Work offline / with local files
Gabe Michalski
Putting a flag down on this one for the moment: The current design of Descript largely makes full offline support unfeasible in the near term. That said, it will continue to be something that a subset of users would love to have, and we'll keep the door open in case we find any workable solutions down the road.
Adam Schoales
Gabe Michalski With all due respect, this is a genuinely terrible thing to hear.
The app
had
offline support. It worked fine for years. Then it went away. Funnily enough around the same time all the frustrating bloated AI features many of the users dont want or need showed up. Is this why it's not feasible? Because you can't get the AI features to work? Fine, make that known, but I fail to see how the core functionality of "edit your video/audio as text" cannot work offline. Especially when,
again
it worked just fine for years.It's astonishing how far away from the "edit your video/audio as text" premise Descript has gone in recent years. This might just be the nail in the coffin for me to find an alternate platform. And judging by the number of people asking about this feature this so called "subset" if actually quite large.
Z
Zack Herman
Gabe Michalski that's terrible. How is that possible? The files already start on our computer, why not just use the storage you already have instead of forcing us to the cloud? It's crazy that a video editor would be cloud only. This product has really gone downhill.
Michael
Adam Schoales I'm with you on this. I canceled my Descript subscription because I don't appreciate being nickeled and dimed into supporting the AI slop machine. If there were a Descript perpetual offline license that simply didn't support any generative AI features, I would by it RIGHT NOW. But there isn't, because they care about the bottom line more than the customer base.
Gabe Michalski
Adam Schoales The main reason was moving from a Desktop app to a Web app. We moved from no browser support, to having separate Web and Desktop experiences, to today having one unified code base that feeds both Desktop and Web.
This enables projects to be accessed and sync'd much more easily by project members, gives us more tools to prevent data loss, and enables all sorts of file processing tools some of which are AI based.
These moves tend to be towards enabling Team-based usecases, but I understand for a lot of professional creators, solo-freelancers, and other user types these changes just seem like overall downgrades.
AI-tool enablement is definitely also part of these changes, but I wouldn't say it's been the main motivating factor for either our product or engineering teams. For my part, I will continue to surface this feedback in hopes that there is a way to compromise on this as alot of our longest running users fit into the solo creator bucket and we've obviously created some friction.
Gabe Michalski
Merged in a post:
Work wholly locally
Joshua Copperman
I couldn't save to the cloud and lost all my data - would love an option to just work entirely locally, even if that means it takes up more storage space on my laptop.
EDIT: something similar is on the premium version and it's probably a better feature for premium anyway.
J
Jonathan Stern
I agree 100%
Autopilot
Merged in a post:
Offline editing feature!
N
Nicole Daly
I’d love to request that the offline editing feature be brought back to Descript. It was a genuinely valuable part of my workflow - especially when travelling, working in low-signal areas, or trying to stay focused without relying on Wi-Fi. Having the ability to edit projects offline made the platform far more flexible and reliable, and its removal has created real friction for users who depend on Descript in different environments. Restoring this feature would make a huge difference.
Autopilot
Merged in a post:
Why did offline disappear?
Andy Gott
I understand if a feature was never offered, but to offer Offline for so long and then to remove feels quite disrespectful to users. A critical feature for editing on planes, trains, in the car, or even to focus on editing and avoid the distraction of the web. Just not sure why it would be removed?
M
Miles O'Brien
Bring back offline!!
M
Miles O'Brien
Descript used to have an offline capability. I found it very useful, and it was one of the big reasons I chose it, as I do a lot of traveling. Is there a technical reason this was removed, and if so, can the company work to bring it back?
Z
Zack Herman
How is this not a feature?! We have to be connected to the internet to edit videos on our local computer?!
A
Abdallah
Yes please, adding pressure to this.
Cesare Pautasso
Same here. About to get on a long flight, only to discover that I cannot edit offline. This must be a joke.
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