Captions vs Synthesia
Buy Synthesia if a company is paying and the video has to be reviewed, translated, governed or shipped into a learning system. Buy Captions if one person is making short-form content on a phone and wants generative extras in the same app. If you are the second person and you buy the first product, you will pay $29 a month for ten minutes of video and a seat model you do not need.
Disclosure: this page is published by Kineo, which is not one of the two tools compared here and does not compete with either on the job they do. There is a short, clearly labelled note about Kineo at the bottom. Everything above it is written as if we had nothing at stake, because on this comparison we do not.
The verdict
Synthesia’s free plan is the most generous evaluation tier in this whole cluster
Basic gives $0, 1,200 credits a month, up to 10 minutes of finished video, 25 AI-generated video assets, 9 AI avatars, 160+ languages and voices and 1 editor seat, in exchange for the Synthesia logo on the output. That is the same minute allowance as its paid $29 Starter tier. Captions Free, by contrast, lists basic editing and one caption template with no AI credits and no generative AI features at all.
Ten minutes a month is the number that ends most of these evaluations
Synthesia meters in minutes of finished video: 10 a month on Basic and Starter, 30 on Creator at $89/month or $64 billed yearly, and unlimited only on Enterprise. If you post short-form daily, 10 minutes is roughly what you would use in a fortnight. Captions meters credits instead — 500 on Max, up to 5,600 on Scale 4x — with no per-minute rate published that we could read, which is more flexible and much harder to forecast.
The seat models tell you who each product expects in the room
Synthesia sells editor seats plus guests: 1 editor and 3 guests on Starter, 1 editor and 5 guests on Creator. That shape exists because somebody has to approve the video. Captions publishes a per-account credit ladder with no guest reviewer concept we could read. If your video needs sign-off from three people, one of these products has already thought about it.
Governance is the whole reason Synthesia costs what it costs
SAML/SSO, brand kits and SCORM export sit on its Enterprise tier. SCORM in particular is a learning-management format — it is not a feature anyone buys for a TikTok. If none of those words are on your requirements list, you are looking at the expensive product for reasons that will never pay off.
Side by side
Every figure below was read off each vendor’s own pricing page on July 26, 2026. Where a tier table did not resolve to readable prices, the cell says so rather than guessing — a wrong competitor price is worse than no price at all.
| Captions | Synthesia | |
|---|---|---|
| What it actually is | A mobile-first short-form editor built around captions, AI edit styles, AI actors and generative b-roll. | Enterprise-leaning avatar video: training, internal comms and localisation, with governance features to match. |
| Needs an existing video? | Mostly. You record or upload, then edit — though the generative features on paid tiers can produce footage, voiceover and images. | No. You write a script, pick an avatar and it renders a presenter video. |
| Free tier | Free plan: basic editing (trimming, transitions, media assets) and 1 caption template, with no AI credits and no generative AI features at all. | Basic free plan: $0, 1,200 credits/month, up to 10 minutes of video per month, 25 AI-generated video assets, 9 AI avatars, 160+ languages and voices, 1 editor seat. The Synthesia logo appears on the video. |
| Cheapest paid plan | Max $24.99/month | Starter $29/month, or $18/month billed yearly |
| Full pricing | Free $0 (no AI credits) · Max $24.99/mo (500 credits/mo, curated AI Edit styles, AI actors and digital twins, chat-based editor, 100+ caption templates, generative music, voiceover, images, video and b-roll) · Scale 1x $69.99/mo (1,400 credits) · Scale 2x $139.99/mo (2,800 credits) · Scale 4x $279.99/mo (5,600 credits) · Enterprise custom. The pricing page states that "Features and prices reflect iOS plans only". | Basic free $0 (10 min/mo, Synthesia logo) · Starter $29/mo, or $18/mo billed yearly (1,200 credits/mo or 14,500/year; 10 min/mo or 120 min/year; 125+ AI avatars, 3 personal avatars; 1 editor, 3 guests) · Creator $89/mo, or $64/mo billed yearly (3,600 credits/mo or 44,000/year; 30 min/mo or 360 min/year; 180+ avatars, 5 personal avatars; 1 editor, 5 guests) · Enterprise custom (unlimited video minutes, 240+ avatars, unlimited personal avatars, SAML/SSO, brand kits, SCORM export). |
| Watermark | Not stated on the pricing page — worth confirming before you commit. | The Synthesia logo is on free-plan video; it is removable on paid plans. |
| Aspect ratio | Short-form vertical. | Multiple, including vertical. |
| Voice / narration | Generative voiceover is available on paid tiers; the free plan has no generative AI. | 160+ languages and voices on every tier, free plan included. |
| Where the visuals come from | Media assets on free; generative b-roll and images from Max up. | Not the point of the product — the avatar and the slide behind it are the shot. |
| Export & usage limits | Credit-metered per month, from 500 credits on Max to 5,600 on Scale 4x. | Metered in minutes of finished video per month as well as credits: 10 minutes/month on Basic and Starter, 30 minutes/month on Creator. |
| Verified | Verified July 26, 2026 — read from https://www.captions.ai/pricing | Verified July 26, 2026 — read from https://www.synthesia.io/pricing |
Sources: Captions pricing · Synthesia pricing — both checked on July 26, 2026. Vendors change tiers without notice, so confirm on their site before you pay. If you find something here that is out of date, we would rather fix it than keep the click.
Captions: The pricing page carries the line "All prices displayed in USD. Features and prices reflect iOS plans only," so plans reached from a desktop browser may differ.
Which one you should pick
Pick Captions if…
- You are one person, working on a phone, making short-form vertical video.
- You want generative b-roll, images, music and voiceover inside the editor — all listed from Max at $24.99/month.
- Caption styling is a real differentiator in your niche: 100+ templates and curated AI Edit styles.
- Your usage is bursty and buying a bigger credit bundle is easier than negotiating a minute allowance.
- You have no approval workflow, no brand kit requirement and nobody asking about SSO.
Pick Synthesia if…
- A company is paying, and the video is training, onboarding, policy or internal comms.
- You need SAML/SSO, brand kits or SCORM export — those are the reason to be here at all.
- You want the most generous free tier in this comparison to evaluate with: 10 minutes a month, 9 avatars, 160+ languages, at the cost of a logo.
- Reviewers need access without each buying an editor seat: 1 editor plus 3 guests on Starter, plus 5 on Creator.
- You are localising at scale: 160+ languages and voices on every tier, the free plan included.
The differences that actually matter
One publishes a watermark policy and one does not
Synthesia is explicit: its logo appears on free-plan video and is removable on paid plans. The Captions pricing page does not state a watermark policy either way in what we could read. For anything public-facing that is not a detail to leave unresolved — confirm it with Captions before you rely on the free tier.
Credits mean opposite things on the two sides
Synthesia quotes both credits and minutes — 1,200 credits and 10 minutes on Starter, 3,600 and 30 minutes on Creator — so the minute figure acts as the real ceiling. Captions quotes credits alone, spent across generative music, voiceover, images, video, b-roll and AI actors. Reading "1,200 credits" against "500 credits" across the table tells you nothing at all; they are not the same unit.
Personal avatars versus AI actors
Synthesia lists 3 personal avatars on Starter, 5 on Creator and unlimited on Enterprise, against 125+, 180+ and 240+ stock avatars by tier. Captions lists AI actors and digital twins from Max at $24.99/month without a published count we could read. If a specific recognisable likeness is the requirement, Synthesia has published the ladder.
Neither produces faceless content, for opposite reasons
Synthesia puts an avatar in frame; that is the product. Captions is built around footage you record or generate, with the editor as the centre of gravity. If your format is narration over stock footage with nobody on screen, neither of these is the front of that pipeline, and the minute allowances above stop mattering.
Frequently asked questions
Is Captions or Synthesia cheaper?
Synthesia Starter at $29/month falls to $18/month billed yearly, which is cheaper than Captions Max at $24.99/month; at monthly list Captions is cheaper. Both figures come from the vendors’ own pricing pages on July 26, 2026. Synthesia Starter includes 10 minutes of video a month, so cheap and sufficient are not the same question here.
Which has the better free plan?
Synthesia, and it is not close. Basic gives 1,200 credits, up to 10 minutes of video a month, 9 AI avatars and 160+ languages, with the Synthesia logo on the output. Captions Free gives basic editing and one caption template with no AI credits and no generative AI features at all.
Can I use Synthesia for TikTok or Shorts?
It supports vertical output, so mechanically yes. But its 10-minute monthly ceiling on Basic and Starter, its editor-plus-guests seat model and its SCORM export are all shaped for organisational video. Posting daily short-form against a 10-minute allowance is the constraint you would hit first.
Does Captions publish an annual price?
Not in what we could read. Its pricing page lists Max at $24.99/month and the Scale tiers at $69.99, $139.99 and $279.99, with the note that features and prices reflect iOS plans only. Synthesia publishes both monthly and yearly rates on every tier.
How many languages does each support?
Synthesia lists 160+ languages and voices on every tier including the free one. Captions does not publish an equivalent language count on its pricing page in what we could read. If localisation is the job, that is a published number against a blank.
One disclosed third option
Disclosure: Kineo publishes this page and is not one of the two tools above. It is a faceless 9:16 Shorts generator — one typed topic in, script, AI voiceover, matched footage and captions out. It has no governance features, no seat model and no SCORM export, so it is not a Synthesia substitute in any sense; it is mentioned because the faceless format is a third answer people often turn out to have wanted.
Make one free →Up to 3 watermarked Fast videos / 24h · No card · Starter $4.90 first month
Other comparisons
Looking to replace one of these rather than choose between them? Synthesia alternatives
Prices, free-tier terms and limits on this page were verified on July 26, 2026 by reading each vendor’s own published pricing page, linked above. They change. Nothing here is an endorsement by, or affiliation with, Captions or Synthesia, and no comparison on this site is paid for or sponsored. Kineo is a product of the same company that publishes this page, which is stated on every comparison whether or not Kineo is one of the tools being judged.