5 Free Ways to Remove Video Background without Green Screens

Generally, video background removal is associated with green screens and a video editing effect called chroma key. However, not all videos are filmed with a green screen or any other single-colored background. In this post, I will show you 5 free ways to remove background from videos without a green screen. 

You don’t need professional programs or skills. You can easily remove or change any video background with a free service or app. Sounds great? Keep reading to learn how. 

Remove Video Background Online

After some research, I have found a free online tool that can remove and replace the background with one click without opening the PS. The tool is called “Unscreen“, a 100% fully automatic and free online tool to remove the background of the video.

You can remove the background by uploading the file. For the main part, you can choose to make the background transparent or add another video, picture, or a single color as the new video background. You can upload a video or GIF file. Supported file formats include MP4, webm, ogg, mov, and gif.

Once the video file is uploaded, you just wait and see. Unscreen will do its work. When the background is removed, you can leave it as transparent or upload another video or gif as the new background. Unscreen also provides some example videos, image, and gifs for you to choose.

The website provides several examples of animation behind the scenes, you can drag left and right to see the effect.

Unscreen offers a paid Pro plan that supports Full HD resolution, full video length, no watermark, and download video formats. Free users can only export GIF, animated PNG and Single Frames.

Another downside of Unscreen is also obvious. Since Unscreen has no other configuration options, it may not achieve good results for some videos. The simpler the video background, the better result.

Remove Video Background with Kapwing Free

Kapwing is another free web service that allows you to remove background in just a few clicks and replace it with an image or video if needed. It works for any video from a storage drive and online public videos of your choosing. It does not require a green screen, but it works best for videos with solid colors like green screens, blue sky, or black backgrounds.

Compared to Unscreen, Kapwing’s Remove Background tool allows you to upload longer videos and export the edited video as MP4 for free. It is also easy to use but with a little more options to control.

Once you get to the Kapwing Video Editor tool, you can upload your video. Then you can click on the Effect and select “Remove Background”. In a short while, you can see the video with a transparent background. You can also adjust the threshold. Of course, you can also add a new video or image as the new background for your video.

The free version is good enough to use and worth trying to remove the video background. However, the accuracy is not as good as Unscreen.

CapCut Online Video Editor

These 2 online background removal tools are fast and convenient, but the result is not very well and with limitations. If you want a free tool to automatically remove background from videos more accurately, you should try CapCut Online Video Editor.

Developed by ByteDance company (TikTok), CapCut allows you to remove background from video with or without green screens. The result is much better than Unscreen and Kapwing. Let me show you how it works step by step.

Step 1. Open your web browser and navigate to CapCut Online Video Editor page.

Step 2. Click the Plus icon to upload the video that you want to remove the background from.

Step 3. If you only want to remove the video background from a part of the video you uploaded, you can click the Split icon or press Ctrl+ B.

Step 4. Click to select the video part for background removal and click “Smart Tools” from the right middle.

Step 5. Select “Cutout” and toggle on the Cutout option.

Step 6. Add another video or image as the background if needed. Then Click Export to export the edited video. You will need to create a free account to export the video.

You can export the video in MP4 or MOV and up to 1080P quality no matter how long the video is. It is completely free to use and has no limitations.

Use Capcut App to Remove Video Background

For even better results, you can also use the Capcut app for Windows, Mac, Android, or iOS. You can free download it from the corresponding app store or its official site. There is a little different using the CapCut app, and you can refer to the steps below to replace a video background.

1. ‌Download the latest version of CapCut from Google Play Store or AppStore. Open it and create a New Project.
2. ‌Import a video or photo to replace the background of which will be removed.
3. ‌Tap the Overlay button at the bottom and then tap Add overlay to import the video you want to remove background.
4. ‌After that, tap the Remove background button at the bottom and you will see the progress.
5. When it reaches 100%, you can adjust the position and size of your video with a transparent video.

That’s how you can remove background from a video without green screens. If your video has a green screen, you can also use the Chroma Key option. CapCut has many other features for quick video editing. Many TikTokers use it to edit videos for TikTok. You can also use CapCut to remove video watermark without blur. It is definitely worth trying.

Remove Video Background with OBS

If you need to remove or change video background for live streaming, then you can use OBS (Open Broadcaster Software). Here are the detailed instructions on how to use the OBS Remove Video Background plugin to remove the background from a video stream.

Step 1. Install OBS: If you haven’t already, download and install OBS Studio, which is available for Windows, macOS, and Linux. You can find the official OBS Studio website to download the software.

Step 2. Install the Remove Video Background Plugin:

• Visit the GitHub release page for the Remove Video Background plugin.
• Download the plugin’s files or installer, depending on your platform.
• Install the plugin.

Step 3. Configure Your Webcam or Video Source:

• Launch OBS Studio.
• Add a scene.
• Add your webcam or video source as a “Video Capture Device” in one of your scenes.

Step 4. Apply the Plugin to Your Video Source:

• Go to the scene where your video source is added.
• Right-click on your video source in the sources list.
• Select “Filters.”
• Click the “+” button to add a new filter.
• Choose the “Remove Video Background” filter from the list.

Step 6. Adjust Filter Settings:

• In the filter settings, you can further customize the background removal parameters.
• You might need to experiment with these settings to achieve the desired effect.

Step 7. Preview and Stream:

• Click “OK” or “Apply” to confirm the filter settings.
• You can now preview the scene and see how the background removal works.
• When you’re satisfied, start your stream or recording.

Conclusion

Honestly, I was amazed by the results of CapCut as a free app. It has become my number one video editor tool. I highly recommend it. If your video background is kind of still, you can use the online method, Unscreen or Kapwing. Unscreen offers better results than Kapwing, but Kapwing allows you to export MP4 for free.