How to Turn a Long Video into Shorts with AI in CapCut

CapCut's Long video to shorts tool scans a long recording, scores moments for hooks and complete thoughts, then outputs several vertical clips with captions and reframing already applied. It runs inside CapCut desktop, supports 20-plus spoken languages, and needs no separate export step: upload once, generate, and each candidate clip arrives ready to trim and post.

What you need

• CapCut desktop, signed in
• A long horizontal video with clear speech (5 minutes or more works best)
• Time for the AI pass, which scales with video length

Step 1: Open the tool

From the CapCut home screen, look in the toolbox for Long video to shorts. Open it and upload your long video, or paste a link if your source is hosted online.

Step 2: Set the clip length and language

Choose a target duration that matches the platform you post to. Set the language to match the speech so captions transcribe correctly. Then click Generate.

Step 3: Wait for the AI pass

CapCut transcribes the whole video, scores segments for hooks and complete thoughts, then assembles candidate clips. A 30-minute source can take several minutes. Each result shows a virality estimate and the topic it covers.

Step 4: Open a clip in the editor

The AI guesses the boundaries, but it is rarely perfect. Click Edit on a promising clip to send it to the full timeline, where you can trim the start so it opens on the hook, and tighten the ending so it does not trail off.

Step 5: Polish and export each clip

Check that the auto reframe keeps the speaker centered, fix any caption errors, then export at 1080p vertical. Repeat for each clip you want to keep.

Result: one 30-minute interview becomes five tightened vertical clips, each captioned and reframed, in roughly the time it takes to watch the source once.

Why repurposing a long video is worth the extra step

Shorts and Reels are where the attention actually is: YouTube Shorts alone now average 200 billion views a day, CEO Neal Mohan announced in mid-2026, up from 70 billion daily views two years earlier. A single long-form recording is the cheapest source material you have for that feed, since the talking has already been done.

FAQ

How long does the AI pass take?

Processing time scales with the source video's length rather than a fixed number of minutes, so a 10-minute clip finishes much faster than a 90-minute podcast. Start the pass, then go do something else; there is no benefit to watching the progress bar.

Does CapCut's AI clipper support languages other than English?

Yes. The tool supports 20-plus spoken languages for detection and captioning, so a source recorded in Spanish or Mandarin gets the same automatic scoring and caption generation as English audio.

Do I need a voiceover artist to add narration to a clip?

No. If a clip needs an intro line or narration the source audio doesn't have, generate it locally with Kokoro-82M or a cloned voice from Breeze TTS 2, then drop the audio into the clip editor like any other track.