Final Cut Pro just copied Adobe Premiere Pro’s worst feature, and it has me a bit worried about the future of their video editing software.

What feature did Apple copy? Well, they copied the subscription. Yes. Just like how Adobe charges $55 per month for Creative Cloud, Apple recently introduced Final Cut Pro for iPad, and with that new app came a new $5 per month or $50 per year subscription fee to use it. They are copying Adobe, and this might just be the beginning.

Now, I do not want this video to be a bunch of fearmongering, or cause you to freak out and start leaving me angry comments down below, but I do want to take a bit to talk about this subscription and what it could mean in the future for all of us as video editors, regardless of whether you edit in Final Cut or Premiere Pro or DaVinci Resolve or Sony Vegas or even EDIUS. Yes, EDIUS. I have got to say, if you think Apple fanboys are vocal, they have got nothing on EDIUS fanboys. Y’all love your editing software.

How Apple And Blackmagic Make Their Money

Anyways, let’s talk about the potential future, because I want you to be prepared for it as a video editor. Currently, if you want to edit on a desktop, Adobe Creative Cloud is going to cost you 55 bucks per month, while Final Cut and DaVinci Resolve Studio are only a one time $300 payment.

The argument for their pricing being set up this way is that Adobe is not a hardware company. They do not make any physical products they can sell that would help offset the cost of their software, so they choose to charge a subscription for Premiere Pro and After Effects and everything else.

Apple and Blackmagic on the other hand are different, with Apple being one of the wealthiest companies on earth, a company that makes billions upon billions of dollars selling phones and computer hardware, so they can afford to charge significantly less for their editing software. Likewise, Blackmagic is not anywhere even remotely as big as Apple, but they are primarily a hardware company, where they sell cameras and color panels and all sorts of tools for professional video editors.

For many years Blackmagic charged multiple thousands of dollars for DaVinci Resolve, but then eventually, as their cameras became more popular, they dropped the price to $1,000 for the software, then $300, and now oftentimes whenever you purchase one of their cameras they give you the Studio version of the editing software for free. Heck, they even have a free version of DaVinci Resolve that is nearly as full featured as the paid version. It’s awesome! But the cheap price of that editing software is only possible because they are subsidizing the cost of developing the software with the hardware they are selling.

Why Would Apple Charge For A Final Cut Pro Subscription?

So with all this talk about Apple subsidizing software with the cost of their hardware, why do you think they would start charging a subscription specifically for their iPad version of Final Cut Pro? Well, I think there are two reasons, and these are going to tie back into the desktop version of Final Cut in a minute, so stick with me.

First, and what may be most obvious to you, and what you may have already typed in a comment, is that people who use software on iPhones and iPads are significantly more used to paying subscription fees to use apps. Do you remember the good old days whenever you could buy a game like Angry Birds on the App Store for 99 cents? That does not happen anymore. It is becoming more and more rare to be able to buy an app outright. Instead, the vast majority of apps offer you a free trial, and then as soon as you fall in love with the app they hit you with that nominal subscription fee. Sometimes it is a dollar a month, sometimes it is five or ten bucks. It does not matter. Everybody is moving to subscriptions.

So it makes sense, right? Apple sees that people are used to paying for subscriptions on the App Store, so why would they not charge a subscription for Final Cut?

Well, that may be it. But if you think about it, in the grand scheme of things, how much money is Apple actually going to make from people signing up for Final Cut? They make so many billions of dollars per year, they are not going to be making much off five bucks a month from video editors on iPads.

Also, remember how I was just comparing Apple to Blackmagic Design and how they subsidize a lot of the cost of their software with the hardware they sell? Well, Blackmagic actually beat Apple to the punch and released an iPad version of DaVinci Resolve in 2022. And guess what? Blackmagic is charging for this app on the App Store. Is it a monthly subscription like Final Cut on iPad? No. It is free, or if you want the Studio version, it is a one time fee of 95 bucks, because Blackmagic is treating Resolve for iPad just like their desktop software.

The Less Obvious, And Real, Reason Apple Loves Subscriptions

That leads us to the second and slightly less obvious reason Apple may have chosen to start charging a subscription for Final Cut Pro on iPad, and I am betting this is the real reason.

In short, over the past ten years or so, Apple as a company has moved away from their reliance on hardware sales. Remember those hardware sales that help them subsidize the cost of their software and keep it really cheap? Instead, Apple began focusing on a major buzzword that much of their competition was already focusing on. No, the buzzword is not AI or crypto, thank goodness. The buzzword is services, and specifically service revenue.

Basically, Apple realized that instead of selling computers and phones and iPads to people every few years whenever they need to upgrade, it is far better to take a page from the likes of Netflix and charge a monthly subscription fee for various services. Enter the launch of little things like Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, podcast subscriptions, Apple Music, Apple Fitness+, Apple News+ and iCloud+. Ever hear of those? You might even be subscribed to one or two of them. I know I am.

For context, Apple is making over $20 billion a quarter from these services, and they have reported that nearly 1 billion people are subscribed to one of them. So this is a big business. And if you think Apple is just making money selling phones or computers, I am sorry, but that is not the way their business works anymore. They have tasted the forbidden fruit. They want that recurring service revenue from you as a customer, and they are going to get it.

That brings us back to Final Cut on the iPad. In light of the fact that Apple is now so heavily prioritizing services and service revenue, is it really that surprising they would copy Adobe, who has an incredibly lucrative and successful subscription business model with their editing software?

Where This Could Go

So here is where we are right now. As of the time of making this video, if you want Final Cut on the iPad it is five bucks per month or 50 bucks per year. But the door has been opened. It is only open a crack right now, but it is open. And I am betting that depending on how many people sign up for Final Cut Pro on iPad, we as video editors could very easily see Apple begin offering the desktop version of Final Cut Pro as a subscription as well.

Think about it. They already have Apple TV+, News+, iCloud+ and Fitness+. Is it really so hard to imagine a Final Cut Plus? “There is no need for you to spend a lot of money upfront anymore! $300? You do not need to pay that. You only need to pay, what, ten bucks a month or a hundred bucks per year, and you can have Final Cut on your desktop and your iPad. What a deal!”

It makes me want to barf even saying those words. But many of the big tech companies, Apple included, have realized that people are more than happy to pay subscriptions for products, and it may be only a matter of time before we see that with Final Cut too. I mean, it is not like Apple has not made mistakes before with their video editing software. Remember Final Cut Pro X whenever it launched? Yeah, that was not exactly a resounding success loved by the editing industry. It is doing better now though.

Would You Use Final Cut Pro If It Was A Subscription?

So tell me this, would you stick with Final Cut if Apple moved it to a subscription service? Maybe they copy Adobe even more and make a Final Cut Classic that you get to keep as a legacy Final Cut user, just like how Adobe treated CS6, which will not receive any updates anymore but will continue to work as you expect. But if you want updates, you have got to subscribe to Final Cut Plus.

Or, instead of sticking with a Final Cut subscription, would you switch your editing software? I know Adobe will happily take your subscription money, that is obvious. And then there is Blackmagic over there with DaVinci Resolve, still 300 bucks one time, and an iPad app with no subscription fee at all. Let me know what you would choose.

I colored this whole video with my color presets, so if you like the colors here and you want colors like this, you can get them for yourself. I will also throw in my free Edit Videos Like A Pro guide, which will show you some of my biggest tips on how to edit videos better and faster.

If you want to go deeper, I have filmmaking courses here, and here is my full list of filmmaking gear.

Thanks so much for reading, and have a great day!