Does your product page need a demo video? Your Instagram… three Reels a week? You’ve already tried opening Premiere Pro and making cuts yourself. No editing background. You and your marketing manager, both.
That’s usually the moment the search starts. Not with “How do I learn to edit,” but “How much does a video editor cost?” and “What is the average video editor salary US?”
And the answers you find don’t line up. Maybe you got $20 on Fiverr. Then $65 as some kind of “average.” Then $150 an hour from a senior editor’s rate card. Then $86,130 a year from a salary site that had nothing to do with any of the other three numbers.
All accurate numbers, each tied to a different kind of editing arrangement.
A $20 gig, a $150-an-hour freelancer, and an $86,000 salary are four different ways of buying video editing, all appearing under the same search.
Here’s what each one actually costs, and which one your business is really shopping for.
In This Blog:
- ➤How Much Does a Full-Time Video Editor Cost in the US?
- ➤How Much Does a Video Editor Cost Per Hour?
- ➤How Much Does a Video Editor Cost Per Project?
- ➤The Four Ways Businesses Actually Pay for Video Editing
- ➤What Actually Drives the Price of a Video Editing Project?
- ➤Is It Worth It to Outsource Video Editing for a Small Business?
- ➤How Remote Staff Helps US Businesses Get This Hire Right
- ➤FAQs
- ➤Do You Need to Outsource a Video Editor?
How Much Does a Full-Time Video Editor Cost in the US?tg
Film and Video Editors earn a national mean wage of $86,130 a year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey (May 2025, SOC 27-4032). That figure covers 25,610 people employed in the role nationally. It’s also base salary only. What the hire actually costs you is a different number entirely.
How Much Does a Video Editor Cost Per Hour?
Freelance video editors in the US charge between $15 and $150+ an hour. Experience, specialisation, and the kind of editing involved account for much of that spread.
Upwork has freelance rates at $30 to $35 an hour. That single number isn’t as transparent as you’d think, though, since what you’re paying for has a lot of flexibility from tier to tier.
Entry-level editors cut footage and export something that meets spec. Mid-level editors add pacing and platform-forward thinking: a 15-second Reel and a 10-minute YouTube video need a different rhythm, and knowing which one to build is its own skill. Senior editors bring motion graphics, and the storytelling calls that turn a video from watchable into one people finish. And enjoy or connect with.
Hourly pricing works fine for a single project with a clear scope. Budgeting gets harder fast past one or two videos a month because the hours a video eats can swing wildly depending on footage volume and how many rounds of revisions come back.
More on this shortly.
How Much Does a Video Editor Cost Per Project?
Some businesses want a finished video with the price stamped all over it.
Typical project rates in video editing:
Video editing studio rates and senior video editor salary? Quoted by finished minute instead. $75 to $200+ per minute, and goes up further with motion graphics or color work involved.
Why per minute? A 90-second ad and a 10-minute interview don’t take proportional time to cut. A short, tightly polished video can actually require more editing work per finished minute than something long-form, because there are more decisions packed into every second.
Project-based pricing suits one-off needs: a single explainer video, a simple descriptive video, a launch video, one ad campaign. It hands you a fixed number instead of an open hourly clock. For anything recurring, hourly or retainer pricing tends to work out cheaper over time, since the general unspoken rule is no repricing the scope from scratch on every video.
What Gets Added on Top of Base Salary
- Benefits and payroll taxes: typically $12,000–$18,000 a year
- Software licensing: Adobe Creative Cloud or Final Cut Pro, roughly $250–$700 a year, more with plugins or stock footage subscriptions
- Hardware: a workstation that can handle 4K and multi-cam footage is a real equipment line
- Management time: someone has to keep this person’s calendar full enough to justify the salary in the first place
A full-time hire pays off when there’s enough steady weekly editing work to keep that person occupied. Below that line, you’re paying a full salary for part-time output.
Lock the math in before the job listing goes up.
The Four Ways Businesses Actually Pay for Video Editing
Where does the money go?
#1. Freelance Marketplaces (Fiverr, Upwork)
Cheapest number on the page – freelance video editor rates (the same is true for entry level video editor salary). Also carries the most hidden work behind it.
If you’re the project manager, or you’re fulfilling the role because you don’t have one, you’re the quality check. The one holding the risk if that editor goes quiet the week before a deadline. By the way, this isn’t a rare thing:
A recent industry survey found the majority of businesses using freelance video editors had dealt with a missed deadline in the past year, with a meaningful share reporting an editor who went unresponsive mid-project.
For a business publishing fewer than four videos a month? The work is occasional while the cost stays tied to actual output. No reason to carry a full-time salary for a handful of edits.
The trouble becomes less of an annoyance and more of a burgeoning concern when you’re repeatedly sourcing, briefing, reviewing, and replacing editors to keep a regular content schedule moving.
#2. Agencies and Subscription Editing Services
This model’s generally a flat monthly retainer, usually $500 to $4,000 depending on volume and complexity, in exchange for a rotating pool of editors rather than one person who knows your brand.
Rotation is where things get muddled: faster turnaround and more capacity, but a different editor may be cutting your footage from week to week.
Ideal for high-volume, templated content, that can be exactly what a business needs. Weekly Reels. Recurring YouTube uploads. Content where publishing speed is behind the strategy more than having one editor learn every little preference behind the brand.
#3. In-House, Full-Time Hire
This is the $110,000 to $135,000 already broken down above.
Bring in a full time editor when there’s enough steady weekly work to keep that person busy. No steady weekly work means a business can end up paying a full salary for part-time output, making this the most expensive option on the list rather than the leanest.
Before posting the job listing, add up the actual editing hours needed each week. If the business consistently needs fewer than roughly 30 hours, it’s worth looking at the other models first.
#4. A Dedicated Remote Hire
This is the option most cost guides skip over entirely.
A dedicated remote hire works exclusively for one business, at the skill level required for the role, without the domestic salary and benefits costs attached to a US-based full-time hire. One person learns one brand instead of a rotating cast of editors cutting the same footage differently every time.
When video is no longer an occasional project but part of the weekly marketing workload, you’ll need rethinking – hiring a freelance video editor isn’t the best strategy here. At the same time, business producing videos every week or two may not need a full-time US hire, but it may have outgrown starting from scratch with a new freelancer every time.
See the numbers yourself by using our free Outsourcing Calculator below:
What Actually Drives the Price of a Video Editing Project?
The number on a quote isn’t always bound by the video editor hourly rate alone. A few things can change the price toward eeither end of the bar.
Raw footage volume
The industry commonly cites a source-to-edit ratio of 5:1 to 25:1 for 3–5 minute marketing videos. Twenty-five minutes of raw footage can take anywhere from 2 to 5 hours to turn into a finished cut. More camera angles, more takes, more final edits, more footage to sort through before a single edit gets made.
Add-on services
Color grading, motion graphics, and custom sound design each add time on top of a standard cut. Reformatting one video is more than one project, especially when you need one for YouTube, one for Instagram, then for TikTok, and another for any other platform. Each platform has its own preferred video format and pacing. Not to mention how these are separate deliverables.
Turnaround time
Rush requests almost immediately command premium rates, whether we’re talking freelance, agency, or project-based pricing.
Revision rounds
When a brief’s vague, that’s really more work waiting in the wings, and more numbers added onto the final invoice. Why is that? Because that implies more rounds of feedback. But it’s easy to avoid with a clear brief that has it all: reference videos and brand guidelines. Specific notes help put a border around the original quote, or let final costs get as close to it as possible.
Is It Worth It to Outsource Video Editing for a Small Business?
Yes, once video editing becomes a recurring part of your marketing instead of something you scramble for every so often. If you’re publishing only a few videos a month, hiring a freelancer per project keeps the cost tied to the work you actually have. As the volume climbs, however, the freelancer-by-freelancer approach starts eating more time: sourcing, briefing, reviewing, chasing revisions, and doing it all again with the next editor.
Count how many videos your business actually published last month, then look at how many editing hours went into producing them. Those two numbers will tell you far more about the right hiring model than a generic “average video editor salary” ever will.
Extra Read: What is Color Drenching and how to outsource interior designers.
How Remote Staff Helps US Businesses Get This Hire Right
What are the benefits of outsourcing in the Philippines with a managed provider? A dedicated remote hire only works if the person behind it can actually edit. Remote Staff has spent 18 years placing technical and creative professionals with US businesses, and video editors are screened the same way:
Real portfolios and project history. Proof of the work. All held together by a friendly remote average salary for video editors, without undercutting them, and encouraging long-term partnership.
The engagement can be full-time, part-time, or project-based, depending on how much editing work exists week to week. Payroll, onboarding, and HR administration are handled on Remote Staff’s end, leaving the business owner to focus on the work itself rather than the employment administration behind it.
For a business that needs a regular editor but isn’t ready to take on the full cost of a US-based employee, a dedicated remote hire offers another middle ground.
FAQs
How much do video editors make in the US?
Film and video editors in the US earn a median $75,420 a year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ May 2025 data. The national mean is higher at $86,130, with the lowest 10% earning below $40,280 and the highest 10% earning above $148,550. Freelance video editors are typically priced by the hour or project, with current Upwork rates ranging from about $10 to $60 an hour, depending on experience and scope.
When it comes to talks of the salary of a video editor, outsourcing video editing can cost considerably less because you’re paying for the editing work you need rather than taking on the full salary, benefits, equipment, and other costs of a US-based employee.
How much does it cost to hire a video editor for YouTube videos?
A YouTube video editor typically charges $200 to $600 per video on a freelance basis, depending on length and complexity. A standard 10-minute video with cuts, color correction, captions, and basic graphics are $200 to $400 with a mid-level editor, while a senior editor handling the same video charges $400 to $800 or more.
Is Fiverr or Upwork cheaper for video editing?
Fiverr tends to offer cheaper rates on the surface, with basic editing packages starting around $65 for simple projects. Upwork’s rates skew a little higher on average, but give more visibility into an editor’s experience and hourly rate upfront, which cuts down on the vetting back-and-forth that comes with a per-gig platform like Fiverr.
How much does it cost to outsource video editing versus hiring in-house?
Outsourcing, whether freelance, agency, or a dedicated remote hire, offers hiring costs (average salary of a video editor) of $500 to $4,000 a month depending on volume and model. A full-time in-house hire has a salary of about $110,000 to $135,000 in true first-year cost once benefits, software, and hardware are factored in. Outsourcing tends to make more financial sense until video volume is high enough to keep one in-house editor busy full-time.
Do video editors charge per video or by the hour?
Both are common, and it usually comes down to the type of work. Editors handling ongoing or variable-scope work tend to charge hourly (if we’re talking about average video editor pay per hour, that is). Editors handling one clearly defined deliverable – a single YouTube video or a 30-second ad, for example – often quote a flat per-project or per-finished-minute rate instead.
How much does a beginner video editor charge?
Entry-level video editors typically charge $15 to $40 an hour, according to Upwork’s published freelance rate data. At this tier, editors handle basic cuts, audio syncing, and clean exports, but usually haven’t built up the experience for color grading, motion graphics, or the sharper storytelling that senior editors bring to a project.
Extra Read: Here’s something about the Ultimate Guide to Hiring Virtual Assistant Services.
Do You Need to Outsource a Video Editor?
There’s a factor much more important than numbers: how much video your business actually needs, and how often you need it.
You don’t need to know the perfect hiring model at the outset. Start with the workload. How many videos are you producing? How many editing hours are going into them? And how much time is your team spending finding, briefing, and managing the person doing the work?
Your answers should ultimately guide the cost and salary research.
If you’re ready to find an editor who fits your business instead of listlessly hopping between four different price tags, call us or Request a Callback.
Vaune Everis Cura has always been a writer in the truest sense, drawn to the art both as a personal creative pursuit and as a profession. Her experience penning content across digital marketing spaces and collaborating with business owners and market shapers has broadened her craft to include strategic direction and SEO insight. Having spent years with the InterContinental Hotels Group before stepping boldly into freelancing, she understands that at the centre of it all are genuine, meaningful brand–customer relationships built on purposeful, human content.
