Character Animation

Add life to your characters.

Add Digital Effects

Brightness, contrast and more.

Use Keyframes

Create smooth motion transitions.

Audio Tracks

Add audio tracks or record audio.

Add Text

Add text to your animation project.

Save and Export

Video, HTML5 or animated GIF.

Create motion animations and add special effects to your videos

Animate text and graphics in your video
Apply digital effects to your animations and videos
Use keyframes to create smooth motion transitions
Export finished projects as video or animated gifs
Express Animate is animation software that gives you the ability to animate shapes, text and imported images. You are also able to enhance your movie projects in post-production using key-frame stop motion animation, masking, dummy objects and more.

Create Stunning Animations

Express Animate helps you create stunning animations using objects, images, illustrations and videos.
Choose from a wide array of effects and animation tools to add your creative flare to your project.

Animation Software Features

Friendly and intuitive drag-and-drop editor
Objects can be moved, resized, rotated and more
Apply digital effects, such as brightness, contrast, negative and more
Key frames can be applied to each object and parameter
Onion skin makes it easy to set up your frames
Add text to your video project
Create animated text and text bubbles
Add artwork from the included clipart library
Add audio tracks or record audio
Apply effects to audio tracks
Group objects for easy editing
Add masks to an object
Export as video, HTML5 or an animated GIF
Upload animated videos directly to YouTube, Vimeo or Flickr
Free to download and easy to use
Works seamlessly with VideoPad Video Editor
Save projects directly to cloud
Create your own characters and objects using the drawing tools
Nest objects to create an organized composition of your character puppet

Transformations and Effects

Get creative with applying transformations and effects to image objects.
Quickly convert a color object to black and white or sepia. Enhance an object by adjusting color temperature or saturation. Use key frames with the object properties to motion tween, zoom, rotate and more.

Character Animation

Add life to your characters. Animate separate body parts or group multiple objects together to optimize the animation process.
Use the timeline to move your character and create animations. Use multiple layers and keyframes to add special effects, audio and more.

Advanced Features

Express Animate has advanced tools for experienced animators and graphic designers, including vector masks, onion skins, blending modes and a graph editor for precise animation.

Export as Video, GIF or HTML5

Save active composition to any video file format or as HTML5 web content. Use Express Animate as a GIF animator to export looping gif animation videos. Export animations in multiple video file formats including: MP4, FLV, GIF, 3GP, ASF, AVI, DV, APNG, MOV, MPG, OGV, RM, SWF, WEBM, WMV.

Easy-to-Use Drawing Tools

Customize colors, gradients and fills for your objects. Easily add lines or draw objects with the vector-based pencil tool.

Pure Digital Audio Tools

Add audio effects such as chorus, echo, distortion and more. Record your own narrations with the click of a button or use sound effects from the free Sound Library.

BASIC FEATURES

NCH Express Animate Home Edition 2025 is an intuitive motion‑graphics and animation tool that lets users drag and drop shapes, text, images, audio, and video onto a timeline with layered object support; offers keyframe‑based animation controlling position, rotation, scale, opacity, and effects like brightness, contrast, negative, onion‑skinning, vector masks, blending modes, masking, object grouping, clipart import or freehand vector drawing, audio track addition or recording with support for audio effects, real‑time preview, exporting options including MP4, AVI, MOV, FLV, GIF, HTML5, image sequences, and direct uploading to YouTube, Vimeo, Flickr, while integrating seamlessly with VideoPad and enabling project saving to cloud storage. 

WHAT'S NEW

Home Edition includes the latest maintenance update aligning with the current UI navigation enhancements and support for additional video formats and codecs to maintain compatibility and performance .

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

Windows 7, 8, 8.1, 10, and 11 (with archived versions for Windows XP/Vista/2000/98) or macOS 10.9 and later; requires a dual‑core Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz or AMD equivalent CPU, DirectX‑capable GPU, at least 2 GB RAM (4 GB recommended), 100 MB free disk space plus room for projects, minimum display resolution 1024×768, and a compatible sound card. 

USER INTERFACES LANGUAGES

English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Dutch, Swedish, Chinese (Simplified), Portuguese .

BRAND

NCH Software

TYPE

Motion Graphics & Animation Software

FOR OPERATING SYSTEM

Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 10, Windows 11; macOS 10.9 or later 

LICENSE CATEGORY

One-time pay 

FORMAT

Digital Download

MODEL

NCH Express Animate Home Edition 2025

COUNTRY OF USE

Global

MANUFACTURER COUNTRY