Best ChatGPT Plugins for Creating Videos [2026]

ChatGPT's plugin directory has no video category. Every video plugin worth installing, sorted by the job it does, with verified 2026 vendor pricing.

Per Harald Borgen

Per Harald Borgen

— 10 min read
Best ChatGPT Plugins for Creating Videos [2026]

ChatGPT's plugin directory has no video category. Video plugins are scattered across Creativity and Productivity, and most only surface if you already know the name to type. Which one is best depends on the job you have: generating footage from a prompt, turning a brief into a produced narrated video, explaining something as a walkthrough, or working on video you already have. This guide covers the plugins that surface when you search the directory for video, what each does, what it costs on the vendor's side rather than OpenAI's, and how to install one.

Scrimba publishes this article and makes one of the plugins in it. Scrimba Explain is listed in the directory as Explain Video Generator. It appears below under the job it does, third of the four jobs covered, and the plugins that beat it at the other three are named with their prices.

How Do ChatGPT Plugins Actually Work?

A plugin is an installable package that connects ChatGPT to an outside service. You find it in the directory, connect your account once, then call it by name in a chat.

The vocabulary is worth getting right, because most published advice is out of date twice over. The original 2023 plugins were retired. Their replacement was called apps. Then on 9 July 2026 OpenAI migrated the App directory to the Plugin directory, making plugin the primary term again with a new meaning: a plugin can contain skills, apps, and app templates, while an app is still the integration reaching external data and actions.

Underneath sits a set of skills plus an optional MCP server carrying tools and interface elements. That is the same Model Context Protocol coding agents use, which is why several video vendors run one server for ChatGPT, Claude, and developer tooling alike.

Installing one takes three steps:

  1. Open the directory at chatgpt.com/plugins, or reach it from Settings or the sidebar.
  2. Select the plugin, click Connect, and complete the vendor sign-in.
  3. Back in a chat, type @ and the plugin name, or pick it from the plus menu.

OpenAI's wording is that select plugins are available in all plans, Free through Enterprise, and that some plugins require a paid plan. Business workspaces have them on by default. Enterprise and Edu have them off until an admin says otherwise.

Discovery is the catch, and OpenAI's developer documentation states it plainly:

Plugins appear on the directory's main pages only if OpenAI selects them for enhanced distribution.

Everything else is found by searching, across fourteen browse sections, none of them video. Publishing is still gated: OpenAI requires a verified individual or business identity and runs automated scans or manual reviews first. A useful floor, not a quality guarantee.

Every Video Plugin in ChatGPT's Directory

Pricing below is the vendor's own, checked against their plan pages in August 2026.

Plugin, as listed Made by The job it does Input Free tier Cheapest paid
Runway Runway Generate footage Prompt or image 125 one time credits $12 a month, yearly
PixVerse PixVerse Generate footage Prompt or image 60 credits daily Not published
AI Video Maker InfoseekAI Generate footage Prompt None Usage based, no rate card
VEED Video Generator VEED Generate and edit Prompt or upload Watermarked, 720p only $12 per user a month, yearly
Visla Video Maker Visla Brief to narrated video Script, PDF, deck, webpage 2,000 credits a month, watermarked $15 a month, annually
invideo invideo Brief to narrated video Prompt Limited credits, weekly reset $17 a month, yearly
Genra Video Editor RAMA ALPACA N4 Brief to narrated video Prompt 40 credits, no watermark $10 for 240 credits
VideoZero VideoZero Technologies Narrated explainer Prompt Free forever, overlay $5 a month
Explain Video Generator Scrimba Narrated explainer Topic, document, webpage, codebase Free during open beta Nothing announced
Descript Descript Edit existing video A recording Yes, limited hours $16 a month, yearly
Yaps Video Captions Yaps Captions on existing video A video file Android only $12 a month, annually

Generate Footage From a Prompt

This is the job most people mean by ChatGPT video generator: you describe a shot that was never filmed and a model invents it frame by frame. Scrimba's guide to how text to video actually works covers the mechanics, and its AI video generator roundup covers the tools with no ChatGPT presence.

Runway, listed as "Generate videos", is the best known name in the directory and the easiest to budget for, because it publishes what a credit buys. Free is 125 one time credits, and Standard is $15 a month, or $12 billed yearly.

PixVerse, listed as "Create AI media with PixVerse", runs its own models for text and image to video plus clip level work like extending, restyling, and lip sync. Registered users get 60 credits refreshed daily. It publishes no consumer pricing page at all: the API rate card is public, the subscription tiers are not.

AI Video Maker, listed as "Make videos from a text prompt", comes from InfoseekAI and generates short form video, optionally steered by a reference image, video, or audio. Its page says pricing is usage based and depends on resolution and duration. No rate card exists anywhere on the site.

VEED Video Generator, listed as "Generate videos with AI", pairs generation with a real editor. The free plan stamps a corner watermark and exports at 720p, and VEED warns the watermark goes in at export, so upgrading later will not clean a file you already downloaded. Creator is $12 per user a month, billed yearly as $147.

Output across all four is measured in seconds, most generations get discarded, and every discarded one is still billed.

Turn a Brief Into a Finished Video

Here you already know what the video should say. You want a produced, narrated result rather than raw footage, and the chat is where the script gets settled.

Visla Video Maker, listed as "Narrated Video Maker", documents its flow better than anyone else, which makes it the clearest picture of how a plugin behaves: connect and sign in to a Visla account, add it to the chat, describe an idea, revise the script by talking to ChatGPT, then click Generate video and pick the project up in Visla. It starts from a script, a PDF, a slide deck, or a webpage. Free gives 2,000 credits a month with a Visla watermark, and Pro is $15 a month billed annually, or $18 monthly.

Visla publishes the number that makes credit systems legible. Text based video costs about 200 credits a minute. AI generative costs about 2,100. The same allowance is ten minutes of one or under a minute of the other, which is why free tiers feel generous in a demo and thin by the end of a week.

invideo, listed as "Create videos of any length", answers to @invideo and writes a script, generates visuals, and adds voiceover and subtitles in one pass. Its free plan needs no card and resets weekly on Monday, and Plus is $17 a month, billed at $200 yearly, for 75 credits. invideo names the trap itself: a separate invideo plan is required for watermark free exports.

Genra Video Editor, listed as "Turn ideas into videos.", is the only tool here without a subscription. Credits come as one time modules running 30 days, from 240 credits at $10, and new accounts get 40 free credits and watermark free exports.

Explain Something as a Narrated Walkthrough

This job starts somewhere different. The two above assume you already know what the video should say, and the tool's work is production. Here the tool's work is the explanation, and the video is only how it arrives. The use cases are onboarding, documentation, and studying.

VideoZero, listed as "Visualize, Animate, Explain", is built for exactly that and aims at education, turning a prompt into a narrated 2D animation rather than footage. Its free plan is candid: always free, commercial use included, but an overlay on the output and 5 MB of storage. Starter at $5 a month drops the overlay and adds automated narration, with 20 credits worth roughly ten generations. One wrinkle it publishes itself: the official plugin works normally, while wiring VideoZero up as a custom connector needs a paid ChatGPT plan.

Scrimba Explain, listed as Explain Video Generator under the tagline "Create free explainer videos", is the plugin Scrimba makes. It turns a topic, a document, a webpage, a codebase, or a product brief into a narrated video with voiceover, diagrams, animations, and code walkthroughs, watchable inline in the chat or shareable by link. Access takes two steps, a free Scrimba account and then the plugin. It runs in ChatGPT, in Claude Code, and in any agent that speaks MCP, and it is free during open beta.

What it is not matters as much. No avatars, no stock footage, no brand templates, so it is not an alternative to a marketing video tool, and it does not invent footage from a prompt the way Runway or PixVerse do. Scrimba's FAQ says it can make mistakes, so anything important should be double checked. Scrimba's guide to using Explain covers what makes a good question to ask it.

Work on Video You Already Have

The plugins that survive in a real workflow are usually the least glamorous. The video already exists and needs cutting, captioning, or stripping down.

Descript, listed as "Edit video by chatting", is still the reference tool for editing a recording as though it were text. A free plan exists with limited media hours, and Hobbyist is $16 a month billed yearly, or $24 monthly.

The Yaps family goes the other way, shipping four single purpose plugins instead of one general one:

  • Yaps Video Captions burns styled, word aligned captions into a new file rather than handing back a sidecar
  • Yaps Video Clipping detects speech and cuts dead air out of talking head footage
  • Yaps Subtitle Generator produces a timed SRT file from video or audio
  • Yaps Video to Audio extracts the audio track to MP3, WAV, or M4A

Cheap and precise, with one condition that decides whether they work for you at all: each is a front end onto an installed Yaps desktop engine, needing a local install, a signed in account, and FFmpeg. Yaps states plainly that ChatGPT web and cloud sessions cannot reach it. Its free tier is Android only, and Pro is $15 a month, or $12 billed annually.

HeyGen, listed as "Create AI videos", is in the directory too, but belongs to the avatar category.

What a ChatGPT Plugin Cannot Do for You

Installing a plugin changes where you type, not who does the work or who bills you.

  • The plugin is a remote control. Rendering, quotas, and billing happen on the vendor's account, so a ChatGPT subscription buys none of it.
  • Almost every plugin here needs a vendor account connected before it does anything.
  • Connecting discloses what data is shared before you agree, and a connected plugin then sees relevant conversation context.
  • Voice mode does not support apps, so this is a typing workflow.
  • Free tiers belong to the vendor, not to OpenAI. Scrimba's audit of free AI video generators covers what each one quietly withholds.
  • The finished video usually lands in the vendor's app, not in your chat.

Which Video Plugin Should You Install?

Pick the job first, then the plugin. The four jobs use different technology, and a tool that is excellent at one is usually poor at the others.

  1. Footage that does not exist and cannot be filmed. Runway for published credit costs you can budget against, VEED for an editor attached to the generator.
  2. A brief, a script, or a document that has to become a narrated video. Visla if the source is a PDF or a deck, invideo for length, Genra if you would rather buy credits once than hold a subscription.
  3. Someone needs to understand something. A narrated explainer tool: VideoZero for animated educational material, or the explainer option above when the source is a document or a codebase.
  4. A recording that needs cutting, captions, or its audio pulled out. Descript for anything with a spoken track, or the single purpose utilities if you work on the desktop.
  5. You are not sure yet. Connect the free tier in the right job rather than the best known plugin in the wrong one.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can ChatGPT create videos on its own?

No. ChatGPT generates text and images natively, but video comes from third party plugins connected to outside services. The plugin settles the script inside the chat, then the vendor renders the video on its own infrastructure and bills your account with them, not your ChatGPT subscription.

How do I install a video plugin in ChatGPT?

Open the plugin directory at chatgpt.com/plugins, or reach it from Settings or the sidebar. Select the plugin, click Connect, and complete the vendor sign-in. Back in a chat, type an @ mention with the plugin name, or pick it from the plus menu, then describe the video you want.

Are ChatGPT video plugins free?

Some are, with limits set by the vendor rather than OpenAI. VideoZero and Genra offer free tiers, Visla and VEED are free with watermarks, and invideo resets a small credit allowance weekly. Runway gives 125 one time credits, and free output is commonly resolution capped.

Why is there no video category in the ChatGPT plugin directory?

The directory has fourteen browse sections and video is not one of them, so video plugins sit mostly under Creativity and Productivity. OpenAI also states that plugins reach the directory's main pages only when it selects them for enhanced distribution, so most are found by searching the plugin name.

What is Explain Video Generator?

It is the ChatGPT directory listing for Scrimba Explain, tagged "Create free explainer videos". It turns a topic, document, webpage, codebase, or product brief into a narrated video with voiceover, diagrams, animations, and code walkthroughs. It runs in ChatGPT, Claude Code, and any MCP agent, and is free during open beta.

Key Takeaways

  • The right video plugin depends on the job, not a ranking: generate footage from a prompt, turn a brief into a produced video, explain something as a narrated walkthrough, or edit video you already have.
  • The terminology changed on 9 July 2026, when OpenAI migrated the App directory to the Plugin directory and made plugin the primary term again.
  • There is no video category. Fourteen browse sections exist and none is video, and plugins reach the main pages only through enhanced distribution, so most are found by name.
  • A ChatGPT subscription buys none of the rendering. Credits, quotas, watermarks, and billing sit with the vendor.
  • Read the export terms before the feature list. VEED bakes its watermark in at export, invideo needs a separate paid plan for clean files, and the Yaps utilities will not run from a cloud chat session.

Sources

All vendor and documentation pages accessed August 2026.

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