KinoDraw

Turn any script into a hand-drawn whiteboard explainer video, on your own computer. Free and open source, no watermark (just a 2-second end card you can turn off), works offline. In English and 中文.

Download Source on GitHub

For Windows · macOS (Apple silicon, M1 or newer) · Linux. No account and no API key needed for the offline director.
Opening it the first time takes one extra approval: see how.
It opens on a finished example video. Your own first video downloads the voice (about 190 MB) and the doodle search (about 70 MB), once, then takes about a minute. Every finished video ends with a short "Made with KinoDraw" card, on by default; one click in the Studio turns it off (or kinodraw make --no-credit).
KinoDraw was called Doodle Studio before version 0.2.0. Close Doodle Studio first: KinoDraw moves your Doodle Studio projects, settings and voice over the first time it opens.

The KinoDraw narrator waving

First time opening on Windows

  1. Unzip the download, open the KinoDraw folder and double-click KinoDraw.exe.
  2. If "Windows protected your PC" appears, click More info → Run anyway.

On Windows 11 with Smart App Control turned on, Windows may block apps that aren't signed yet, like this one, and there's no Run anyway button.

First time opening on a Mac

The Mac app needs Apple silicon (M1 or newer) and doesn't run on an Intel Mac. To check yours, choose Apple menu → About This Mac: an Apple silicon Mac lists a Chip, an Intel Mac a Processor.

KinoDraw isn't notarized by Apple yet, so the first time you open it, macOS stops it. You approve it once:

  1. Unzip the download, drag KinoDraw to Applications and double-click it. macOS says it can't check the app for malware. Click Done (don't move the app to the Trash). The message "KinoDraw.app Not Opened", with the Done button circled
  2. Choose Apple menu → System Settings, then scroll the sidebar on the left down. System Settings, with an arrow showing to scroll the left sidebar down
  3. Click Privacy & Security, then scroll the right side down to the Security section. Privacy & Security circled in the sidebar, with an arrow showing to scroll the right side down
  4. Next to "KinoDraw.app was blocked to protect your Mac", click Open Anyway. This button is available for about an hour after you try to open the app; if it isn't there, double-click the app again first. The Security section, with the Open Anyway button circled
  5. macOS asks once more: click Open Anyway again. The question "Open KinoDraw.app?", with the Open Anyway button circled
  6. Touch the Touch ID key, or click Use Password… and enter your login password. KinoDraw opens, and from then on it opens with a double-click, like any app. The Touch ID request, with the Use Password button circled

These are Apple's own steps (Open an app by overriding security settings). Right-click → Open no longer skips this on macOS Sequoia and later. If macOS says the app is damaged, run xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine "/Applications/KinoDraw.app" in Terminal once.

On Linux: unpack the download and run KinoDraw/KinoDraw.

How the Printing Press Changed the World

A 300-word script, turned into this 3½-minute video on a laptop, in offline mode.

For teachers: KinoDraw for Classroom

A Chrome extension that turns your lesson script into a hand-drawn video and posts it to your Google Classroom class. See how it works.

Free and premium AI directors

The video above was planned by the offline director: free, private, no account. Here is the same script planned by KinoDraw Cloud's AI directors, with the same voice and drawing hand.

GPT-6 Luna

Free, with no account needed. Choose KinoDraw Cloud AI in the app.

Claude Opus 5.5

Coming later as a paid plan.

Script in, video out

1 · Paste a script

Text, Markdown or a Word file. Each heading becomes a section.

2 · It plans the board

Every sentence gets a doodle; numbers become charts, dates become timelines, and definitions become sticky notes.

3 · It draws and speaks

A hand draws while a natural voice narrates. Captions, chapters, music and a thumbnail come with the video.

More examples

Why Is the Sky Blue?

Science · English

为什么我们需要睡觉？

Health · 中文 (Mandarin voice and handwriting)

What's inside

1,760+ doodles

279 original drawings plus 1,483 Fluent Emoji, all in one outlined style, and a recurring narrator in 8 poses.

Local voice

Kokoro neural voices run on your CPU. Drawings and captions land on the spoken word, within a fraction of a second.

Edit anything

Swap doodles, fix labels, retitle sections and preview frames in the Studio app before you render.

Checked output

Every video is decoded frame by frame, its audio compared with the mix, and its chapters verified.

Who plans the visuals?

DirectorCost
OfflineFreeMatches each sentence to the doodle library. Nothing leaves your computer unless you send feedback or use your own voice server.
KinoDraw CloudFreeGPT-6 Luna plans each section. No account and no key needed; signing in with an email code is optional. Paid plans with more videos and Claude Opus 5.5 come later.
Your own key≈ $0.02 per 15-min video with GPT-6 LunaOpenAI, Anthropic, or any OpenAI-compatible server, including a local model.

AI suggestions are checked by code before use: doodles must exist, drawings must start on words that are really spoken, and numbers and quotes must appear in your script.

For the command line

uv tool install git+https://github.com/edwardaiwang-svg/kinodraw
kinodraw make my-script.md -o "My Video"
kinodraw studio          # the app window