How to make a product launch video for X

A product launch video for X is not a trailer for your website. It plays muted, at phone size, between a meme and a hot take, and it has about as long as a thumb takes to move to decide whether anyone watches it. Everything below follows from that.

1. Write the line before the script

Every launch video that works can be summed up in one sentence. Cognition’s was “the first AI software engineer”. Antseed’s was “what BitTorrent did for files, we want to do for AI inference”. If you cannot write yours in one sentence, the video will not find it for you.

Test the line by saying it out loud to someone outside your company. If they ask a follow up question, you are close. If they nod politely, keep going.

2. Design the first frame like a headline

Most people in the feed see one frame and the post copy. That frame needs to read at phone size with the sound off. Three openings that work:

• The output. Sora’s launch post opens on a generated scene. No logo, no UI.
• The blank state. bolt.new starts on an empty prompt box, so you want to see what happens next.
• The answer to the doubt. Figure opened on a title card that said “film speed 1.0x” before showing the robot.

You can see all of them in our annotated gallery of AI launch videos on X.

3. Capture the product clean

Real product footage is the proof, so treat it like a shoot:

• A fresh account with realistic data, not “test test 123”.
• Text sized for a phone, which usually means zooming the UI well past what feels normal on a laptop.
• One task from start to finish, recorded at real speed. Speed up the boring parts and label it if you do.

This is where AI tools earn their place: cleanup, motion, generated b roll, voice, and quick variants of the same cut.

4. Cut for a muted feed

• Burn in captions. Do not rely on auto captions.
• Put text on screen for anything the viewer must understand.
• Keep the hero cut as short as the line allows. For most AI products that is somewhere between 30 and 90 seconds. Our note on launch video length and specs for X goes deeper.

5. Make the cutdowns now, not later

Launch day is one post. Launch week is many. While the edit is open, cut:

• a short version of the hook for replies and quote posts,
• a single feature clip per follow up post,
• a version with a different first frame for ads.

6. Write the post and the video together

The post copy and the video are one piece. The copy carries the line and the proof points; the video shows them. Devin’s post put three proof points in text, so the video did not need to say them out loud.

7. Plan the launch, not just the upload

A great video posted at the wrong time, from the wrong account, with nobody ready to share it, is a great video nobody sees. Decide who posts (founder or brand), when, and who will quote it in the first hour. This is the part we handle on the launch side: send us your brief and we plan the video and the launch together.