Remote work, and work in general, is all about communication. It's easy to default to communicating in real time, whether that means constant meetings or perpetual Slack conversations. Loom is unique among online collaboration software for focusing solely on asynchronous video communication. Instead of getting on a live call with a coworker or sending a typed message, you record a video for the recipient to watch at their convenience. Video messages can include what's on your screen, your face, or both. The idea is to quickly show and discuss what you're working on, give a quick presentation, or even just say hi.
There's nothing revolutionary about recording your screen, your face, or even both at once. You can use any screen capture app to do the same thing, or you can record the screen on your Windows PC or Mac without installing any extra software. Loom's value is simplicity: hit record, make your video, and it's instantly uploaded and ready for you to share. It's an interesting idea and an appealing app, but it may not be compelling enough for teams to buy it, given the broad availability of similar tools that most people already have.
How Much Does Loom Cost?
Loom offers a free version that allows each user to upload 25 videos up to five minutes long. It's enough to get a feel for the application, but that's about it. Expect to pay for Loom if you're using it regularly.
Paid accounts start at $10 per person per month for a Business plan, with a slight discount if you pay annually. The Business account gives you unlimited uploads of any length. You also get custom branding, password protection for videos, and the ability to embed links in a video.
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There's also an Enterprise tier with custom pricing. This tier offers advanced security features and a Salesforce integration.
How Does Loom's Pricing Compare?
Loom costs around as much as applications that offer similar video messaging features and a lot more. Slack, for example, offers a video clips feature that lets you record your screen and share it with your team all in a couple of clicks. This feature is only available to paid Slack users, and plans start at $8 per person per month. I wouldn't make a direct comparison between Slack and Loom, however. Slack does much more than share recorded videos, but it doesn't offer an easy way to share videos outside an organization. Still, teams already paying for Slack might think twice about paying for Loom.
Asana is another tool with a video messaging feature that's arguably similar to what Loom offers. The free version of Asana offers this feature with unlimited storage if you sign up for a free Vimeo account. Asana's paid versions start at $10.99 per user per month, but again, you don't need to pay for Asana to use the video sharing feature.
If your team uses Prezi, you might already be skilled at creating videos of your talking head overlaid on your screen or other graphics. Prezi isn't just a video-creation tool either. It's also an innovative presentation app, with paid plans starting at $60 per year. Just as with Slack and Asana, you get more bang for your buck with Prezi than you do with Loom.
There's also Dropbox Capture, a free download from Dropbox that offers the same feature set as Loom, including the ability to easily share videos with anyone. The only catch is you have to pay for storage space past the 2GB offered by the free plan (although that 2GB gets you a lot more free video than what Loom offers for free). Dropbox's paid plans start at $9.99 per month for 2TB of storage, compared to Loom's unlimited storage. Again, it's not a direct comparison. Dropbox offers more than video sharing, but it may help you think about what value you would or would not get by paying $10 per month for Loom.
Getting Started With Loom
Setting up Loom doesn't take long. Head to Loom.com and sign up for an account using Google, Slack, Apple, SSO, or an email address. After that, you install the application for your device. Direct downloads are available for Mac and Windows, and you can get the Android and iOS apps from their respective app stores. There's also a Loom Chrome extension.
Once you install the application, you have to enable permissions for recording from your screen, webcam, and microphone. The desktop application shows up in your system tray (Windows) or menu bar (Mac). You can start recording from here or by using customizable keyboard shortcuts.
With everything set up, you can start recording a video. The default settings record your screen with a webcam overlay but you can optionally record just your screen or just your face. Note that the iOS version of Loom can't record both things at once; it's one or the other. You can resize and reposition the webcam overlay before recording begins, and you can choose to record only part of the screen if you prefer. There's optional support for recording system audio.
The actual recording, in my tests, was seamless, but the real magic is what happens after you're done. The entire video is uploaded to Loom, which opens in your browser immediately. From this new webpage, you can do some basic editing including trimming and splicing in other videos you've uploaded. You can also add calls to action, which are basically links that pop-up after the video is complete. It's all very quick and simple, which is the main selling point of Loom.
Sharing and/or Caring
Every video you created is shared by default with the entire world. This means you can copy the link, send it to anyone, and trust they can watch it using their browser. I could not find a way to change this default behavior, but you can turn off public sharing for individual videos.
Anyone who watches your video can speed up the playback, leave comments, react with emoji at any moment, and see an automatically generated transcript of your video.
The Share button in the interface offers one-click sharing on social networks and code for embedding the video on a website. The Chrome extension, when installed, automatically converts Loom links into embedded videos in sites like Gmail, Google Docs, JIRA, and GitLab, which is a nice touch.
Sharing videos you record on Loom couldn't be easier, which is, as I mentioned, Loom's selling point. I can't think of a faster way to create and share a video.
Not a Great Screenshot Tool
Loom comes with a screenshot tool. It's marked as being in beta, which makes sense because it's definitely not ready for general-purpose use. Oddly, there's no way to annotate screenshots, and every time you create a screenshot Loom opens a browser window, which is more than a little annoying. You're probably better off using the system's provided tools for taking screenshots on any device. I won't dock points for a beta feature. Hopefully, the feature improves post-beta. Until then, you might want to stick with a dedicated screenshot app like Snagit.
Culture Drift
Set up a new Loom account and you'll see a tutorial featuring Loom CEO Joe Thomas. He tells you that recording a video with feedback speeds up the feedback process, and to me, this gets at the heart of why I'm not sure about Loom. Maybe it's because I write for a living, but I question the assumption that videos are faster than other methods of giving feedback.
Sure, it's faster for you to quickly record a video and send the link to your colleague, but is it faster for them to watch that video than it would be to read a message? Probably not. The thing that makes writing take time is editing, which is to say, thinking about what's most important and only sharing those parts. Loom makes it too easy to not filter yourself, which can mean wasting your colleague's time.
Having said that, video has its uses, particularly when it comes to communicating progress on visual projects. That's where tools like Loom may in fact shine. Being able to quickly communicate asynchronously while showing off your work is essential for some types of work.
You May Already Have Tools for Sharing Videos
Loom's problem is that Asana, Dropbox, and Slack all offer similar tools alongside their core offerings, which cost about the same and deliver way more functionality than just video messaging. If you're already paying for one of those services there's no real reason to pay for Loom, and even if you're not you could accomplish the same thing using features already built into your operating system.
For most teams, Loom is a luxury product, a subscription for a slightly sleeker way to share screen recordings. If your team needs a fast and quick way to share information asynchronously via video, then Loom absolutely delivers, but teams on a tight budget can often get by with existing tools.
Loom is the fastest and easiest way to record your screen and turn that into a public video, though you might already be paying for tools that do essentially the same thing.
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