aismaTwo tasks hold most of the volume.
Background work (52.0%) and replacing a person or face (31.5%) make up 83.5% of the 78,190 summed monthly volume. The other five tasks share what’s left.
What Americans want to fix in their videos.
2026 search data.
We sorted 4,044 US search phrasings about editing footage people already shot into seven tasks. Background work and face or person swaps hold 83.5% of the summed search volume. New outfits and products in a clip are still a sliver, though both grew from small bases.
We make Aisma, an AI editor for video people already shot, so we have a stake in this topic. None of this comes from our users: it’s public search data from Ahrefs, with no Aisma customer data in it.
Published November 1, 2026 · Data pulled November 1, 2026 · United States
- distinct US search phrasings
- 4,044
- queries after merging near-identical phrasings
- 1,908
- summed US monthly search volume
- 78,190
WHAT THE DATA SHOWS
Six things
worth quoting.
People want the background gone more than changed.
Removal phrasings sum to 36,270 a month, about ten times the 3,530 for changing or replacing a background. Blur adds 680. Weather, sky and time of day add 180.
“AI” moved to the front of face swap searches.
In October 2023, “face swap video” drew 1,795 monthly searches and “ai face swap video” 906. By October 2026 they stood at 5,430 and 10,054. The plain phrasing peaked at 16,305 in November 2024.
The fastest risers are still small.
Across their tracked queries, text prompt editing went from 264 to 1,119 average monthly searches, clothes from 145 to 444 and product swaps from 84 to 180. Together that’s 1,743, beside 35,737 for background work.
People search for a tool, not an explanation.
Question-style phrasings (how, what, can, which) are 17.3% of the merged queries but only 5.6% of the volume. The big numbers belong to plain tool-style phrasings.
“Free” is a large part of the ask.
The word appears in queries worth 28.6% of clothes volume, 26.2% of removal and 12.1% of background work. “Free” face swap terms are out of scope here, so that task isn’t in the comparison. Aisma is a paid product, so this number doesn’t flatter us.
THE SEVEN TASKS
Where the search
volume sits.
Each merged query counts once, in one task, at its largest phrasing’s volume.
| Task | Phrasings | Merged queries | Summed US monthly volume | Share of volume | Questions, share of queries | Questions, share of volume |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Change the background or setting | 1,216 | 511 | 40,660 | 52.0% | 15.9% | 3.1% |
| Replace a person or face | 856 | 287 | 24,610 | 31.5% | 24.7% | 6.5% |
| Remove a person or object | 782 | 386 | 5,640 | 7.2% | 15.8% | 13.3% |
| Restyle or transform the video | 833 | 532 | 5,350 | 6.8% | 17.5% | 9.5% |
| Edit by text prompt | 143 | 67 | 1,200 | 1.5% | 9.0% | 12.5% |
| Change clothes or an outfit | 159 | 83 | 560 | 0.7% | 15.7% | 12.5% |
| Swap or place a product | 55 | 42 | 170 | 0.2% | 14.3% | 0.0% |
| All seven | 4,044 | 1,908 | 78,190 | 100.0% | 17.3% | 5.6% |
The list has a long tail. Ten queries hold 62.5% of the volume, and 1,207 of the 1,908 merged queries show under 10 searches a month. “AI” appears in queries worth 28.0% of the total.
TASK BY TASK
What people
actually type.
Top phrasings with their Ahrefs US monthly volume. The links lead to our own pages on each edit.
Change the background or setting
40,660 summed monthly · 511 merged queries · 3.1% of volume from questions
- remove background from video18,000
- video background remover8,700
- video background remover free2,200
- ai video background remover600
- remove background from video free600
Removal phrasings sum to 36,270. Changing or replacing a background sums to 3,530, blur to 680, and weather, sky or time of day to 180. Aisma changes a background from a written request; transparent exports, which is much of what these searches want, are on our roadmap.
Replace a person or face
24,610 summed monthly · 287 merged queries · 6.5% of volume from questions
- ai face swap video9,300
- face swap video7,000
- best ai video face swap tools 2026400
- multiple face swap video250
- ai body swap video200
Faces are 23,410 of the 24,610. Replacing a whole person or character sums to 1,200. Question-style phrasings are 24.7% of the merged queries here, the highest of any task, yet only 6.5% of its volume.
Remove a person or object
5,640 summed monthly · 386 merged queries · 13.3% of volume from questions
- remove object from video700
- how to erase someone in a video500
- video eraser400
- video object remover online free350
- video object remover300
Object wording sums to 3,190 and people wording to 1,380. The other 1,070 is general wording such as “video eraser” and specific things such as shadows and reflections. “How to erase someone in a video” owes its number to isolated spikes, not steady search.
Remove objects from videoWedding photobomber exampleParked car example
Restyle or transform the video
5,350 summed monthly · 532 merged queries · 9.5% of volume from questions
- video to video ai1,200
- video to cartoon converter200
- ai video filter150
- ai video style transfer150
- cinematic video filter ai150
“Make it look like” searches (anime, cartoon, old film, VHS) sum to 3,230. The technical wording (video to video, style transfer) sums to 2,120. Aisma’s restyle examples are older recordings, marked Previous version on the page.
Edit by text prompt
1,200 summed monthly · 67 merged queries · 12.5% of volume from questions
- ai video editor with prompt350
- ai video editor with prompt free100
- ai video editor with text prompt100
- text based video editing100
- top rated text based video editing software80
“Text-based editing” often means editing a transcript rather than describing a change in words, and both sit in this total. We didn’t count the broad “AI video editor” searches here, because they don’t name a prompt.
Change clothes or an outfit
560 summed monthly · 83 merged queries · 12.5% of volume from questions
- ai video clothes changer80
- how to change clothes in video editing40
- ai clothes changer in video online free30
- best ai tools to change clothes in video 202630
- change clothes in video ai free30
Changing a garment sums to 480 and changing its color to 80. Photo try-on tools are out of scope, and queries about video try-on barely register. Most phrasings show under 10 searches a month.
AI video clothes changerRed suit exampleChange a shirt color
Swap or place a product
170 summed monthly · 42 merged queries · 0.0% of volume from questions
- video product replace50
- add object to video ai20
- replace object in video ai free20
- add object to video10
- ai replace object in video10
The smallest task. Product wording sums to 50 and object wording to 120. Few people search for this in these words yet, which may say more about the wording than the need.
YEAR OVER YEAR
What rose,
and what fell.
Average monthly volume, October 2024 to September 2025 against October 2025 to September 2026.
Monthly history exists for the 277 largest queries we tracked, up to 40 per task. Their combined volume averaged 60,068 a month in the earlier window and 67,031 in the later one. It peaked at 72,865 in December 2025 and was 62,206 in September 2026, so the climb has flattened.
One warning on these rises: we picked each task’s largest queries today, and that favors what already grew. Read the task totals as the upper end, and read the small tasks as small numbers moving.
| Task | Tracked queries | Share of task volume covered | Oct 2024–Sep 2025 | Oct 2025–Sep 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Change the background or setting | 39 | 88.6% | 27,990 | 35,737 | +27.7% |
| Replace a person or face | 39 | 87.7% | 23,808 | 21,426 | −10.0% |
| Remove a person or object | 39 | 75.2% | 3,195 | 4,177 | +30.7% |
| Restyle or transform the video | 40 | 76.1% | 4,581 | 3,948 | −13.8% |
| Edit by text prompt | 40 | 100.0% | 264 | 1,119 | +323.1% |
| Change clothes or an outfit | 40 | 100.0% | 145 | 444 | +206.6% |
| Swap or place a product | 40 | 100.0% | 84 | 180 | +113.0% |
Face swap: the plain phrasing against the “AI” one
- ai face swap video
- face swap video
Oct 2023Oct 2026
Rising phrasings
| Phrasing | Task | Earlier average | Latest average | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| video background remover free | Background | 564 | 2,183 | +287% |
| ai video editor with prompt | Text prompt | 45 | 326 | +624% |
| video object remover online free | Removal | 120 | 345 | +188% |
| how to replace face in video | Person or face | 61 | 193 | +216% |
| ai body swap video | Person or face | 52 | 175 | +237% |
| ai video editor face swap | Person or face | 13 | 118 | +808% |
| how to make ai face swap video | Person or face | 33 | 123 | +273% |
| how to put ai face on video | Person or face | 35 | 124 | +254% |
New phrasings
| Phrasing | Task | Earlier average | Latest average | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| cinematic video filter ai | Restyle | 0 | 118 | New |
| long video face swap ai | Person or face | 6 | 113 | New |
| ai video editor with text prompt | Text prompt | 1 | 113 | New |
| ai video editor change face | Person or face | 4 | 108 | New |
| ai remove background video free | Background | 7 | 102 | New |
Falling phrasings
| Phrasing | Task | Earlier average | Latest average | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| face swap video | Person or face | 11,607 | 7,045 | −39% |
| video face swapper | Person or face | 625 | 134 | −79% |
| video face swap online | Person or face | 627 | 193 | −69% |
| video background remover online free | Background | 347 | 179 | −48% |
| video background remover app | Background | 265 | 111 | −58% |
We left phrasings with a year in them out of these lists, since “2026” rises by itself. Three series that sat at zero for most months with isolated spikes stayed out of every trend and season figure.
SEASONALITY
Not much of
a calendar.
Each month against its centered 12-month average, April 2024 to March 2026. 100 is a normal month.
| Task | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Background | 102 | 99 | 106 | 103 | 105 | 99 | 104 | 100 | 92 | 93 | 93 | 104 |
| Person or face | 102 | 95 | 89 | 93 | 95 | 98 | 100 | 97 | 96 | 106 | 131 | 116 |
| Removal | 100 | 93 | 111 | 100 | 108 | 107 | 113 | 100 | 89 | 95 | 96 | 94 |
| Restyle | 101 | 70 | 80 | 97 | 110 | 116 | 107 | 93 | 109 | 108 | 101 | 99 |
| Text prompt | 112 | 79 | 111 | 81 | 68 | 56 | 67 | 86 | 94 | 118 | 112 | 108 |
| Clothes | 93 | 98 | 150 | 88 | 78 | 65 | 87 | 82 | 84 | 86 | 82 | 91 |
| Product | 92 | 86 | 112 | 79 | 87 | 88 | 102 | 137 | 113 | 120 | 80 | 75 |
Background and Removal show no month that repeated in both cycles.
- Person or face: high in November, December.
- Restyle: low in February, March.
- Text prompt: high in January; low in April, May, June, July.
- Clothes: high in March; low in June.
- Product: high in August; low in November, December.
METHOD
How we built
the table.
- Source
- Ahrefs Keywords Explorer: matching terms and monthly volume history.
- Date of pull
- November 1, 2026
- Country
- United States only.
- How queries were picked
- We ran about 200 seed phrases for the seven tasks, which returned 14,675 unique US keywords. A query had to name video, footage or a clip and match a task by its words: we read the kept list by hand and cut what didn’t belong. 4,044 phrasings stayed.
- How queries were grouped
- By word rules into the seven tasks, each query in one task only. Removing a whole background counts under background work; removing people from a background counts under removal.
- How near-identical phrasings were merged
- Phrasings with the same words in any order, ignoring articles, prepositions and plurals, count once, at their largest volume. That turned 4,044 phrasings into 1,908 merged queries.
- Out of scope
- Watermark or logo removal, audio removal, Teams and Zoom backgrounds, NSFW and undressing terms, “free” face swap, photo-only try-on and photo outfit changers, pure video generators, and the names of other companies’ models and products, phone makers and social apps included. We also left out “deepfake” searches, which mix news with tools, caption and text removal, non-English queries and queries naming real people. We give no volumes for any of these.
- Limits of the data
- Ahrefs volumes are rounded estimates, not measured counts. Summed volumes overlap, since one person can run several of these searches and close variants can share an estimate, so a sum is never a count of people. Search shows what people look for, not what they buy or use. Word rules misfile the odd query. Queries under Ahrefs’ reporting floor show 0.
THE DATA
Take the table
with you.
The CSV gives each task’s totals and its five largest phrasings with their Ahrefs US monthly volume.
To cite it: Aisma analysis of Ahrefs Keywords Explorer data, United States, pulled November 1, 2026.
THE SAME TASKS
On real footage,
with Aisma.
Our own edits, for context. They’re no part of the data above.
QUESTIONS
Reading these
numbers.
Do these numbers count people?
No. They’re Ahrefs estimates of monthly searches, added up across phrasings. One person can run several searches, and close variants can share an estimate, so the sums overlap. Quote them as summed search volume.
Is any of this Aisma user data?
No. Every number comes from Ahrefs. We used nothing from Aisma’s accounts, tasks or analytics.
Why should I trust a study from a company that sells a video editor?
You shouldn’t take it on faith, so we publish the task totals, the top phrasings and the rules behind them. The largest task in the data, removing a background to a transparent file, is one Aisma doesn’t export yet, and the word “free” runs through the list.
Are clothes and product swaps a small market, then?
They’re small as searches in these words. Search can’t tell you how many people want an edit and don’t yet know what to call it, and it says nothing about what they’d pay. That’s as far as this data goes.
Can I quote this or use the table?
Yes, with a link to this page. Please name Ahrefs as the source of the volumes and November 1, 2026 as the date of the pull.
Updated
Questions about
the data?
Write to support@aisma.ai with “Data” in the subject line. Press details are on the about page.