Palmier Pro is an open-source, Swift-native video editor for macOS designed from the ground up around AI-assisted editing. Built by the Y Combinator-backed Palmier team, it lets a user and an AI agent generate and edit video together directly inside a professional timeline. With more than 8,000 GitHub stars under the GPL-3.0 license, it stands out as one of the few native desktop creative tools that treats an AI agent as a first-class collaborator rather than a bolt-on chatbot. ## A Native Editor Aiming at Premiere Pro Unlike the many web-based or Electron-wrapped AI video tools, Palmier Pro is written from scratch in Swift as a true macOS-native application. The team's stated north star is Adobe Premiere Pro, and the editor provides a familiar multi-track timeline experience while layering an AI workflow on top. Because it is native to Apple Silicon, it can lean on the platform's media frameworks for responsive playback and editing rather than fighting browser limitations. The trade-off is platform exclusivity: it currently requires macOS 26 (Tahoe) on Apple Silicon and runs nowhere else. ## Generative AI Inside the Timeline The headline capability is in-timeline generative AI. Users can generate video and image clips with state-of-the-art models — including Seedance, Kling, and Nano Banana Pro — without leaving the editor or juggling separate web tools. Generated assets land directly on the timeline where they can be trimmed, sequenced, and composited alongside imported footage. This keeps the creative loop tight: prompt, generate, place, and refine all happen in one window, which is a meaningful workflow improvement over copying outputs between disparate apps. ## Agent Collaboration Over MCP Palmier Pro exposes an MCP server at a local HTTP endpoint whenever the app is open, allowing external agents such as Claude Code, Codex, or Cursor to operate on the same project the user is editing. A few CLI commands wire Claude Code or Codex to the editor, and the app bundles a one-click Desktop Extension for Claude Desktop. There is also an in-app agent for users who prefer to stay inside the application. In practice this means a user can ask an agent to assemble a rough cut, adjust pacing, or generate B-roll, and watch those changes appear live in the timeline — a genuinely collaborative human-plus-agent editing model. ## Open Source Scope and Licensing The project is deliberate about what is and is not open. The video editor itself — including the timeline, the MCP server, and the agent chat — is fully open source under GPL-3.0, so anyone can download and use it as a free editor comparable to CapCut or Premiere with no login required. The only closed-source component is the generative AI processing backend, which powers the model-based generation features and requires login and a subscription. This split lets the core editor remain genuinely open while sustaining the compute-heavy generative features commercially. ## Considerations The biggest limitation is reach: Palmier Pro is macOS-only and specifically targets macOS 26 on Apple Silicon, leaving Windows, Linux, and Intel Mac users without access. The most attention-grabbing capability — generative video and image creation — sits behind a paid subscription, so the free open-source editor, while fully functional as a timeline tool, does not include the SOTA generation features out of the box. As a young YC-stage project the surrounding ecosystem and stability are still maturing. For Apple Silicon creators who want a native, agent-aware editor with generative AI built into the timeline, however, Palmier Pro offers a distinctive and rapidly evolving take on the future of video editing.