PickaSi
Tested by actually running them

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AI video tools, tested by actually running them

Same brief, same prompt, word for word — in every tool. Credits, retries, queue time and watermarks logged. What we haven’t run is labeled vendor claim, never scored.

SPRINT A · GENERATIVE SHOOTOUT  ·  6 briefs · 3 tools · zero retries  ·  Runs logged Oct 23, 2026 · Dynamic QA Oct 24, 2026

Brief T1 — the scare scene: a convenience store at night; the CCTV grid shows one figure too many; she turns around — the store is empty.

Kling 4.0Standard plan
#1 · Provisional
“CCTV grid, one extra figure behind her; she turns — empty store.”
Only tool that rendered the scripted beat in full.
KlingAI 4.0
4.36/ 5 weighted
Cost / finished min$9.54
Avg. wall-clock~8 min
FormatTrue 9:16

Best story fidelity at the lowest cost — if the watermark is acceptable on your channel.

Veo 3.1 Qualityvia Flow · Google AI Pro
#2
“CCTV grid, one extra figure behind her; she turns — empty store.”
Best face of the three. Zero garbled on-screen text.
No watermark
3.43/ 5 weighted
Cost / finished min$15.00
Avg. wall-clock~15 min
FormatTrue 9:16

The clean export for commercial work — just budget for the queue.

Runway Gen-4.5Standard plan · text-to-video
#3
Delivered 16:9 — brief was 9:16
“CCTV grid, one extra figure behind her; she turns — empty store.”
2.86/ 5 weighted
Cost / finished min$17.28
Fastest single run~3.5 min
Format16:9 locked

Fast and competent — but text-to-video can’t do vertical. Enter via image-to-video instead.

Provisional ranking: scored on 3 of 6 protocol dimensions (output quality, cost, speed). Languages, rights/terms and editing control are not scored yet — we publish no score without a log behind it.

The score, at a glance — Provisional
Kling4.36 / 5
Veo3.43 / 5
Runway2.86 / 5
Output quality for the job 30% weight
Kling4 / 5
Veo4 / 5
Runway3 / 5
Cost per usable finished minute 25% weight
Kling5 / 5
Veo3 / 5
Runway2 / 5
Speed / reliability 15% weight
Kling4 / 5
Veo3 / 5
Runway4 / 5

3 of 6 protocol dimensions scored — languages, rights, editing control not yet run. See the full score breakdown

Brief T2 — the life scene: rainy night; a delivery rider hands a bag of steaming buns to a customer under a shop awning. One generation per tool, zero retries.

Hand-over beat: complete in both — Kling framed it steadiest; Veo gave it a process (wave → receive) and the strongest neon mood. Kling's panel above renders its real export artifact: the “KlingAI 4.0” watermark, frame-verified. Timings on this brief: Kling ~6 min; Veo ~30 min, almost all queue.

The full battery: We Ran the Same Six Prompts Through Kling, Veo, and Runway. Here Is the Scored Result.

Every pairing, by dimension

Kling vs RunwayBattery averages · zero retries
Cost → Kling · $9.54 vs $17.28 / min Vertical → Kling · true 9:16 vs locked 16:9 Fastest single run → Runway · ~3.5 min on T2 Average speed → Kling · ~8 vs ~10 min
Veo vs RunwayCleanliness vs speed
On-screen text → Veo · zero garbled text in all six briefs Cost → Veo · $15.00 vs $17.28 / min Speed → Runway · ~10 min avg vs ~15, queue up to ~30 Vertical → Veo · true 9:16 vs locked 16:9
Kling vs VeoThe headline tension: price vs clean export
Cost → Kling · $9.54 vs $15.00 / min Watermark → Veo · none vs “KlingAI 4.0” on every export Story fidelity → Kling · only tool to fully render the T1 beat Faces & text → Veo · best faces, zero text artifacts

Start here

Sora Is Gone. Here Is Where Your Workflow Goes Next.

The Sora Migration Center: the honest map of what happened, what to save before it disappears, and where each job actually goes now, based where possible on tools we have run ourselves, on the same prompts, with the costs logged.

We Ran the Same Six Prompts Through Kling, Veo, and Runway. Here Is the Scored Result.

The scored evidence article behind the comparison frame in the Sora Migration Center: six briefs, three tools, the same prompt, word for word, in every tool.

Same Script, Three Free Tiers: One Finished Clean, One Watermarked Itself, One Refused to Start

The Sprint B free-tier test: ElevenLabs, Synthesia, and HeyGen run the same frozen 228-word explainer script on $0 plans — one clean finish, one watermarked demo, one 60-second wall. Paid tiers explicitly not tested.

What AI Video Tools Actually Pay Affiliates — And What the Listicles Get Wrong

What each program pays according to its own current terms, how long it pays, what we could not verify from public pages, and which widely-cited figures are stale.

How this site works

How We Test

the published protocol and weights behind every score.

Disclosure

how PickaSi makes money, plainly.

Corrections

what we do when we get something wrong.