How to make a real estate video from photos: iMovie, CapCut, Canva or AI

If you want one cut, vertical, for Instagram, and you have an evening, CapCut is the best free tool for this. If you want every format and you have fifteen minutes, use an AI tool. iMovie is the wrong tool for social video in 2026, which surprises people because it is the one already on their Mac. Canva sits in between and wins when you care more about the graphics than the motion.

That is the conclusion. Here is how each one works, start to finish, with the same listing: a 3 bed, 2 bath house with 22 photos from a professional shoot.

Before any editor: choose and order the photos

This step is the same in every tool and it is where most of the quality comes from. Twenty-two photos is too many for a 30 to 45 second film. Pick 12 to 16.

1. Find the hook: the single photo a buyer would screenshot. It goes first, not the front elevation.
2. Cut near duplicates. Two angles of the same bathroom become one.
3. Order the rest the way you would walk a buyer through: exterior and entry, living spaces, kitchen, bedrooms, baths, outdoor space.
4. Put the strongest room or view near the end as a peak, and finish on a twilight or best exterior.
5. Rename the files 01, 02, 03 in that order. Every editor below imports in file name order, and this saves ten minutes of dragging.

Time: 10 to 15 minutes. If you skip it, no editor will save the film. Our guide to listing photos that make a great film covers what to ask your photographer for.

iMovie: fine for widescreen, awkward for everything else

iMovie on a Mac locks every project to a 16:9 canvas. There is no setting for vertical. The workaround people pass around (starting an App Preview project, then rotating the export in QuickTime) works, but it is fiddly enough that we would not build a weekly habit on it. iMovie on iPhone handles vertical better if you start from vertical footage, but stills in a vertical frame still take wrangling.

For a widescreen film for YouTube or your website, it is perfectly good:

1. In iMovie settings, set photo placement to Ken Burns, then create a new movie and import your numbered photos.
2. Select all the photos in the timeline and set the duration to about 2.5 seconds; then lengthen the hook and the peak shots by hand to 4 or 5.
3. Check every Ken Burns move. iMovie picks a start and end frame automatically and will happily zoom into a light switch. Fixing these is most of the work.
4. Add a title over the first shot (keep it short) and an end card with price and contact details.
5. Drop a music track under it. Use one you have the rights to, and read the licence on iMovie's built-in soundtracks before using them in advertising.
6. Export at 1080p.

Time: 90 minutes to 2.5 hours the first time, about 45 minutes once you know it. No captions from speech, no narration tools beyond recording a voiceover yourself, one format.

CapCut: the best free option for vertical

CapCut, on desktop or phone, starts in 9:16 natively and has the two things iMovie lacks for social video: auto captions and keyframes. Some effects and features sit behind CapCut Pro, listed at $19.99 a month in the US in 2026, but the free version makes a good listing film.

1. New project, set the ratio to 9:16, import the numbered photos.
2. Set each photo to 2 to 3 seconds. Vary it: details at 1.5 seconds, the hero room at 4 or 5. Even timing is what makes a film feel like a slideshow.
3. Add motion. Either use a zoom preset on each photo or set two keyframes per photo (start and end scale and position). Keyframes take longer and look much better.
4. Wide horizontal photos in a vertical frame need repositioning per photo, choosing which slice of the room to show. This is the step that eats the time.
5. Record or import narration, then run auto captions. Fix the transcription errors, especially street names and prices.
6. Pick a caption style and move the captions up out of the bottom third, where TikTok and Reels put their own text.
7. Add music and lower it under the voice. Check the track's licence: not every track in CapCut's library is cleared for commercial use, and a listing video is commercial use.
8. Export at 1080p, 30 fps.

Time: two to three hours the first few times, 60 to 90 minutes when practised, for one vertical cut. A 4:5 or widescreen version is a second project, because every photo needs reframing again.

Canva: start from a template, live with its motion

Canva's strength is design. There are hundreds of real estate video templates with title cards, price tags and agent end cards that look tidy straight away. Its motion on photos is simpler than CapCut's, and the templates were designed for a specific number of photos, so a 14 photo listing in a 9 photo template means duplicating pages.

1. Search Canva for a real estate Reel or listing video template in the size you want.
2. Replace the template photos with yours, page by page, and set each page's duration.
3. Edit the text: address, price, beds and baths, your contact details. Apply your brand kit if you have Canva Pro.
4. Add an animation to each photo (pan, zoom, or one of the preset effects) and a transition between pages if the template does not have one.
5. Add music from Canva's library or upload your own. Record narration in Canva or upload it.
6. Download as MP4. Canva's Magic Switch (a Pro feature) can resize the design to another format, but you will still need to fix each page by hand.

Time: 45 to 75 minutes with a template you like, 30 minutes once you have a saved one of your own. Canva Pro is in the $15 to $18 a month range depending on billing.

An AI tool: upload, review, export

The AI approach collapses the steps above. Here is how it goes in Property Video Generator, since that is the one we know; competitors differ in the details, which the comparison of AI video tools covers.

1. Enter the address and upload the photos (up to 40) or paste a listing link from Redfin, Realtor.com or many brokerage sites to import them. Add price, beds, baths and size if you want them in the script.
2. Choose a vibe: Calm luxury, Bright family or Bold modern.
3. Press create and sign in. The product reads every photo, leaves out near duplicates and weaker angles, orders the walkthrough, writes a hook and narration checked against your details, and times the shots to the room and the music.
4. Review it. Reorder or remove shots, change a camera move, rewrite a narration line, switch the voice or the captions, or tell the AI Director what you want in plain words: “open on the pool”, “make it under 30 seconds”.
5. Download the cuts: vertical, 4:5, square, widescreen and the unbranded MLS cut.

Time: about 5 minutes of setup, a few minutes of rendering (you can close the tab and get an email), and 5 to 10 minutes of review. Call it 15 to 20 minutes for all five formats. You give up the hand control of setting every keyframe yourself, though most of it is available in the editor if you want it.

The tradeoffs in one table

Where each one wins

iMovie wins when you only need a widescreen film for YouTube or your website and you already know it. That is a narrow win in 2026.

CapCut wins when you enjoy editing, have time, and want total control over a single vertical cut. Agents who treat their Instagram as a craft often end up here, and the results can be excellent.

Canva wins when the design around the photos matters more than the motion: a just sold announcement, an open house card with a short clip, a carousel. Its templates also make it easy for a team assistant to produce something on-brand.

An AI tool wins when you list more than a couple of homes a month and want every format every time. The arithmetic in what a real estate video costs is mostly about this: an hour saved per listing adds up quickly.

Many agents end up with two: an AI tool for every listing, and CapCut or Canva for the occasional custom piece. That is a perfectly sensible place to land.