Camtasia is a video editor and screen recorder. Camtasia offers a range of plans designed to meet varying video creation needs, and enables users to produce professional-looking videos. Its features include Camtasia Rev, script generation, text-to-speech, translations, and avatar videos, to streamline the video creation process. The editions available are Free, Essentials, Create, or the Pro plan.
$179.88
per year per user
Zight
Score 8.8 out of 10
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)
Zight (formerly CloudApp) is a solution with a community of over 4M users, offering visual asynchronous communication, eliminating the need to use different applications for screenshots, GIFs, screen recordings, and web recordings.
$0
Pricing
Camtasia
Zight
Editions & Modules
Camtasia Business
$198
per year per seat
Free
$0
Team
$8.00
per month per user
Pro
$9.95
per month per user
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Camtasia
Zight
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
Yes
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
*Discounts available for purchases supporting a large volume of users.
Camtasia is so easy to use that I recommend it over Adobe Premiere, Captivate, Storyline, and other tools. The only problem is the price. Due to the fact that I purchased this for education purposes, and educational prices have gone up exponentially, it has been difficult even at $179 to upgrade, as an educator and the organization is not always willing to reimburse the purchase, it would have been more economical. It was less than $100 (Black Friday) when I bought our updated version in 2019. Camtasia profile accounts aren't the best setup, however. My profile account does not reflect when I was a user or show past invoices, and I wanted to see how long ago I was a user.
When it comes to client-facing roles, this functionality is key. Before, I had to use an internal clipping or snipping tool and then download the content then share it as an attachment. With Zight, I simply capture what I want, then easily share a link that can be accessed within minutes by the ones I am engaging with. It is very easy to collaborate and clearly communicate. I would not recommend using it for internal documentation. Having too many screenshots might be hard to manage.
USB Microphones can sometimes cause a problem if they become accidentally unplugged during a recording session. This can corrupt some of the files that the Camtasia Recorder application uses to capture directly to .avi mode.
You'll sometimes get a message when you next try to record that .avi mode isn't available and the only way to fix this is by completely uninstalling and reinstalling Camtasia (with a reboot in the middle of these two actions).
This bug only manifested after Camtasia 8 was released, but still seems to cause an issue right up to and including Camtasia 2021.
I'd like to see more standard Annotation options. The existing ones are pretty good, but variety is a little lacking.
More 'Behaviours' would also be really welcome as these are a great feature and make Callouts a bit more interesting and lively. I've not seen any new Behaviours over the past few versions (since Camtasia 2018).
Each release of Camtasia has added just enough functionality to justify the upgrade to the new version. I like that Camtasia is not a subscription-based product as we have more flexibility and control over our spend on the product. We can also purchase support packages that include the next version when released.
In all honesty I don't even have time to look for an alternative to CloudApp at this point in our business. CloudApp works for what we had planned to use it for and unless a competing service that offers the same quality and ease-of-use along with video screen capture comes out I will renew indefinitely.
I haven't used another video recording and editing tools that is as comprehensive and straight-forward as Camtasia. Typically, if you want a user-friendly video editing tools for novice users, you have to compromise on features. Camtasia solves this problem by offering extensive editing features in a simplistic, user-friendly environment. Highly recommend
If someone is used to using internal screen capture software Zight may have a small learning curve. Luckily, once you get the hang of your new capture method, it is a quick process. Updates can be tedious. Although I am glad the team is working on the application and consistently improving it.
With the latest version (Camtasia 2020), I actually had problems with an Imac with HighSierra, but from the first moment they answered and guided me to solve the problem, even before making the purchase (with some doubts I had). And they have support in English and Spanish, I really liked that.
I would give cloud app a 9/10 score on overall support mostly because I have had very little need of any support at all being that the tool was designed almost to use itself. In my opinion this level of forethought is equal to customer support. As of yet I've only had one real problem with cloud app which was the loss of a 20 minute video screen capture. Unfortunately I have not had the time to contact support about this loss. The only other minor issues that I confronted was within the initial set up which I was able to resolve via their website's support pages.
I was extremely satisfied with how quick and easy the implementation of Cloudapp was on my MacIntosh using MacOS Sierra was, along with how amazingly fast I was able to be up and going with the tool. most often with sass tools we are lucky if we can use 50% of the features without having to have consultations and a ton of back-and-forth email on how to use other features of the product. Cloud app has made it extremely user-friendly with almost no need for customer support. To My business, that equals time savings which as most business owners know, can be far more valuable than a few dollars saved.
I've tried several freeware recorders, too. If all you want to do is literally record your screen, and nothing else, you don't need Camtasia. There are literally dozens of apps that will do that. If you want an app that will record your screen while capturing mouse clicks, follow you, record your voice while you capture, and annotate when you're done, Camtasia has no equal. Plus, it doesn't stop there. You can add professional intros and outros (many already created to choose from), lower thirds, etc., leading to videos with very high production value. This is THE program to buy if you want to produce training videos of very high quality.
The tools I have used in the past weren't available in the tool selector! Basically, I've mostly used Jing which I found to be quite clunky. The user interface is unnecessarily complicated and sharing files is more difficult. Trying CloudApp once was enough to see how much more superior it was to Jing! Honestly, if you need a tool that will help you take screenshots to help you communicate better with your team, give it a try!
The amount that I paid for it, I feel that it's paid for itself over and over and over multiple times, if for one reason, and that's time saved. If I have one app that does it all, quickly, and efficiently, that's my positive ROI.
