Reaction Video Maker: How to Make a Reaction Video
Record your camera and the video you're reacting to in a single take, keep the tab's audio, then arrange the layout and share a link — all from your browser.
What is a reaction video?
A reaction video is a recording of you responding to something as you watch it — usually another video. Your camera captures your face and your commentary while the thing you're reacting to plays on screen, and both end up in the same take.
Reaction videos are quick to make because the hard part of the content already exists. All you add is your response. Most are recorded over videos from YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, or X, but the same format works for async replies at work: someone sends you a product demo or a design walkthrough, and you record yourself reacting to it instead of writing three paragraphs back.
Two technical details make or break a reaction video, and both trip people up the first time: capturing the audio of the video you're reacting to rather than just your microphone, and placing your camera so it doesn't cover the thing you're reacting to. Both are covered in the steps below.
How to make a reaction video
Open the video you're reacting to in its own tab
Load the video you want to react to in a separate browser tab and pause it at the start. Keeping it in its own tab — rather than full screen or in another app — is what lets you capture its sound cleanly in the next step.
Record your camera, the tab, and both audio sources
Start a recording in Tella, connect your microphone and camera, then choose to share the tab holding the video. When your browser asks which tab to share, turn on the option to share that tab's audio: this routes the video's sound straight into the recording instead of picking it up through your speakers and mic, which is what causes the thin, echoey audio you hear in a lot of reaction videos. Chrome, Edge, Brave, Vivaldi, and Arc all support tab audio sharing. With your mic and the tab audio both captured, press record and play the video — your commentary and its soundtrack land in the same file.
Arrange the layout so your camera doesn't cover the video
When you stop, Tella takes you to the finished video with its share link already copied — quick mode is on by default, so a reaction video you're happy with in one take needs nothing further. To fix the framing, open that video in the editor. Switch layouts to move your camera into a corner, shrink it, or set it beside the video rather than on top of it — the point is that nothing important in the video you're reacting to sits underneath your face. Trim the dead air at the start and end, cut the parts where nothing happens, and add a background or zoom in on the moments worth emphasising. Generate subtitles if the video needs to work with the sound off.
Share a link or download the file
You already have the link from the moment you stopped recording, and it keeps working while you edit — there's no publish step to wait on. Press Share to get it again, to embed the video, or to change who can see it. If you'd rather upload to YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, or X yourself, press Download and take the MP4.
Frequently asked questions
Share the video's browser tab and turn on that tab's audio when your browser asks what to share. That sends the sound directly into the recording alongside your microphone. If you share your whole screen instead, most browsers won't offer the audio option, and you're left recording the video's sound through your microphone — quiet, echoey, and mixed in with whatever else is happening in the room. So: open the video in its own tab, share that tab, and tick the audio option.
Less than most people expect. You need something to react to, a camera, a microphone, and a way to record and edit the result. A laptop's built-in webcam and mic are enough to start, and Tella records both plus your screen from the browser, so there's nothing to install.
The upgrade that makes the biggest difference isn't a better camera — it's a better microphone. Any wired earbuds with a mic, or a cheap USB microphone, will improve a reaction video more than a webcam upgrade will, because viewers tolerate a soft picture far longer than they tolerate bad audio. Decent lighting facing you comes second; a window works.
A reaction video is a video in which someone reacts to something — often another video, but also music, film trailers, or viral clips. The content being reacted to usually plays in the larger part of the frame, while the reactor's expressions and commentary are captured live in a smaller one. The point is to share the response, which can be anything from delight or surprise to analysis and criticism.
Yes. Record the same way, then set the video to a portrait format in the editor so it fills a phone screen instead of being letterboxed. In vertical, stacking works better than picture-in-picture: put the video you're reacting to in the top half and your camera in the bottom half, so neither one covers the other. Keep it short — the reaction is the content, so cut straight to the moments worth reacting to.
It depends on how much you use and what you add. Reaction videos generally rely on commentary and criticism to justify showing someone else's footage, which means the safer versions show short excerpts, keep your own commentary as the substance of the video, and don't replay the original in full. Platforms enforce this independently of the law: YouTube's Content ID can claim or demonetise a video that reuses copyrighted footage even when you believe your use is fair. If you're monetising reaction content or reusing a lot of one source, get advice specific to your situation rather than relying on a rule of thumb.