How to Make a Product Launch Video in One Evening (Script, Timing and Sizes)

To make a product launch video in one evening, keep it to 30 seconds and build it from seven beats in order: hook, problem, promise, screen one, screen two, proof and ask. Write the script first in a timed table, build it as motion graphics (big type over your actual screens), and caption every line, because feed video often starts on mute. Render a 16:9 master for your homepage and Product Hunt, then a 9:16 cut for Reels and Shorts. Four to five focused hours is realistic if the product already has screens worth showing.

This is for founders and solo marketers launching in one to three days with no designer and no editor. With a week and a budget, a freelance motion designer will beat anything here. This guide is for when you have neither.

Oakgen is our product, and Oakgen Motion is one way to build the video; there's also a section on doing it in an ordinary editor.

The short version

How this was put together: researched on October 22, 2026, from Product Hunt's help docs and launch guide, LinkedIn's video ads page and YouTube's help pages. Channel lengths are our recommendations unless a source is linked. The storyboard is a fictional example, not a customer.

What to prepare before you open any tool

Most launch videos go wrong before editing starts. Give this half an hour. Skip it and you'll end up rewriting the script inside the editor.

The one-line promise. One sentence that names who it's for and what changes for them. A useful shape: your product helps a specific person get an outcome without the annoying part, as in "Tallybird (a made-up product we use below) helps freelancers get paid without writing the awkward email." If you can't write it in under 15 words, the video won't fix that.

Three screens, maximum. Pick the moments that prove the promise: the input, the product doing its thing, and the result. Capture them with realistic but fake data (no real customer names, emails or invoices). Hide the browser chrome, close the notification badges, and crop to the part that matters. A screen with 40 elements on it reads as noise at phone size.

One piece of proof. Whichever you actually have: a number you can stand behind, a short quote from a beta user who agreed to be quoted, an integration, or a before-and-after inside the product. If you have none yet, the result screen is your proof. Don't invent a stat.

The ask. One action, such as "Try it free at yourdomain.com". Also gather your logo and two brand colours.

If the product is half-built. You can still make the video. Show less of the product, and only what works today. One complete path from input to result beats five half-working features. Cropping out an unfinished sidebar is honest; presenting a Figma mock as the product is not. Give the problem and promise beats an extra second or two, label the closing card "Early access" or "Beta", and if people can't use it yet, make the ask "Join the waitlist".

The launch video script template

This is the part to copy. Fill in the on-screen and voice columns for your product, then read the voice lines aloud with a timer. If it runs long, cut words rather than talking faster.

The product doesn't appear until second seven, so the opening works for strangers. And there are only three screens (two plus the result), which is the hardest cut to make.

Example: a 30-second storyboard for a fictional SaaS

Tallybird is invented to show the template filled in. It is not a customer or a real product. It chases unpaid invoices for freelancers.

That's under 40 spoken words, with room to breathe, and no "we're excited to announce".

Launch video length by channel

These are recommendations from the Oakgen Team, not platform limits, except where a source is linked.

For Product Hunt, as of October 2026 its help docs (the page shows May 28, 2025) say only YouTube links are supported, the video must not be set to private, and you need the full URL, not a shortened one. The same page recommends 1270x760 gallery images and a 240x240 thumbnail. Product Hunt's launch guide says videos "can help depending on what your product is, but aren't always necessary", and suggests that without a budget for a high-end video you "consider doing a quick demo with a video tool (e.g. Loom)."

Voiceover or not: a decision rule

Work through these in order and stop at the first yes.

1. Can a stranger understand each screen in about three seconds without being told what it is? Skip the voice. Use on-screen text and music. Consumer apps and visual tools often land here.
2. Does the value depend on a sentence of reasoning ("it reconciles your ledgers so month-end takes an hour")? Use a voice. B2B, developer tools and anything abstract usually land here.
3. Will most people see it in a feed rather than on your homepage? Then the voice is a bonus, not the carrier, and every spoken line also needs to be on screen.

Your own voice, recorded in a quiet room, feels personal; a clean synthetic voice is fine if your only room has an echo. Either way, read every line aloud first.

Captions and silent autoplay

Design for sound off. Every spoken line should appear on screen, either as captions or as the kinetic type itself; if the type already says what the voice says, separate captions may be redundant. Size everything for a phone: if you can't read a label at arm's length, it's too small, which is why full-screen screenshots rarely survive and cropping matters.

In 9:16, keep text away from the edges. Most feed apps draw their own buttons and post text over vertical video, so keep words and the key part of each screen near the middle. Hold each line long enough to read. If a line is up for half a second, most people won't finish reading it.

Before you publish, watch every file muted, on your phone. Do this check; it is the cheapest one.

If you build it in an editor instead

Any timeline editor can make this video. Capture screens at 2x resolution (a retina display or browser zoom does it) so crops and zooms stay sharp. Keep text large, a size you can read on a phone without squinting. Export the 16:9 master first, then make the 9:16 version by re-laying out each scene for a tall frame (type stacked, screen cropped to its key area), not by cropping the 16:9 frame, which cuts off half your words.

One warning on music: use a track you hold a licence for. YouTube's Content ID can claim videos with copyrighted music, and its help pages say that, depending on the rights holder's policy, a video using claimed music may be muted or unavailable.

Mistakes that sink launch videos

• Opening with the logo. Nobody knows it yet. Open with the viewer's problem.
• Showing every feature. Ten features at two seconds each means none registers. Three cropped screens.
• Fake proof. An invented user count or a mocked screen presented as live. It's the fastest way to lose a launch-day comment thread.
• No silent version. A voice-led video with no on-screen text becomes 30 seconds of moving shapes in a muted feed.
• Two asks. "Sign up, follow us, and upvote" is three asks. Pick one.
• Polishing at 11pm. A fourth font swap isn't making it better. Keep your stop times.
• Uploading at the last minute. A private video or a shortened link won't load in your Product Hunt gallery. Upload the night before and test the link in a logged-out window.

The one-evening schedule

This plan assumes a 6pm start and a working product. Print it and keep it next to the script template. The stop times are the point.

By hand, the 7:30 to 9:30 block is where the evening slips: keyframing type, lining text up with a voice and re-exporting after every typo.

How to make the launch video in Oakgen Motion

1. Describe the video. Choose "Describe your video" and write the brief (20 to 600 characters): who it's for, the promise, the proof and the ask. Set "Kind of video" to Announcement or Promo and Length to 30 seconds, which is a target; the script and voice set the real length.

2. Brand from your site. Paste your website and Motion reads your name, logo, colours and up to three product shots, free. If the site isn't live, add the name, an optional logo and two colours by hand.

3. Pick the look. Use Bold kinetic type, the launch look: "Big words that move on the beat, your screens, and a voice that explains." It maps onto the seven-beat template almost directly. Once you pick it, the look plays live with your brand before you've made anything: your name opens it, your tagline appears if it fits, and your colours, logo and call to action close it. The other lines are neutral, and it's silent and doesn't use your screens. More on the style in kinetic typography without After Effects.

4. Add your screens and sizes. Upload up to eight screens or product shots (PNG or JPG), each with a note of up to 80 characters saying what it shows. Turn voiceover on or off and pick a voice (Jessica, Brian or Alice; you can hear each one before choosing); word-by-word captions need the voiceover. For sound, pick a new track made to fit the cuts (it's made after you press Make video, so there's no sample to hear first), your own MP3 or WAV, or none. Then pick sizes: 16:9 Wide (1920x1080), 9:16 Phone (1080x1920), or both. Pick both here if you want both at the end; each extra size adds to the render.

5. Review the free storyboard. It's a real playable preview. Edit words and spoken lines, change a scene's design, redo, reorder or delete scenes, or re-plan from the brief. Planning and previews use free tries, 60 a day, which reset at midnight UTC.

6. See the price, then approve. The exact price in credits shows at the top of the storyboard and on the Make video button itself, with a rough dollar figure under the button. Pressing it is your approval, and nothing is charged before that. If a change moves the price, you approve again. Free accounts have no credits, so rendering needs credits; see pricing.

7. Check the draft. It usually renders in a few minutes, and you can leave the page; the studio tells you when it's ready. Watch it muted on your phone; words and scene order are still free to change, but length is locked.

8. Download the final MP4. When it's right, press Finish to make the final files (no credits). The final screen offers the sizes you picked in step 4: "Download all sizes" fetches one size per press, at 1080p, and 720p (where it's offered) is under More options. Motion doesn't post for you: upload the 16:9 file to YouTube and post the 9:16 file yourself. For a genuinely shorter vertical cut, plan it as its own 15-second video.

If you stop a render partway, finished shots stay charged and the unfinished part goes back to your balance.

What Motion is not

Motion videos made this way contain no AI-generated footage. They are type, your screens and product shots, graphics, voice and music, rendered from HTML, which is why text stays sharp and editable up to approval. There's no camera involved.

Use something else when:

• The founder's face is the story. A 20-second phone clip of you to camera will do more than any motion graphic. Pair the two.
• The product needs a real walkthrough. For a dense workflow, a narrated screen recording serves people who've decided to look closer.
• You need generated scenes or cinematic shots. That's a job for an AI video generator.
• You need more than 60 seconds or 4K. Motion's range is 15 to 60 seconds.

After launch day: reuse what you made

The seven beats map onto a seven-slide carousel for LinkedIn or Instagram; the guide to recreating a carousel that already works shows how to borrow a proven structure and fill it with your launch. A short audio sting on the closing logo helps a series of launch videos feel like one brand, as covered in the sonic logo guide. For product images, ad variants and social assets, see building an AI product launch kit, and for a longer teaching-led video later, how to create animated explainer videos.

Frequently asked questions

How long should a product launch video be?

Thirty seconds is a safe master length for most launches. Cut a 15 to 20 second version for vertical feeds, and save 60 seconds for a click-to-play homepage video.

What video format does Product Hunt accept?

As of October 2026, Product Hunt's help docs say only YouTube links are supported for video. The video must not be private, and the link must be the full URL.

Do I need a voiceover for a launch video?

Only if the product needs a spoken sentence to make sense. Caption it either way, because feed video often starts muted.

Can I make a launch video if my product isn't finished?

Yes. Show the one flow that works end to end, crop away unfinished parts, and never show a feature that doesn't exist yet.

Is a quick screen recording good enough for a launch video?

Often, yes. Product Hunt's own launch guide suggests a quick demo with a tool like Loom if you don't have a budget for a high-end video.

Should I make one video or a separate one for each channel?

Write one script and make two masters: 16:9 for your homepage, YouTube and Product Hunt, and 9:16 for Reels, Shorts and TikTok.