Which product video do you actually need?
"Product video" covers at least three formats that want different lengths, different budgets, and different tools. Picking the wrong one is the most expensive mistake available here, because you find out after it is made. This page sorts them, then says plainly which one supaintro makes.
The three formats
| Format | Length | Job | Where it goes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Product demo | 2 to 10 minutes | Show the actual workflow, click by click | Sales calls, docs, onboarding, a /demo page |
| Explainer | 60 to 120 seconds | Make an unfamiliar category make sense | Homepage hero, paid social, investor decks |
| Launch film | 30 to 90 seconds | Announce, create appetite, send to a URL | Launch day post, Product Hunt, X, LinkedIn, YouTube pre-roll |
A demo answers "how does it work". An explainer answers "why does this exist". A launch film answers "why should I care today". They are not interchangeable, and a demo used as a launch film is the most common version of this mistake: nobody watches six minutes of screen recording from a company they have not heard of.
How to tell which one you need
- People already understand the category and you want them to try it. Launch film.
- People do not understand the category at all. Explainer first, launch film second.
- Someone is already in a sales conversation and wants to see it work. Demo.
- You are shipping a feature to existing users. Short launch film, or a 30-second clip of the feature.
- You need something on the homepage above the fold. An intro video or launch film. Not a demo.
What each costs to make
| Format | Agency | Freelance | Tools | AI generated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Demo | $5k to $20k | $1k to $5k | Screen recorder, $0 to $40 per month | Screen-capture tools with AI voice-over |
| Explainer | $8k to $40k | $2k to $8k | Template libraries | Prompt-to-video, mixed results |
| Launch film | $10k to $50k | $2k to $8k | Templates, looks templated | supaintro, $59 to $149 per film |
The full breakdown, including where the money goes in an agency quote and what drives the range, is in what a product launch video costs.
What supaintro makes, and what it does not
What it does make is a 60-second motion-graphics launch film built from your real brand and your real copy: your hex codes, your logo, the headline you wrote, product evidence read off your own page, and an end card with your URL. Music is generated for the film from your brand brief, voice-over is synthesised from the approved script, and captions are locked to it frame by frame.
If a launch film is what you need, the detail is on the SaaS launch video page.
Using a launch film as product evidence
A common middle case: you want something that shows the product but is not a demo. The workable version is a launch film that carries product evidence rather than footage. Real numbers from your dashboard as typography. Your actual feature names. A metric you can defend. The film is short, it is on brand, and every claim in it came from your own copy rather than from a stock library.
That is the format supaintro is built for, and it is why the storyboard step shows you verbatim on-screen copy before anything renders. Whether the claims are true is a decision you make while reading the beat sheet, not something you discover in the finished file.
Product video questions
Can AI make a product demo video?
Not the click-by-click kind, at least not well. A demo has to show your real interface doing real things, which means capturing it. Tools that record your screen and add AI voice-over do this properly. AI generation is a good fit for the launch film and explainer end, where the video is composed rather than captured.
How long should a product video be?
Demos run 2 to 10 minutes because completeness matters more than retention: the viewer already wants it. Launch films should be 30 to 90 seconds, because retention is the whole game and nobody asked to watch. Explainers sit at 60 to 120 seconds.
Can supaintro show my product's UI?
It composes product evidence from what it reads on your page and what you write in your notes: feature names, metrics, and copy, treated as designed elements in the film. It does not record or simulate your interface, and it will not invent a UI that does not exist.
Do I need a voice-over?
Every project renders both a music-only cut and a voice-over cut, so you do not have to choose in advance. Silent feeds want the music-only version, your website and YouTube usually want the narrated one.
Brand extraction and the storyboard are free. Read the beat sheet, then decide.