According to market research firm Statista’s statistics in 2023, about 38% of the world’s short video content has been created with the free AI video generator tool, but its capacity for processing complex scenes (multi-shot editing, dynamic special effects, etc.) is still inadequate. For example, the time taken to generate a 10-minute video by AI is only 15 minutes (6 hours for manual editing), but the naturalness score of cross-scene transitions is only 7.2/10 (9.5/10 for manual editing). Let’s take the example of Runway ML. In the videos its free version generates, the object tracking error rate is as high as 12% (manual editing ≤2%), which has caused a product Logo drift in the promo videos of a Brazilian advertising company, and the customer complaint rate has increased by 18%.
Technically, the free version of free AI video generator software such as Synthesia only supports 720P output (bitrate 5Mbps), and the median audio synchronization deviation is 0.3 seconds (0.05 seconds for professional software such as Adobe Premiere). Experiments show that the adjustment accuracy of AI-generated videos’ color correction parameters (such as hue and saturation) has an error rate of ±8% (±2% for manual editing), and the noise density up to 12.5 per pixel in low light (which can be reduced to 2.3 per pixel after manual editing). For instance, a night scene video produced by an Indonesian travel blogger using the free version of Descript saw its YouTube completion rate drop to 43% due to excessive noise (which increased to 78% after manual correction).
Cost-benefit analysis suggests the use of the free AI video creator can reduce the cost of video creation to $0.05 per minute (plus, on average, $2.5 per minute for manual editing), but just for generic templates (e.g., e-commerce product promotion). Enterprise applications show that chain restaurants in Mexico have realized 92% cost savings per promotional video created by Lumen5. However, due to the AI’s inability to recognize dialect accents (with an error rate of 23%), the localized ad placement effect is 35% lower than that of manual production. Moreover, free software often limits the font copyright library (with just 10% available for choosing), which resulted in a German fashion brand being sued for 12,000 euros for font infringement.
In terms of compliance and legal risks, the material generated by free AI video generator has potential copyright risks. Based on the 2023 report of the European Union, in AI uses where users are unidentified (such as DeepBrain), 32% of training data is unauthorized, whereas the possibility that video clips generated are more than 70% identical to the original material is 18%. For instance, a French independent filmmaker had his film remade by Pictory user AI with the identical frame rate of 41%. He received 48,000 euros in damages following a lawsuit. While the manual editing team does purchase original material libraries (e.g., Artgrid), the infringement risk is less than 0.5%.
User behavior data shows that 58% of creators utilize AI tools only for routine tasks such as adding subtitles and basic editing, while complex creative ideas still need to be done manually. For instance, TikTok’s top blogger @TechReviewer uses Kapwing’s AI auto-editing feature to edit daily content (with 60% higher efficiency), but for high-end review videos (i.e., multi-camera teardown), he still uses an editing team, with one cost $300 and playback volume 2.7 times that of the AI version.
On the technical bottleneck level, the physics engine simulation ability of the free AI video generator is insufficient. Tests show that the physical accuracy score of AI-generated special effects such as water movement and fire is only 54/100 (92/100 for work by human special effects artists), and the rendering speed is slow (e.g., Blender guide rendering is 2 hours for 1 minute of special effects, and AI is 8 hours). It cost some sci-fi short film on Netflix an additional $120,000 in 2024 for manual restoration when the explosion scenes generated by AI were distorted.
Despite the limitations, the free AI video generator has a significant advantage in agile production environments. Small businesses using Veed.io to create 15-second product advertisements have cut the production cycle from 3 days to 20 minutes, with a conversion rate difference of only ±4% (in the manual control group). In the future, the AI-assisted (non-replacement) mode will maybe be mainstream – for example, Adobe Premiere Pro’s Auto Reframe feature can save 70% of the basic editing time, but keyframe adjustment still requires manual operation.