The deciding factor is steady volume. An in house editor pays off when there is enough editing to keep one person busy every week, all year, and when having them in the room matters: on shoots, in planning meetings, turning around same day changes. If your volume rises and falls with launches and seasons, or you need a mix of podcast, ads and short form that one hire rarely covers well, outsourcing gives you the output without carrying a salary through the slow months.
When does an in house editor make sense?
Hire when the work is constant and the role is clear. A brand shooting a weekly YouTube show, cutting daily short form from it and running paid social tests can fill an editor's week without trying. At that point the backlog costs you more than the salary.
In house also wins when the editor needs context you cannot write down. They sit in on the strategy call, hear why the founder hates a certain shot, and know the product well enough to pick b roll without a shot list. That knowledge builds over time.
The catch is everything around the hire. You need a workstation that handles 4K footage, software licences, storage, a backup plan, and someone who can manage creative work and give useful notes. If nobody on your team has edited, you will struggle to judge their output or know when a request is unreasonable.
An editor with nothing to edit is a cost, and a backlog with no editor is a cost too. Pick the one your volume can carry.
When is outsourcing the better call?
Outsource when volume swings. Most of the brands we edit for have a heavy month around a launch or event and a lighter month after. Paying for editing as you use it fits that pattern better than a fixed salary.
It also fits when you need range. A podcast editor and an ad editor think differently: one cares about pacing a long conversation, the other about the hook in the first two seconds and a clean call to action. One hire rarely does both at the level you want.
The common complaint about outsourcing is inconsistency: a new editor every project, explaining your brand again each time. Fix that by insisting on the same editor on every request. Crispy Edits is built that way, one dedicated editor per customer, because consistency is what makes outsourced editing feel in house.
What does each option cost beyond the obvious?
Do not compare a salary to a project quote and call it done. An in house hire carries recruiting time, benefits, equipment, software, storage, training, and the weeks it takes them to learn your style. They also cost the same whether you shipped ten videos that month or two.
Outsourced editing cost is driven by video length, footage volume, turnaround speed, revision rounds and graphics. When you compare offers, ask what a revision round includes, how fast drafts come back, and whether you get the same editor each time. Two quotes that look alike can differ a lot once revisions and rush turnaround are counted.
To size it, estimate your monthly editing hours. From our experience a short form reel takes 1 to 2 hours, a podcast episode 4 to 6, and a long form YouTube video 6 to 10, with footage volume, graphics and revisions moving the number. If your total sits well under a full working month, a full time hire will spend part of every week idle.
Count your editing hours before you count salaries.
How do you test outsourcing before you commit?
Run a trial on real work, not a test clip. Send a full month of what you publish, with a written brief, brand assets, reference videos and raw footage organised into folders. Judge the drafts against what you would accept from staff.
Watch the process as closely as the cut. Notes should go in as time coded comments, for example in Frame.io, so "tighten the intro" becomes "cut from 0:04 to 0:09". Check whether the second round fixes everything from the first, and whether the editor starts anticipating your preferences by the third week.
If your outsourced hours keep filling a full working week for several months, that is your signal to hire. By then you will also have a brief, a style guide and a library of approved edits, which makes onboarding an in house editor far faster.
Count the editing hours you need each month. If they fill a full time week every week and you can manage creative work, hire; if not, outsource to one consistent editor and revisit when the volume stays high.
