--- title: "How credits work" description: "What a credit is, when it is spent, and what each setting adds to the cost of an export. Credits never expire, previews are free, and a failed export returns what it reserved." canonical: "https://websitescrollvideo.com/how-credits-work/" last-updated: "2026-10-29" site: "Website Scroll Video" language: "en" --- # How credits work Credits are what you spend to render a video. Editing, previewing and changing your mind are all free, and every feature works from your first export. - **51 free to start** — Granted once at signup. No credit card required. - **They never expire** — No monthly reset, no expiry date. Use them whenever you need them. - **Previews are free** — Only exports cost anything. Replay your page as often as you like. ## What a credit is A credit is the unit you spend to render a video. There is no subscription and no plan. You get 51 free at signup, buy more when you run low, and your balance is simply how much you can render. Credits buy quantity, not permission. Every setting in the editor works on every account from the first export: 4K, 60 FPS, Live Capture, pauses, hovers, phone and tablet capture, a hand-typed output size. Pricier settings cost more credits. Nothing ever asks you to upgrade, because there is no tier to upgrade to. ## When credits are used Only when you press Export. Loading a page, dragging the trim handles, adding a pause, switching resolution and replaying the preview all cost nothing, however often you do them. The exact cost sits on the Export button before you press it, and it updates as you change settings. Drop from 60 FPS to 24 and watch it fall by six. That number is what you are charged. It is not an estimate and it is never revised afterwards: the same sum runs in your browser and on our server, and if the two ever disagreed we would refuse the export rather than bill you a different figure. Credits come out when the render starts, not when it finishes. That is what stops two exports in two tabs from spending the same balance twice. ## What makes an export cost more Two things: how long the finished video is, and how demanding the settings are. Length costs one credit per two seconds of the finished file, rounded up, and it is counted once across the whole timeline. That covers the opening and closing holds, every pause, every hover, and the return leg if the scroll goes back up. None of those seconds are charged twice. A hover is worth a second look, because each one is two durations. The video holds while the cursor travels to the element (one second on Fast, one and a half on Normal, two and a half on Slow), then for however long you set it to rest there. Both land in the finished file, so both count towards the length. A handful of settings then carry a premium, because they change what the renderer actually has to do: resolution, frame rate, Live Capture, each pause, each hover, reading the page at tablet or phone width, and a hand-typed output size. The table below lists every one. ## What is free Most of the editor. Output format, scroll easing, cookie and pop-up removal, hiding elements, freezing animations, forcing light or dark mode, background colour, the browser frame with its padding and corners, a transparent background, where the scroll starts and stops, and the holds at either end all cost nothing. So is every preview. That is a design decision, not generosity: previewing is how you find out whether a video is worth making, and a meter on it would turn experimenting into something you ration. ## If an export fails Your credits come back automatically and in full. They are reserved when the render starts and only spent once a video comes out the other end, so a render that fails, times out, or that you cancel part-way through returns the whole amount. You are never charged for a video you did not receive. Each refund is recorded against its export, so it lands once no matter how many times a failure is reported. ## Credits never expire There is no monthly reset, no rolling window and no expiry date. Credits stay in your account until you spend them, whether that is today, next month, or whenever the next site is ready to record. They are also non-refundable. That is the other half of the same deal: nothing is taken away for going unused, and nothing is paid back once bought. --- This is the markdown rendering of https://websitescrollvideo.com/how-credits-work/. Every page on this site answers to the same suffix — https://websitescrollvideo.com/about.md, https://websitescrollvideo.com/pricing.md — and https://websitescrollvideo.com/index.md is the home page. - https://websitescrollvideo.com/llms.txt — the whole site in brief - https://websitescrollvideo.com/agents.md — when to use this tool, when not to, and how to drive it - https://websitescrollvideo.com/sitemap.xml — every page, in all thirteen languages