How To Add Voice Over In Premiere Pro [Get Timing Right]

This guide shows you how to add voice over in Premiere Pro using the timeline editor. At the end of the guide, we will recommend better and faster ways to add voiceover for video content.

Create Voiceover Script First (Very Helpful Tip)

A well made video with pre-planned voiceover script should be the first step.

You can creator a voiceover script on your own or use JasperAI to help you come up with things to say with a little bit of editing. 

Common Problems: Adding voiceover script to a existing video can run into:

  • Synching the key parts of the video
  • Noticing missing B rolls to what's being narrated
  • Changing narration script to fit the timeline of the original video
  • End up re-shoot the footage

Add Voiceover To Premier Pro

  1. Import the A roll footage (Primary footage)
  2. Consolidate audio and video files are in the same folder, and do not move them
  3. Create a sequence project, and make sure the sequence settings match the source footage
  4. Use J cuts and L cuts throughout the video, and add markers to all narration cues
  5. Select relevant B rolls (cutaway footage) and edit out the best takes on a separate sequence
  6. Stack the sequences, and adjust the heads and tails of the best part of the shot
  7. Adjust the timeline and synch narration to the footage at the right time
editing voiceover script in adobe premier pro

This is a very tedious process for long videos

Premier Pro is a great video editing software, but this traditional method for adding voiceover script takes a long time to get everything right.


Here Are 2 Faster Ways

Use Descript Storyboard Software

descript logo

Descript Storyboard software lets the editor easily match the spoken voice to the right part of the video without manually synching with narration.

  1. Record your narration (Use your best take)
  2. Let Descript transcribe spoken words into text
  3. Break up the text into scenes
  4. Find parts of the text you want to show contextual B rolls and break it up with "/"
  5. Drag the footage right over that section

This is a much faster and precise way to add the right footage to what's being said in the script.


Record Audio live in the timeline editor

Right click on the audio track and select "customize"

audio track
record and add voiceover

Make sure the video starts from the beginning, and hit record to speak into the mic while the video is playing.

This is helpful for adding narration to a video, but the problem still exist if narration timing doesn't match the video. The editor has to either edit the video to fit the voiceover script or change the voiceover script to fit the video.

add caption to premiere pro

If you want to add video caption to it, please click here to learn how