How to Make a Karaoke Video From Any Song (Step by Step)

How to make a karaoke video from any song: upload the full track, hear the music without the vocals, sync every word, then design the frame and render.

A karaoke video has two jobs: play the song without the singer, so whoever holds the microphone becomes the voice, and show every word at the moment it is due, so nobody needs the lyrics by heart. Get the timing wrong and the singer is left guessing.

Here is the whole build in Karaoke, the LimePulse studio for sing-along videos, with the reason behind each choice.

What you need before you start

Step 1: Upload the full song

Open a new Karaoke project and add the full song as it is. You do not need an instrumental or karaoke version, which many songs never get: the finished track goes in, vocals and all, and plays without the vocals, in the preview and in the finished video.

Use the best copy you have, a WAV or a high-quality MP3. The video runs the length of the song, so for the chorus alone, upload an edit of just the chorus, at least 30 seconds long.

Step 2: Build while the song is prepared

The first time a song is opened in Karaoke it is prepared, and you do not have to wait: the full song plays in the meantime and the whole frame stays open to edit. When it is ready, the music switches to the version without the vocals by itself, and Render waits until then.

Step 3: Paste the lyrics, one line per sung line

Open Lyrics and paste the words, one sung line per line of text. The line breaks decide what the screen shows: the line being sung, set large, with the next one underneath, smaller and faded. A line broken in the wrong place shows the singer half a thought.

There is no need to tidy the text first. Section headers such as [Chorus] and repeat markers such as (x2) are understood, and a chorus written once but sung again is expanded for you.

Then sync the words to the song. Every word gets its own start and end, not just every line, and that is the real difference from a lyric video: the highlight tells the singer when to come in and how long to hold a note. The first line shows a few seconds before it is due. Karaoke lyrics that light up word by word goes deeper.

Step 4: Play it through and fix what is off

Play the song from the top and sing along: you will feel a word that lands early or late before you see it. Every timed line sits as a bar under the waveform: drag a bar to move its line, words and all, or pull either end to change how long it stays on screen. Every change can be undone.

Already have an SRT file? Load it in the lyrics screen and its lines arrive timed. An SRT file times lines, not words, so each line's words light up in turn across its time, a longer word taking a little longer. Pasting and syncing the words follows a long held note more closely.

Step 5: Design the frame around the words

Start with the highlight, since it is what the singer reads. Wipe fills each word with colour from left to right while it is sung, so a long note fills slowly. Pop lights each whole word the moment it starts, with a small bounce, which suits short, punchy words and a strong beat. Then pick three colours: the words still to come, the sung words and the glow behind them. Keep the first two far apart, because that change is the signal the singer follows.

Behind the words, choose a solid colour, a soft ambient gradient, or a picture or video clip with a blur you set. A clip, uploaded or picked from the stock video search, is cut to the length of the song. Blur keeps the words readable: a busy photo behind the lyrics is hard to read from across a room.

Then add whatever else the video needs: any of 15 props, from a spinning vinyl to a disco ball, a title in any of 200 fonts, your logo or the cover, a subscribe prompt or a QR code. Each is a layer you can move, resize, rotate, hide or lock, the lyrics included, and the project saves itself as you work.

Step 6: Decide how much of the singer to keep

The Vocal volume slider runs from 0, the music alone, to 100, the original vocal at full level. Set it for whoever is holding the microphone:

The finished video carries the same mix you hear while you work, so set it by ear. Renders are unlimited on the Creator plan, so a version with a guide and one without are two renders of the same project. Practise singing with a guide vocal has more on using the guide.

Step 7: Pick the shape

Switch the shape at any time; every layer keeps its place in the frame.

All three render at 60 fps. One catch for Shorts: YouTube only treats a vertical or square video as a Short when it runs 3 minutes or less, so make the Short from an edit of the chorus and keep the full song for the landscape version.

Step 8: Render and publish

Press Render. The video is made on our servers, so you can close the tab while it runs, and it comes out as an H.264 MP4 with AAC audio and no watermark. It waits in your library to download, or to publish straight to your YouTube channel with your own title, tags and visibility.

Before it goes public, think about rights. A karaoke video still carries the song's music and its words, which belong to the people who wrote and recorded them. Post karaoke versions of your own songs, of songs you have licensed, or of songs whose owners allow it, and expect YouTube to check the upload against Content ID as it does any music. Karaoke videos on YouTube has more on sizes, length and rights.

Karaoke video or lyric video?

Want the original vocal left in, with the words shown line by line? That is a lyric video, made in Compose, and how to make a lyric video walks through it. A karaoke video is the sing-along: the music without the vocals, and the words lit one at a time as they are sung.

The short version

  1. Open Karaoke and upload the full song, vocals and all.
  2. Build the frame while the song is prepared.
  3. Paste the lyrics, one line per sung line, and sync them.
  4. Sing it through and drag any line that is early or late.
  5. Pick Wipe or Pop, your three colours and a background.
  6. Set Vocal volume: 0 to perform, higher to keep a guide.
  7. Choose landscape, vertical or square, render, and publish.

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