Shotstack
Cloud video editing API that renders video from a JSON timeline.
About
Shotstack is a cloud-native video editing platform for developers. Instead of desktop editing software, you define a multi-track timeline in JSON with clips, transitions, text overlays, and audio, send it to the API, and Shotstack renders the finished video, image, or audio file on its infrastructure. A Create API adds AI-generated assets such as text-to-speech, text-to-image, and image-to-video directly into timelines.
The platform splits responsibilities across APIs: Edit for rendering, Ingest for uploading and transforming source footage, Serve for hosting and delivering assets, and templates for reusable designs. It suits batch production of personalized marketing videos, real estate tours, and automated reports, with SDKs, a sandbox environment, and webhook notifications for render status.
What it can do
- JSON timeline video rendering in the cloud
- AI asset generation (TTS, text-to-image, image-to-video)
- Edit, Ingest, Serve, and Create APIs
- Templates with per-render overrides
- Webhooks and SDKs for common languages
Setup
Register at dashboard.shotstack.io for a free API key and POST a JSON timeline to the Edit API.
Prerequisites
A Shotstack account and API key.
Use cases
Works with
Trust score — 8/10
Scored 8/10 (verified tier, metrics-v1). Evidence: Verified via vendor site/docs/GitHub and reputable coverage, wave 104; Trending score 76/100 from researcher assessment.
Sources
Every fact above was checked against these sources. Where a claim comes from the provider and couldn't be independently verified, the text says so.