Seedance 2.5 is the only Seedance tier that delivers a finished take in one pass — and the only one that can rework or continue footage you already have.
Seedance 2.5 is ByteDance Seed's flagship video model, announced on July 31, 2026. Its siblings return a fragment you then assemble; 2.5 returns a finished take — up to 30 seconds of synced audio-video in a single pass, from as many as 50 mixed image, video and audio references. It is also the only Seedance tier here that can edit or extend a video you already have.
The costs are real. In-frame text is unreliable — we asked for a chalkboard reading "SOUPE DU JOUR" and got "SOUPE DU JWIN". Reviewers still see morphing in fast action, and generated voices arrive with accents you did not choose. Launch coverage mentions 4K; the API we use caps at 720p, so native 1080p and 4K live on Seedance 2.0 instead. It is also the priciest video model we run.
Positioning, duration and reference limits are from the official ByteDance Seed release: Introducing Seedance 2.5 — One-take Creation, Flexible Referencing
“A single generation can now produce up to 30 seconds of video, and up to 50 reference materials can be passed into one clip.”
“Version 2.5 expands the scope of what must be tested — from whether a generated result is usable, to whether it can be brought closer to a finished deliverable.”
“Morphing and decoherence still show up in fast action sequences, even with well-structured prompts, and no amount of upscaling removes it.”
The model is ByteDance's; the reason to use it here is everything wrapped around it.
Getting Seedance 2.5 directly means Jimeng or Doubao Pro accounts, or a Volcano Engine key that needs a mainland +86 phone number and business verification. Here it went live for every subscriber the day the API opened — sign in, pick the model, generate. No key, no SDK, no invoicing setup, and the next flagship lands on this same page.
Seedance 2.5 is the most expensive video model we run, so our Ava agent only recommends it when the brief actually needs it — an output longer than 15 seconds, or image, video and audio references combined in one pass. For drafts, social variants and everyday clips Ava routes you to Seedance 2.0 Mini or Grok Imagine 1.5 instead, and says why.
Pricing is per second and shown before you press generate: 110 credits per second at 480p, 230 at 720p — so a 4-second draft is 440 and an 8-second 720p final is 1,840. Clips driven by a reference video bill at a lower rate on input plus output seconds. The same plan also covers Seedance 2.0, Veo, Kling, HappyHorse, GPT Image 2 and Nano Banana Pro, so you can draft cheap and finish here without five vendor accounts.
In our seven-clip launch-day test every prompt completed on the first take: 4-second 480p clips averaged 2m 38s, the 8-second 720p clip took 5m 13s. We verified the audio with ffmpeg rather than trusting the spec sheet — every clip with audio enabled carries a real AAC stereo track, and switching it off produces a file with no audio stream at all. Every generation keeps its prompt and parameters in history, so a setup that works is reproducible next week.
All 7 videos below were generated on CreateVision AI on August 7, 2026 — every one on the first take, with the exact prompt shown, no editing and no cherry-picking. The six 4-second 480p clips averaged 2m 38s (range 1m 37s–3m 40s); the 8-second 720p clip took 5m 13s. Sound on.
A ceramicist in a sunlit workshop looks up from the wheel and speaks warmly to camera: "This one finally came out right." Clay-dusted hands, natural skin texture, shallow depth of field, soft window light, ambient studio room tone.
Subtle living portrait: she blinks, exhales, and turns her head a few degrees toward the window light. Hair strands drift, golden dust motes float, the landscape outside slides past. Keep her exact face, freckles, and hair unchanged.
Vertical food macro: molten chocolate poured over a warm hazelnut cake, glossy ribbon folding slowly, steam curling upward, crumbs catching the light, cozy cafe ambience.
Place the woman from @image1 walking slowly up the stone steps toward the red torii gate seen in @image2, early morning mist, lanterns glowing, her face and hair exactly as in @image1. Handheld documentary framing, birdsong and distant temple bell.
A seamless loop: the camera drifts a few centimetres closer and then settles back exactly where it started, her expression softening and returning. No cuts, no new elements.
Close-up of a chef's hands rapidly julienning a carrot on a wooden board, knife tapping fast, a handwritten chalkboard menu reading "SOUPE DU JOUR" visible behind, busy kitchen sounds.
One continuous cinematic shot that travels through four worlds without a cut: a neon-wet Tokyo alley at night, dissolving into a sunlit Moroccan spice market, into an underwater kelp forest lit by shafts of light, into a snow-covered pine ridge at sunrise. Fluid camera glide, rich colour grade, transitions carried by light rather than edits.
It is the flagship tier, and it earns that only on jobs the cheaper siblings cannot do at all.
Thirty seconds arrive in a single pass, so there is no seam where two clips were joined and no drift in the character between them. Every other Seedance tier here stops at 15.
Images, video clips and audio tracks in the same request, pointed at from the prompt with tags like @image1. Our reference test took a location from one photo and a person from another and held both for the full take.
Video Edit replaces or removes elements in an uploaded clip; Video Extend continues one forward or backward. Neither mode exists on the 2.0 tiers — they return an error if you ask for them.
Native synced audio is on by default, and reviewers single out longer talky shots as where this model holds up best. Casting is not controllable, though — generated voices can arrive with an accent you did not ask for.
It carries the highest per-second rate of the four Seedance models we run, so drafting ten variations here is the expensive way to work — use Mini or Fast for that and bring the winning setup back. And in-frame text is unreliable: our chalkboard came back reading "SOUPE DU JWIN".
All four run in this workspace on one subscription — switching between them is one click.
| Seedance 2.5 | Seedance 2.0 | Seedance 2.0 Fast | Seedance 2.0 Mini | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Best fit | Long takes and mixed image, video and audio references | Native 1080p or 4K delivery, multi-shot scenes | Iteration and social clips at 720p | High-volume drafts and variations |
| Clip length | 4-30s in one pass | 4-15s | 4-15s | 4-15s |
| Resolution tiers | 480p, 720p | 480p, 720p, 1080p, 4K | 480p, 720p | 480p, 720p |
| Credits per second at 480p | 110 | 50 | 35 | 15 |
| Credits per second at 720p | 230 | 100 | 75 | 30 |
| Credits per second at 1080p | Not offered | 300 | Not offered | Not offered |
| Credits per second at 4K | Not offered | 610 | Not offered | Not offered |
| Reference-video rate, per second of input plus output | 65 at 480p / 140 at 720p | 30 at 480p / 65 at 720p / 180 at 1080p / 380 at 4K | 20 at 480p / 45 at 720p | 10 at 480p / 20 at 720p |
| Reference inputs per request | 30 images + 10 clips + 10 audio, 50 assets total | 9 images + 3 clips + 3 audio | 9 images + 3 clips + 3 audio | 9 images + 3 clips + 3 audio |
| Edit or extend an existing video | Yes | No | No | No |
| Web search in text-to-video | Yes, +10 credits | Yes, +10 credits | Yes, +10 credits | Not offered |
| Native audio | Included; same rate with it off | Included; same rate with it off | Included; same rate with it off | Included; same rate with it off |
| Our measured speed | 4s/480p averaged 2m 38s, 8s/720p 5m 13s (7 clips, 7 August 2026) | Not measured | Not measured | ~3m 19s per clip, 6 of 6 on the first take (6 clips, 13 July 2026) |
Credit rates, resolution tiers, duration limits and reference caps are read from our own model registry on 20 August 2026 - the same rate table the generator on this page bills from, so these figures move only when our prices move. Credits are charged per second of output; a reference video adds its own length to the billed seconds, and audio never changes the rate. Speeds are our own measurements with the sample size and date stated - a model we have not timed says "Not measured" rather than borrowing a vendor figure, and a tier a model does not offer says "Not offered" rather than showing the nearest number.
Compare Seedance 2.5 with other video models — same workspace, one click to switch.
| Model | seedance-2.5, by ByteDance Seed (announced July 31, 2026) |
|---|---|
| Modes | Text-to-video, image-to-video (first frame, or first and last frame), reference-to-video, video edit (rework an uploaded video), video extend (continue it forward or backward) |
| Duration | 4–30 seconds in a single pass |
| Quality tiers | 480p and 720p |
| Aspect ratios | 16:9, 9:16, 1:1, 4:3, 3:4, 21:9, plus adaptive (image-to-video always adapts to your photo) |
| References | Up to 30 images, 10 videos and 10 audio clips per request, 50 assets in total |
| Audio | Native synced audio, on by default — verified as real AAC 32 kHz stereo in our test set; can be switched off |
| Credits | 110 per second at 480p · 230 per second at 720p · lower per-second rate when a reference video is used, billed on input plus output seconds |
| Measured speed | 4s/480p averaged ~2m 38s, 8s/720p ~5m 13s (our 7-clip test, August 2026) |
Create a free account — no API key, no phone verification, no business paperwork. The generator on this page is already set to Seedance 2.5.
Type a prompt for text-to-video, attach one photo as a first frame (or two for a first-and-last-frame move), or open Reference to Video to combine images, clips and audio in the same request. To rework footage you already have, switch the mode to Video Edit ("remove the passers-by in @video1") or Video Extend ("continue @video1 forward").
Pick anything from 4 to 30 seconds at 480p or 720p. Draft at 480p — it is less than half the credits — then rerun the setup you like at 720p. The exact cost appears before you generate.
Short clips come back in two to four minutes. History keeps every prompt and parameter, so re-running a variation is one click rather than a rewrite.
One account, the full image and video generation workflow.
Where Seedance, Veo, Kling and Hailuo actually differ on motion, audio and price.
The previous generation — still the better value for most 4–15 second clips.
If budget is the constraint, start here instead — Seedance 2.5 is our priciest model.
Google's cinematic alternative, and when its camera language wins.
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No — it is the flagship tier and one of the most expensive video models on the platform, at 110 credits per second at 480p and 230 at 720p. Every account gets daily credits, and Z Image Turbo (0 credits, images) plus Seedance 2.0 Mini are the cheap ways to lock an idea down before you spend on a Seedance 2.5 final.
Up to 30 seconds in a single pass, in one-second steps from 4 seconds up — double the ceiling of Seedance 2.0. That is the main reason to pick it: no stitching, no visible seam where two clips join. A 30-second 720p render costs 6,900 credits, so most people draft at 480p first.
Use 2.0 unless you need something 2.5 alone can do. Seedance 2.0 covers 4–15 seconds at less than half the per-second cost and is the better everyday choice. Move to 2.5 when the clip has to run longer than 15 seconds, or when you need image, video and audio references combined in one request.
Yes — that is its other headline capability. One request accepts up to 30 images, 10 video clips and 10 audio tracks, 50 assets in total, and you point at them in the prompt with tags like @image1 or @audio1. Requests that include a reference video bill at a lower per-second rate but count the input video length as well as the output.
Yes — Video Edit mode takes an uploaded video plus an instruction like "remove the passers-by in @video1" or "replace the bottle in @video1 with the jar in @image1", and reworks the footage while keeping its length (the output follows the input, so duration is set automatically). It bills at the lower reference rate — 65 credits per second at 480p, 140 at 720p — counted on input plus output seconds, so a 10-second edit at 480p is about 1,300 credits.
Yes — Video Extend continues an uploaded video forward or backward by 4 to 30 seconds, guided by your prompt ("continue @video1 forward: the character keeps walking into the sunset"). The aspect ratio follows the input automatically, and you can add reference images or audio to steer the new footage. Billing uses the same reference rate on input plus output seconds, with the exact cost shown before you generate.
Yes, and it is on by default at no extra cost. We checked the files rather than the spec sheet: every clip in our test set with audio enabled carried a real AAC 32 kHz stereo track, and turning audio off produced a file with no audio stream at all. Reviewers do note that generated voices can pick up an accent you did not ask for.
In our August 2026 test set, 4-second 480p clips averaged about 2 minutes 38 seconds (fastest 1m 37s, slowest 3m 40s) and an 8-second 720p clip took 5 minutes 13 seconds. Generation is asynchronous — you can keep working and the result lands in your history.
Text inside the frame, mainly: we asked for a chalkboard reading "SOUPE DU JOUR" and got "SOUPE DU JWIN". Reviewers also report morphing in fast action sequences and unpredictable voice casting. And although launch coverage mentions 4K, the API we use caps at 720p today — for a higher-resolution finish you would need a separate upscale pass.
Yes, videos you generate can be used in personal and commercial projects under our terms of service. You remain responsible for prompt content, trademarks, and likeness rights.
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