How to Remove Ums and Filler Words From a Video

To take an um out of a video, split the clip just before it and again just before the next word, delete the piece, and listen to check that the words on either side are still whole. Captions or a transcript make this much easier, because you can read the ums instead of listening for each one. Cut the ums and uhs, and be choosier with word fillers like “like” and “you know,” which sometimes carry meaning.

Two Kinds of Filler

Sound fillers are the noises you make while your brain catches up, such as um, uh, er and hmm. They almost never mean anything, so they’re safe to cut wherever they turn up. Then there are word fillers, real words used as padding, such as so, like, basically, actually, you know and kind of. The same word can be padding in one sentence and doing real work in the next. “It was, like, fine” loses nothing without its like. Take the like out of “it looked like rain” and the sentence breaks. Judge each word filler by ear, one at a time.

Cutting Them Out by Hand

If your editor can show auto captions or a transcript, turn them on and read through for each um. Without that, listen with headphones at normal speed. An um is easy to hear but often hard to spot in the sound wave, since it’s about as loud as the words around it.

• Split at the end of the word before the um.
• Make a second split just before the next real word starts.
• Delete the piece and play the cut. If the next word starts partway through its first sound, move the second split a frame or two earlier.

Leave a sliver of breath around each cut. Cutting tight against the next word makes you sound rushed, and it can take the first sound of that word with it. People who’ve used automatic filler removers describe the tool “deleting actual words out of the hook,” so whichever way you clean up, listen closely to your opening sentence afterward.

Do You Have to Remove Every Um?

Usually not. One um in a relaxed, chatty video sounds like a person talking. A run of them is what makes a video feel unprepared, and so does an um before your first word. Clear your opening line completely, along with any stretch where fillers bunch up. A stray um elsewhere can stay if cutting it leaves the line sounding clipped.

The cleanest fix happens before you edit. When you lose your thought, close your mouth and pause instead of saying um. Silence is far easier to cut than a sound, and if you leave it in, it reads as thinking. There’s more on trimming those gaps in how to remove pauses.

What Picado Takes Out

Picado edits videos of one person talking to the camera, and this cleanup is part of every edit. Upload your take and it cuts um and uh, along with restarts and long pauses, then adds captions.

On the review page your words appear with every cut crossed out, so you can check that no real word went out with a filler. Tap a crossed-out part to bring it back. If a “like” or “so” is still there and bothers you, tap it to take it out. Picado never rewords what you said or adds words of its own.

How It Works walks through each step, and the FAQ answers questions about limits, captions and privacy.

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