Teleprompter with camera: how to choose one and set it up

“Teleprompter with camera” gets used for three different things: a phone app that records while it prompts, a glass rig that sits in front of a separate camera, and a browser prompter that shows your webcam behind the words. Only the first one reads and records in one device, and it is what most people searching for a teleprompter with camera want. Below: how to tell a good one from a frustrating one in two minutes, and how to set it up so the video does not look read.

What “teleprompter with camera” means

All three solve one problem — keeping your eyes near the lens while you read — in very different ways.

The glass rig gives the best eye line, because the camera sits behind the words. It also needs a second device, a mirrored display and some assembly — how to mirror a teleprompter for glass covers that. For one person filming themselves, the phone app is the setup that actually gets used.

Teleprompter app with video recording: four checks

Most prompter apps look alike in a store listing. The differences show up in the first take, and these four decide whether you keep using one.

1. Where the text sits relative to the lens

This is the check that matters most and gets the least attention. A viewer reads your eye line from the angle between where you look and where the lens is. With the phone at arm’s length, about 60 centimetres, reading a line 10 centimetres below the camera turns your gaze down by about 9.5 degrees; reading a line 2 centimetres below it, by about 2. That is arithmetic (the arctangent of the two distances), not a study, but it is why an app that scrolls text across the whole screen makes you look like you are reading and one that keeps a short band under the lens does not. The longer explanation is in why teleprompter videos still look like reading.

Turn the phone on its side as part of this check. In landscape the front camera is on a short edge, and an app whose text stays at the top of the screen is now reading you sideways, away from the lens.

2. It records while it scrolls, and starts both together

Some “teleprompter” apps only scroll text. A teleprompter app with video recording starts the scroll and the recording from one tap, ideally after a countdown. Two follow-ups: can you change the speed mid-take without the text jumping, and does the script stay out of the recorded file? The words should be on your screen, not burned into your video.

3. Export, resolution and watermark

Save a take to your gallery and look at it before you record anything important: the corners, the last two seconds, and the resolution. A logo stamped on the free tier, or an end card you did not ask for, is common in this category. What to look for, app by app, is in teleprompter apps with free export and no watermark.

4. What happens if the app is killed mid-take

A phone call, a low-battery shutdown or the system closing the app to free memory can end a recording without warning. Many apps lose the entire file when that happens, because a video is only finalised on a clean stop. The test takes four minutes and is described in does a teleprompter app save your video if it crashes. For anything longer than a minute, it is worth running before you need it.

The two-minute test

Install, paste a paragraph of your real script, and run through this before committing to an app:

Front camera or back camera?

The back camera on most phones has a better sensor and copes better in low light. It also points away from the screen, so the teleprompter is on the side you cannot see. You have three ways round that:

• Stay on the front camera. At 1080p it is sharp enough for every social platform, and it is the only option where one device shows the script and records. Light makes more difference than the sensor — face a window.
• A second screen beside the lens. Record on the back camera and put a tablet or a second phone running a prompter right beside it. The eye line suffers unless the text is very close to the lens.
• A glass rig. The back-camera phone (or a proper camera) sits behind beam-splitter glass, and a second device under the glass shows the script mirrored. Best eye line, most setup. Why the text is mirrored is worth reading before you buy one.

How to set up a teleprompter with camera

1. Phone at eye level, lens at eye height. A tripod with a phone clamp is ideal; a stack of books works.
2. Arm’s length away, 60 to 90 centimetres, for a chest-up frame. Further away hides eye movement better but needs larger text.
3. Light in front of you. Face a window or put a lamp behind the phone. A bright window behind you turns your face into a silhouette.
4. Paste a script written for speaking. Short sentences, a blank line between ideas so you have a visible place to breathe. How to write a teleprompter script has the format.
5. Shrink the reading area to the camera edge and enlarge the text — three to six words a line in portrait, which on most phones is around 30 to 40 points.
6. Set the speed from your own voice. Read your script aloud for exactly 20 seconds, count the words and multiply by three. Most people land between 120 and 160 words a minute; the method and the reasons to err slow are in the best teleprompter speed.
7. Read it through once without recording and rewrite the two or three lines that trip you.
8. Record in sections of a minute or two, with a two-second pause before and after each, so you have clean places to cut.

The full version of this, with the reasons behind each step, is the guide to how to use a teleprompter on your phone; framing, light and sound for the same setup are in the talking-head video setup for a phone.

On a laptop or webcam

On a computer the webcam usually feeds another program — Zoom, Teams, OBS or a screen recorder — and the teleprompter only has to put words under the lens. The free online teleprompter does that in any browser, with an optional camera view behind the text for checking your framing; the view is a preview, not a recording. Desktop options are compared in teleprompter for Mac and PC.

Doing it in Orate

Orate is ours, and it is a teleprompter with camera in the first sense: it reads and records on the same iPhone, iPad or Android phone.

• The script scrolls in a band directly under the front camera — 45% of the screen to start, adjustable from 15% to the full screen — and when you turn the phone the band moves to whichever edge the lens is on, so landscape works like portrait. Text starts at 34 points and runs from 18 to 96.
• One tap starts both. After a countdown the recording starts and the script starts scrolling with it. You can change the pace mid-take without losing your place, and the script never appears in the recorded file.
• Front or back camera, plus a prompter-only mode for rehearsing and an audio-only mode for voiceovers.
• Free: recording up to 1080p, saving and sharing with no watermark, crash-safe takes — if the app is killed mid-take you keep the take except at most its last two seconds — and three saved scripts.
• Pro adds 4K, 60fps, HDR, unlimited scripts and Follow my voice, which scrolls at your speaking pace using on-device speech recognition and keeps following while it records on iPhone. There is a three-day free trial; the store listing has the current price.

Afterwards you can trim the take and crop it to Vertical 9:16, Portrait 4:5, Square 1:1 or Landscape 16:9. What Orate does not do: it has no captions, no remote or Bluetooth clicker control, and no desktop app.

Questions people ask

What is a teleprompter with camera?

Usually it means a phone or tablet app that scrolls your script on screen and records video at the same time, with the text placed next to the front camera so you can read while looking close to the lens. The term is also used for glass teleprompter rigs that sit in front of a separate camera, and for browser prompters that show a camera preview behind the words.

Is there a free teleprompter app that records video?

Yes. Orate’s free tier records up to 1080p with the script under the front camera and saves without a watermark, with three saved scripts. CapCut and Instagram’s Edits also have prompters built into their cameras, covered in our guides to the CapCut teleprompter and the Edits teleprompter. Whatever you pick, save a test take to your gallery and check it for logos first.

Does the script show up in the recorded video?

In a well-made teleprompter app it does not: the scrolling text is drawn over the camera preview on your screen, and the recording contains only the camera image and your audio. Test it once by saving a short take and opening it in your gallery app. If the words appear in the file, the app is recording the screen rather than the camera.

Can I use a teleprompter with the back camera?

Only if you can see the script some other way, because the back camera faces away from the screen. The options are a second device showing the prompter beside the lens, or a beam-splitter glass rig with a mirrored display. For one person talking to camera, the front camera with the text right under the lens is simpler and good enough at 1080p.

How far away should the phone be when recording with a teleprompter?

About an arm’s length, 60 to 90 centimetres, for a chest-up frame, with the lens at eye height. Further away makes eye movement harder to see but means the text has to be larger to read. Closer makes every glance down more obvious, so keep the reading area small and right under the camera.