Clips, Apple's compact video editing app for iPhone, has been killed off by the company, eight years after its launch.

Back in 2017, Apple Clips was introduced as a video editing app designed for making clips for sharing on social media. On October 10, Apple killed it off.

The notice posted to Apple's support page on Saturday explains that the app is no longer being updated. While Apple made it no longer available to download to new users as of October 10, existing and former users can continue to use the app, and redownload it from the App Store via their Apple Account.

Apple advises that users can save clips videos with and without effects to their devices. It also offers links to the user guide for iMovie, Apple's other more well-known and free video editing tool.

A promising social tool

At launch, Clips could let users create a video by putting together small snippets of video. The limit was 60 minutes in total, across 300 individual segments.

It also had features like filters, symbols, and emoji, as well as "Posters," which were fullscreen text-based images usable as title cards. There was even a Live Title feature that translated voices into text in 36 languages, complete with its own filters.

There was also an automatically-generated soundtrack option, Smart Suggestions with facial recognition, and support for quite a few social platforms.

It proved to be initially quite popular, securing between 500,000 and 1 million downloads within four days, but without managing to crack the App Store's top 20 app list.

Over the years, it has been the subject of various updates, including 360-degree scenes, the addition of Memoji and Animoji, assorted filters, and graphic changes. In 2021, it even gained support for Cinematic mode video.

To reinvigorate the app, it was also the subject of a "Today at Apple" session in 2021, demonstrating how to make looping videos.

Despite being an early prospect for social video, Apple had all but forgot about Clips as 2025 began. It was surrounded by apps such as CapCut and Meta's Edits.

Social media apps are also providing extensive video-editing tools to their users, making using a third-party app less appealing.

While Apple is still technically supporting the app for existing users, pulling the App Store listing for Clips is its way of saying the app has lived long past its prime. It certainly had potential to go far, but it was left to wither and die.