ClipForge

Desktop app to download YouTube videos and cut them into vertical 720x1280 reels. Built with Electron + React + Python.

This open-source app Clipforge — AI-powered clip suggestions with unlimited usage. No credits, no subscriptions, no watermarks.

Features

• Download & Cut — paste a YouTube URL, edit clips, generate vertical reels

• Fill Mode — crops landscape video to fill the full 9:16 vertical frame

• Crop Mode — overlays configurable padding bars at top/bottom (independent %, any color)

• Per-clip control — switch Fill/Crop mode per clip with global defaults in Settings

• AI Clip Suggestions — uses Groq (llama-3.1-8b) or Gemini (2.0-flash) to auto-detect highlight moments

• Note Ai generation, Currently Disabled in Release 2.1 Clone the repo to enabled, Or analyze the Yt link then copy the prompt paste to any third party ai chat like Chatgpt or Gemini so no Api generation needed and you can get better results.

• Gallery — browse all generated reels with inline player

• Cache Management — clear downloaded video cache from Settings

• Health Checks — real-time status for Python, yt-dlp, ffmpeg

• Auto-Start Backend — Python server spawns automatically from Electron

• Auto-Retry — app retries starting the backend every 15s if offline

• Python Path Fallback — detects Python installed via winget even if not in PATH

• Donate — ☕ Donate button in the sidebar

Comparison

Tool	Type	Starting Price	Credit System	Cost per 60-min Video	No Watermark	API
ClipForge	AI Clipping	Free	Unlimited	$0	✅	✅
Opus Clip	AI Clipping	$15/mo	1 min = 1 credit	~$6.00	Paid only	❌
Ssemble	AI Clipping	$7.50/mo	1 video = 1 credit	~$0.75	✅ Free+Paid	✅
CapCut	Manual Editor	Free	Unlimited	$0	✅	❌
Reap	AI + Dubbing	$9.99/mo	Hours	~$1.00	Paid only	✅
Choppity	AI Clipping	$7.50/mo	Upload hours	~$2.50	Paid only	❌
Vizard	AI + Teams	$14.50/mo	1 min = 1 credit	~$14.50+	Paid only	❌
Klap	Simple AI	Free (1 video)	Upload-based	~$29	✅ (1 free)	❌
Submagic	Captions + AI	$12/mo	Videos (2-5 min)	N/A (short only)	Paid only	✅

Download

Download the latest installer for Windows

Or build from source (see SETUP.md).

Requirements

• Python 3.10+
• ffmpeg (in PATH)
• yt-dlp (installed via pip)

Quick Install (Windows): Download the release, extract, then double-click resources/setup.bat — it auto-installs Python, ffmpeg, and yt-dlp via winget/pip. Or open Settings → System Health → "Run setup.bat".

After first-time install: If the app stays offline after 30 seconds, close and reopen ClipForge.exe. The app will auto-detect the new dependencies.

Install dependencies manually

pip install yt-dlp

Download ffmpeg from ffmpeg.org and add it to your PATH.

Usage (Installed Version)

1. First run? Double-click resources/setup.bat to auto-install all dependencies
2. Double-click ClipForge.exe to launch
3. The backend starts automatically. If it shows offline for more than 30 seconds, restart the app.
4. The app connects to http://127.0.0.1:18764

Quick Start (Development)

# Install frontend deps
npm install

# Install backend deps
pip install -r backend/requirements.txt

# Run dev (Vite + Python backend)
npm run dev

Tech Stack

Layer	Technology
Shell	Electron 33
Frontend	React 18 + Vite 6
Backend	Python 3 (http.server)
Download	yt-dlp
Video	ffmpeg
AI	Groq API / Gemini API (opt-in)

How It Works

Paste URL -> Analyze -> Edit Clips -> Generate -> Reels
    |            |            |           |
    v            v            v           v
yt-dlp      metadata   trim times    720x1280
fetch       (title,    + padding     portrait
            duration)  mode          MP4

See BLUEPRINT.md for architecture details and SETUP.md for installation.

Donate

If you find this tool useful, consider buying me a coffee ☕. Every bit helps keep development going!