The 5 best video animation alternatives to Powtoon
From Disney’s masterpiece, Frozen, to the hundreds of animated videos used in marketing: animation is on the rise.
The term “animation” refers to much more than Disney-style cartoons or 3D-figures. According to Wikipedia, animation “is a method in which pictures are manipulated to appear as moving images“. So as soon as you are making a picture move or rotate in a video, you are animating!
Today, animators come in all shapes and sizes. Video animation is being used by everyone, and this is due in large part to the various free video animation making applications available today.
PowToon is undoubtedly one of the industry leaders when it comes to video animation and has helped video animators all across the world. That said, PowToon is not the only video animation maker available today. Far from it. In fact, there are hundreds of programs designed to help you create your animations.
We have compiled a list of our favorite online video animation makers to help you decide which program to use when creating your animations. For anyone looking to change it up, and adventure away from PowToon, here are our top 5 alternatives!
Number 1 PowToon alternative: OnlineVideoEditor
Let’s start with our top choice, the crème de la crème. The best, most powerful and most cost-effective online video maker. Yep, it’s OnlineVideoEditor (no surprises there). OnlineVideoEditor is a cloud-based digital media content creation platform, which means you don’t need to download and install any software or worry about updates.
So where do we start? OnlineVideoEditor has many unique graphical, animation, audio and video libraries, including over 1 million free assets! On OnlineVideoEditor, you will find:
- The popular Doodle Marker Style Library with whiteboard style line graphics you can draw or animate,
- The professional-looking Infographics Style Library with a variety of icons, pictograms, shapes and cartoons
- The Business Graphics, Web Icons, Graphs and Charts libraries, ideal for animated business videos
- The Motion Graphics library with transitions and cinema effects you can lay over your content
- the free Storyblocks library, with over 1 million of royalty-free stock photos, illustrations, videos, motion graphics, sounds and music, all free for you to use in your content!
- the iStock library from Getty Images, with another 75 million stock media objects you can purchase per item to exactly fit your content requirements – available at prices much lower than on iStock itself!
- Finally, you can also add your own organization’s libraries, with logos, icons, product pictures or other brand assets you may want to use to create your animated videos. Selected users who are members of a group can get access to such private libraries.
In other words, if you’re looking for cartoon style videos, OnlineVideoEditor offers many libraries with cartoons and other graphics in many different styles. You don’t have to start from scratch: you can easily compose your video using the pre-built scenes (we call them ” clips”) you find in every library. Just modify whatever you want in these clips: text, colors, music, visuals…
OnlineVideoEditor offers a full-featured Free version that allows you to create and publish your videos for free. Check it out here.
Number 2 alternative to PowToon: Vyond
Like PowToon and OnlineVideoEditor, Vyond (formerly GoAnimate) is a cloud-based software that allows users to create professional looking cartoon videos. We must say, we enjoyed using Vyond to create our cartoons. Similar to OnlineVideoEditor, Vyond has different animation styles, such as an Infographic style, 2D animated videos, and whiteboard animations.
Number 3 alternative to PowToon: Animaker
Onto the next, Animaker. Animaker makes use of beautiful cartoons, templates and is the ideal platform if you don’t care too much about customizing your video plot. With Animaker, you can just choose a premade template (presentation) and add your text to each slide. Although you do have less choice and overall a smaller input options, you can make a pretty decent animation in a short period.
Although you are restricted to creating 2-minute videos and have access to a limited library, Animaker is a good animation creator and a good alternative to PowToon..
Number 4 alternative to PowToon: Wideo
Wideo is another tool which allows users to utilize a range of free, animated professional templates. The downside, however, is that with Wideo’s free license, your video can only be a maximum of 30 seconds long. Of course, you could always upgrade your license should you want to make a longer animated video.
Whether you are creating an animated video for your startup, or perhaps for your students, Wideo has a good number of animated video templates and assets to help you make a great first impression.
Number 5 alternative to PowToon: Prezi
Although Prezi is not directly a video animation platform, we decided to include it amongst our list of PowToon alternatives. PowToon allows you to create animated videos along with presentations, in which Prezi are known for.
Instead of creating static like presentations, Prezi takes your audience on a cinematic animated journey like no other. Prezi is available on a free 14-day trial, after which an upgrade is required.
There you have it. 5 best video animation alternatives to PowToon
That concludes our list of PowToon alternatives. We hope our review has helped you find the right animation platform for you to create your video on.
