How to Make a Kinetic Typography Video

Plan the kinetic typography script before you animate

Most kinetic type that feels rushed was rushed at the script stage. The fix is simple arithmetic. A calm narrator speaks at roughly 130 to 160 words per minute, which is a little over two words per second. Viewers can read short phrases at about the same pace, so two to three words per second on screen is the ceiling for a phone.

That gives you a word budget before you write a line:

If your script is over budget, cut words rather than speeding up the animation. Then mark the key word in each phrase. Those words get the accent colour and the biggest move, so aim for one key word every two or three screens, not one per screen. If every word is emphasised, none of them is.

Fonts, colour and motion in kinetic type

Kinetic type works because the motion carries meaning. A word that slams down feels heavy, a word that drifts in feels soft. You control five things.

• Typeface. Heavy, condensed sans serifs fill the frame and stay readable when they move. Free options such as Bebas Neue, Anton, Oswald and Montserrat Black are common choices. Use one family and at most two weights.
• Case and size. All caps for punchy pieces, sentence case for calm ones. On a 1080x1920 vertical frame, key words often fill most of the width.
• Colour. White on near black, or black on off white, with one accent for key words. A second accent usually adds noise.
• Motion. Pick two or three moves and repeat them: snap in, scale up on key words, slide out on the cut. Repetition reads as design, a new trick per line reads as random.
• Sound. A voice, a beat, or both. Soft whooshes on the big words help the eye follow the motion.

Kinetic typography prompt to paste into Otto

Adapted from real requests Videotto users sent to Otto. Paste your own script in place of the lines, keeping one phrase per line.

Make a 30 second kinetic typography video, vertical 9:16.
Script, one line per screen:
[line one]
[line two]
[line three]
Bold kinetic typography: one heavy condensed typeface, all caps, white on near black.
Key words in one accent colour (orange) and scaled up when they land.
Time every line to the voiceover. Use a calm, confident AI voice to read the script.
Subtle whooshes on the big words, light music under the voice.
No footage, no stock clips. Hold the last line for two seconds.

Shorter kinetic typography prompts

• "Turn this paragraph into bold kinetic typography, one phrase at a time."
• "Make the words hit on every beat of the music."
• "White text on black, the key word in red, nothing else on screen."
• "Same script, but make it feel calm and slow instead of punchy."

Steps to build and check the animation

Once the script fits the budget, the build itself is short.

1. Pick the format. 9:16 (1080x1920) for Shorts, Reels and TikTok, 1:1 (1080x1080) for feeds, 16:9 (1920x1080) for YouTube. Say the length you want.
2. Choose the voice or the beat. Upload your voiceover, ask for an AI voice to read the script, or ask for music with a clear beat if there is no narration.
3. Describe the motion. Name your two or three moves and the accent colour in the prompt, so they stay consistent across every screen.
4. Watch it twice. Once with sound, once muted. Read each phrase out loud as it appears. If you cannot finish it before it leaves, give it more time or fewer words.
5. Fix with short follow ups. "Slow down line four", "make the last word bigger", "less whoosh". Small, specific requests beat a full redo.

Worked example: a 30 second kinetic typography script

This is an illustration, not a real client project. Say a small coffee roaster wants a launch line for a new decaf. The script is only 21 words, far under the 60 to 70 word budget for 30 seconds, because punchy launch lines need long holds between hits.

Only three words get the accent colour: "3PM", "ZERO" and the product name. The voice reads each line a beat before the next one appears, so the eye never chases the ear. The first draft comes from one prompt, and the edits are follow ups such as "hold ZERO half a second longer".

Common mistakes show up clearly in an example like this. Whole sentences on screen turn motion into reading homework. Mixing three fonts makes the piece look like a template collage. And music that sits too loud under the voice makes viewers switch to reading only, which defeats the point of timing the two together.

Kinetic typography tools compared

People usually weigh three manual routes against a prompt. Times below are typical estimates for a 30 second piece, not measured results, and they vary a lot with experience.

Templates are quick but they shape your script to fit them. Keyframing in After Effects gives exact control but takes the longest. A prompt sits in between: you describe the timing you want and fix it with follow ups.

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