Advanced and basic animation tool for your videos
• Texts for your videos
• Workflow and interface
• Multitasking and video clips length
• Working with other third-party plugins and tools
• Supported file formats
• Pricing
• What is Adobe Premiere Pro best for?
• What is Adobe After Effects best for?

What is Adobe After Effects?

After Effects is a video editor software that allows you to create motion graphics such as:

•  Animated titles, visual effects (fades and dissolves, as well as more sophisticated transitions).
• All types of dynamic media experiences (lower thirds, full-screen intros, photomontages).
• Look for development with is color correction tools.

It can also be used for video editing, especially after adding motion graphics and visual effects to the already edited footage.

Check out our full article about Adobe After Effects.

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What is Adobe Premiere Pro?

Adobe Premiere Pro is also a professional video editing program with many advanced features allowing you to work on your audio tracks and video tracks. It is a non-linear editing software meaning you can arrange video, audio clip, effects, and text all built-in.

Think of Premiere Pro as a complete editing software that provides you with all the video editing tool and functionalities to create various video files.

You can think of After Effects as software that focuses on adding visual effects to your different audio and video clips, while Premiere Pro is more about creating longer video projects and clips using multiple tracks at once.

Check out our full article about Adobe Premiere Pro.

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A Comparison of After Effects vs Premiere Pro

After Effects and Premiere Pro both provide excellent video editing tools for creating and editing videos. Depending on the different tasks you need to perform, either Adobe After Effects or Adobe Premiere Pro might be better suited to help you complete your projects.

Let's overview the main differences between After Effects vs Premiere Pro.

Basic effects and tools for your videos

In terms of the basic editing effects and video editing tools, both After Effects and Premiere Pro have almost everything you need to edit videos and all their content.

With After Effects, you can add motion graphics and text to your video footage in different layers and animate them. You will have more control over creating these animations.

While using Adobe Premiere Pro, you also can add motion graphics and text to your video clips (lower thirds, full-screen intros, etc.) using the same principle of layers. There are also a lot of presets already in the program that you may choose to use.

Advanced visual effects for your videos

In the battle between After Effects vs Premiere Pro, this is where After Effects shines. Advanced visual effects are better with After Effects, from color grading to simple animated titles. Also, After Effects is all about creating different visual elements to enhance your video.

Advanced and basic animation tools for your videos

You can animate your video content in both Adobe After Effects and Premiere Pro; however, After Effects is mostly about animating shapes and text layers.

You'll find yourself spending less time working on an advanced animation with After Effects than Premiere Pro.

Texts for your videos

Both After Effects and Premiere Pro are great to work with texts. They both allow you to animate your text to create lower thirds, subtitles, or dynamic typography videos.

After Effects is more about animating vector-based typefaces (built by using stroke paths), meaning your texts are fully scalable in any resolution you work with.

Workflow and Interface

One of the first things you'll notice after launching Adobe Premiere Pro is its interface. It has a clean and intuitive layout that allows you to easily switch from one video editing tool to another, regardless of which part of the timeline you're working on.

Adobe After Effects' interface can be overwhelming at first, as it's more about adding different tools and functionalities to your video content rather than arranging them in a way that can be easily handled.

The interfaces for Premiere Pro and After Effects are very different. Adobe Premiere Pro's interface is more about working with the different tracks simultaneously, which you edit to create your video. After Effects adds different effects and layers to one opened video track.

Multitasking and video clips length

After Effects is less ideal for creating full-length productions as it's mostly about creating short video sequences. The workflow of working on one project at a time with no immediate previewing might prove to be frustrating for some people.

With Premiere Pro, you can work with multiple tracks at once, making it a better choice for people looking to create a more extended video project.

If your projects involve multiple clips, Adobe Premiere Pro might be best for editing video. Premiere Pro allows you to have many different projects opened simultaneously, while After Effects opens only one project.

Working with other third-party plugins and tools

Both Adobe After Effects and Premiere Pro have a lot of third-party plugins you can use to work on your video content. If you need some specific effects or tools that the standard version doesn't provide, you should first check for an alternative plugin.

However, as After Effects is mostly about creating different visual elements with many different layers added to your video track, it's more difficult to use third-party plugins in Adobe After Effects than it is with Premiere Pro.

Supported file formats

As Adobe Premiere Pro is all about video editing, it supports a much more extensive range of different file formats for your videos. The most common file formats supported by Premiere Pro are .mp4, .avi, and  .mov.

Pricing

After Effects program and Premiere Pro program are part of Adobe Creative Cloud, which means you need to subscribe to the Adobe suite every month. Both pro editing software are available at the same price of $20.99 per month with the Adobe Creative Cloud plan.

What is Adobe Premiere Pro Best for?

Adobe Premiere Pro is best for:

• Longer video projects (more than 20 minutes).
• Adding and editing many different tracks at the same time.
• Creating basic animations with texts and shapes.
• Importing and editing videos in different formats.
• Working with third-party plugins.

Premiere Pro is best suited for video professionals, news editors in TV stations, commercial production, and YouTubers. It's known for its powerful editing tools and precise workflow, even in the case of longer video projects.

What is Adobe After Effects Best for?

Adobe After Effects is best for:

• Creating short animation sequences.
• Animating texts and shapes.
• Creating visual effects (fades, glow).
• Editing visuals with many different layers simultaneously.

After Effects is best suited for graphic designers looking to create their dynamic videos, as its interface can be overwhelming at first. People who work with vector-based typefaces (built using stroke paths) will also find After Effects better to make lower thirds or subtitles.

After Effects vs Premiere Pro Conclusion

Suppose you like adding effects and creating motion graphics, then After Effects is an excellent choice for you. If you want video editing software that allows you to work with audio tracks and video tracks simultaneously, Premiere Pro can fulfill your needs better.

If you're a graphic designer looking to create videos for your portfolio, then After Effects may help you as it's best to work with many different layers simultaneously. In case of any long video projects, Adobe Premiere Pro might be better as it allows you to work with multiple tracks simultaneously.

Alternatively, you could use both platforms to create content. You could edit your video clips in Premiere Pro and then import them into After Effects for finishing touches and animations. Since both programs are available in Adobe Creative Cloud, you could work within both programs natively.

Remember, you can try both of these programs for free.

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Topics: Video Editing, Adobe, Premiere Pro, Premiere Pro Transitions, Premiere Pro Masks, Premiere Pro Adjustment Layers, Premiere Pro Timeline, premiere pro editing, video transitions