VidovaWhat is a phonk edit? The music, the editing style and where it came from
A phonk edit is a short video cut to drift phonk: a dark grade, hard cuts on the beat, speed ramps into the drop. Where the music came from and how to make one.
Vidova teamLast updated
The short answer
A phonk edit is a short video of cars, sport, gym or anime cut to phonk music, most often drift phonk. It has a dark grade, often red and black, cuts on the beat, speed ramps that nearly stop on a hit, and a hard drop. Phonk is a hip hop subgenre built on 1990s Memphis rap. Drift phonk, a faster style with heavy bass and TR-808 cowbells, came from Russia in the late 2010s and spread on TikTok from 2020.
Key takeaways
- A phonk edit pairs drift phonk with car, sport, gym or anime clips, cut hard on the beat.
- Phonk started as a hip hop subgenre built on Memphis rap. Drift phonk added faster tempos, heavy bass and cowbells.
- Use a track you have the rights to. Phonk tracks belong to their producers like any other song.
What is a phonk edit?
A phonk edit is a short vertical video cut to phonk music, most often to drift phonk. Wikipedia says drift phonk music is often used in videos about weightlifting, drifting, association football, anime, fighting sports and street racing (Wikipedia). Those are the clips a phonk edit is made from.
The editing style follows the music. The intro is dark and slow. The drop of the song hits with a flash and a shake, the cuts after it land on the beat, and a few clips ramp from fast to nearly stopped on a hit. In Vidova, a phonk edit is built the same way as a velocity edit.
What phonk music is
Phonk is a subgenre of hip hop that emerged in the United States in the early 2010s. Wikipedia describes it by its Memphis rap-inspired vocals, chopped and screwed production, and samples from early 1990s hip hop, often with jazz and funk (Wikipedia).
The American rapper and producer SpaceGhostPurrp coined the term. His 2012 debut album is Mysterious Phonk: Chronicles of SpaceGhostPurrp, and he said in an interview that “phonk is slang for funk”, a reference to G-funk. The genre draws on Southern hip hop artists such as DJ Screw, Three 6 Mafia and Tommy Wright III (Wikipedia).
Drift phonk, the sound of the edits
Drift phonk emerged in Russia in the late 2010s. Wikipedia describes it by high bass, TR-808 cowbells and distorted sounds that often make the sampled lyrics hard to recognise, and says its tracks tend to have a faster tempo than other phonk. It gained traction on TikTok in 2020 (Wikipedia).
Three researchers at the University of the Sunshine Coast wrote that the name drift phonk “comes from the marriage of the music with TikTok videos of drift car racing” (UniSC).
As drift phonk spread on TikTok, the word phonk came to mean this subgenre for many listeners. Spotify's curated phonk playlist, released in May 2021, was almost all drift phonk. Mick Kenney, who records as Kordhell and is known for “Murder in My Mind”, is described as the first phonk producer to reach Spotify's top 500 most popular artists (Wikipedia).
| Style | Where and when | Sound |
|---|---|---|
| Phonk | United States, early 2010s | Memphis rap vocals, chopped and screwed production, early 1990s hip hop samples |
| Drift phonk | Russia, late 2010s | High bass, TR-808 cowbells, distortion, faster tempo |
| Funk automotivo | Brazil, popular online by the mid-2020s | A subgenre of Brazilian funk, often called “Brazilian phonk” outside Brazil |
The editing style that goes with it
Vidova's phonk car edit template shows the usual structure. It expects a phonk or heavy trap track at 120 to 160 BPM with a quiet intro and a hard bass drop on a downbeat.
- Intro: slowed car shots behind black bars, an engine start under a riser, and a title in stretched condensed capitals.
- Drop: the bars snap open, the frame flashes white for two frames, the picture shakes and splits, and one red word fills the frame.
- After the drop: every cut sits on the beat, each cut punches in, and every downbeat flashes.
- Ramps: a few shots run fast, nearly stop on a beat and turn red and black while a sub hit lands.
- End: a cut to black on the last downbeat, the title again and a sub hit that ends the song.
The look is black, red and white. The grade pulls colour out and crushes the shadows, so tail lights and the type carry the accent. For a car edit made this way, read how to make a car edit with AI.
How to make a phonk edit in Vidova
- Upload your clips and a phonk track with a clear drop.
- Ask for a phonk edit, with the length, the format and the clip for the drop.
- The agent detects the beats, bars and drop of the song, finds each clip's moment, and fills the phonk car edit or velocity fan edit template.
- Slowed moments get AI smoothing so they do not stutter. The agent previews frames before it reports back.
Make a 20-second vertical phonk edit from my night driving clips and this track. Keep the intro dark, then hit the drop with the drift in clip 5. Cut on every beat after the drop and slow two moments to quarter speed. Red and black look, one word on the drop.
This is an example brief. Use a track you have the rights to: phonk tracks belong to their producers like any song, and YouTube removes videos after valid copyright requests. You can also ask Vidova to generate a track for the edit, which uses credits.
Sources
Learn more
You can start free. Plans and credit costs are on the plans page.
