In a world that consumes and demands more, fresher, and better video content every day, it can be difficult for small brands and businesses to produce the kind and amount of videos necessary for a successful marketing strategy.
Stock video templates are a convenient and cost-effective way to enhance your video projects and produce more in less time without breaking the bank. With a wide variety of options, you can easily find the perfect template to suit your needs and create professional-looking videos quickly.
Read on to discover the benefits of video templates and our recommendations for the best video template providers!
Quick gift – Special offers to save in your templates!
What Are Stock Video Templates
Video templates are pre-made video designs you can customize to fit your needs. They're blueprints where the hard work of creating layouts, animations, and transitions is already done; you only have to tweak the details to make it your own.
They come with various pre-designed elements, such as text boxes, image placeholders, and video slots, that you can easily swap out with your own photos, videos, and text. Most of these designs offer a high degree of flexibility, empowering you to modify color palettes, change mood filters, and make many more subtle alterations through wise video editing.
The video template files you can find in stock media sites are usually compatible with the most popular video editing software: Adobe Premiere Pro, After Effects, Final Cut Pro, etc.; some all-in-one design platforms like Canva or Animoto also have their own video templates.
Whether you're a seasoned video editor or a complete beginner, editable video templates make it easier to produce high-quality videos.
Here is a thorough explanation with practical examples of how to best use video templates, courtesy of Adobe Stock and Epidemic Sound:
Benefits of Using Video Templates
Templates for video production save you much time. Instead of starting from scratch with a visual concept and graphic elements, you can go straight to adding your footage and custom elements to assemble the project. Increasing production speed will allow you to keep up with these fast-paced times and push freshly new content out faster.
Video templates are a playground of creativity. They are highly editable and retain their powerful design elements and effects while allowing you to infuse your unique touch into each of those elements. This means you can achieve a consistent brand image that reflects your vision.
These templates are not just visually appealing; they exude professionalism, making them the perfect solution for when you desire a high-quality video but lack advanced video editing skills. With templates, you don't have to worry about creating sleek transitions or catchy intros; you start with a solid foundation crafted by a professional, ensuring your video looks top-notch.
And if that sounds expensive, don't worry; it's the opposite: stock video templates are affordable and accessible for all. Not only that, but they simplify and shorten the creative workflow, so if you're using a video editor, it'll also help reduce the hours they'll need to complete the assignment.
Last but certainly not least, the templates offered at stock media sites are usually licensed royalty-free, which covers commercial use in social media, websites, advertising, and so on at no added cost.
Types of Templates
Stock video templates are an invaluable resource for digital video production, covering virtually any creative need. Their versatility is truly inspiring, as whatever you have in mind to make, there is likely a ready-to-use template for it.
The top stock video services, which we've listed below for your convenience, offer a thrillingly diverse range of themes and purposes in their template libraries. Here is just a glimpse of the variety you can expect:
- Intros and openers: From logo reveals to title sequences, broadcast openers, and more; these visual designs are ready to introduce your content in a captivating way.
- Transitions: Be they seamless, shape-based, or animated, these motion designs move your audience from one scene to the next while maintaining engagement and visual impact.
- Social media: You can find templates for everything; Instagram stories, Facebook posts, ads, TikTok and Youtube intros and outros, and more to make your channel unique.
- Promo and commercial: Graphics designed to bring life to products, events, and business promotion content. These visuals, from adverts to corporate videos, will help make your content pop.
- Infographic: Motion designs for data visualization, such as animated charts and graphs, among other resources, are ideal for conveying information more easily.
- Special effects: These perfectly complement your native footage, adding elements like explosions, lens flares, rain, and more.
- Explainer video: Animations of whiteboards, characters, and other visuals for how-to videos are ready to customize.
- Backgrounds: Animated, looping, abstract, realistic… all sorts of backgrounds ready to edit your content and call it a day.
- Holiday and seasonal: Find themed templates for the New Year, summer, back-to-school, and all sorts of special moments.
And many, many more!
Where to Find the Best Video Templates
There is an abundance of stock video agencies that include templates in their offer. But in our experience, only a few tick all the boxes to be among the best. Our criteria consider:
- Affordability – Reasonable costs, flexibility, and price points accessible for all.
- Variety – A rich catalog covering different themes, styles, and purposes.
- Quality – Only professional-grade templates produce professional-like results. This involves both content and resolution aspects.
- Royalty-free (or similar) – It's the most flexible and convenient license model for creatives.
Based on those factors, we recommend the following sites to find downloadable stock video templates.
Adobe Stock
Adobe's signature stock media licensing service, Adobe Stock, is not just a standalone resource but a seamlessly integrated part of its pro-grade video editing software Premiere Pro and After Effects. This integration empowers you, the video editor, graphic designer, or content creator, to work efficiently without the hassle of switching between different platforms. The newly added video template library, with its thousands of files covering all types of motion graphics and effects styles, is compatible with native and third-party editing tools. This collection, always up-to-date with the latest trends, is available on-demand with credits or multimedia subscription plans. And the best part? The prices are affordable –starting at just $29/mo for a multimedia plan with one video download per month– relieving you of any financial burden, and the royalty-free license enables commercial use. More in our Adobe Stock video review.
Even better? You can test the waters before spending money using the Adobe Stock free trial, which will let you download a fixed number of files of your choice—including templates—for free for one month.
Shutterstock
Shutterstock, one of the most popular stock photo sites, is renowned for its massive library size. This extensive collection includes stock photos, footage, and templates for every need. With a solid commercial style and thousands of options in every topic and subject, you can feel confident that you will find what you need for your project here. You can download templates with a video subscription or a video pack, with accessible prices starting at $99/mo for 5 video downloads and an encompassing royalty-free license. See our full Shutterstock video review.
The good news is that we have an exclusive Shutterstock discount code for our readers. This code unlocks a 15% discount on all video plans and download packs!
Motion Array
Motion Array is a stock media service aimed at video creators. Video templates and presets are one of their specialties, and they have a complete catalog conveniently arranged by their compatibility with video editing software. Besides for the popular Adobe tools, they have Final Cut Pro templates, DaVinci Resolve, and MOGRT files (motion graphic templates). They offer various subscription options with unlimited downloads and affordable prices starting at $15.82/mo (billed annually), making it one of the most convenient services for those constantly needing lots of files. Find out more in our Motion Array review.
And you know what else? As our reader, you access an exclusive $50 discount on your annual Motion Array plan!
Envato Elements
Envato is a multimedia download service that lets you access a collection of carefully handpicked media elements to create visual content. The collection includes video templates for every occasion compatible with the most used video editing tools and covers various concepts and styles. The license offered is royalty-free, albeit limited to one design per download. It's very low-cost and straightforward, offering only one subscription option with unlimited downloads for $14.85 per month.
The best part is our exclusive Envato coupon that saves you 10% in the first year! Meaning you pay 14,85 USD for 19 million assets!
Artgrid
Artgrid, a highly curated stock footage library, offers a diverse collection of high-resolution clips from top cinematographers, perfect for visual storytelling. Artgrid's sister company, Artlist, provides a range of stock audio tracks and other elements to enhance your video projects, including templates for all the major video editing apps, plugins, and more. This resource is accessible via annual subscriptions with unlimited downloads and is fairly priced from $29.99 monthly (with annual billing). Learn more in our Artgrid review.
Canva
Canva, the ultimate design platform for non-professional designers, offers a user-friendly experience with its image and video editors. It's a treasure trove of templates for every purpose imaginable, from social media to advertising, presentations, and events. While the Canva license is royalty-free, it's limited to one design per download. But here's the exciting part: they offer lots of free stock video templates, and with a Canva Pro subscription, you can enjoy unlimited downloads of premium templates for a nominal fee.
Unlock the full potential of Canva with a Pro subscription, a cost-effective solution that provides unlimited downloads for all your visual content needs for only $6.50 a month.
And those are our recommendations for stock video template providers!
Produce More and Better Videos with Stock Templates
In conclusion, using stock templates effectively creates compelling and professional-looking videos faster, easier, and more affordable for all your content needs.
So head to one of our recommended sites, pick a template, and start creating!
Header image copyright: IngImage / Stockphotos.com, all rights reserved.
