Arcade.software vs Synthesia.io: Which AI Automation Tool Wins?

Introduction

If you're building AI-powered workflows in 2026, you've probably wondered: which tools can I actually invoke programmatically to create polished content at scale? Two platforms keep coming up in very different contexts — Arcade.software for interactive product demos and Synthesia.io for AI-generated training videos.

On the surface, they seem like apples and oranges. Arcade creates clickable, embeddable product walkthroughs. Synthesia generates video with AI avatars reading scripts. But zoom out to the AI agent perspective — which tool can my agent call via API to produce professional content without a human in the loop? — and the comparison gets fascinating.

This guide breaks down both platforms feature-by-feature, digs into their APIs and SDK support, evaluates how well they integrate with AI agent workflows, and ultimately answers: which one should you pick, and when?

What Is Arcade.software?

Arcade.software is an interactive demo platform that lets teams create product walkthroughs, click-through demos, and branded videos without writing code. More than 20,000 companies use Arcade to tell their product stories, and it claims 7.2x higher engagement compared to traditional video.

How It Works

Arcade captures your product's UI through a Chrome extension or desktop app. You click through your product naturally, and Arcade records each step as an interactive "arcade" — a guided walkthrough viewers can click through at their own pace. You can then enhance it with:

• Synthetic voiceovers — AI-generated narration over each step
• Chapters & branching — non-linear paths for different user journeys
• Hotspots & callouts — highlight specific UI elements
• Camera recording — overlay your face for personal touch
• Forms — collect lead data mid-demo
• Video & GIF export — convert to traditional video formats
• AI Agent updates — keep demos current as your product changes

The result is embeddable anywhere — your website, help docs, sales emails — and viewers interact with it rather than passively watching. Arcade also provides analytics showing who viewed what, how far they got, and where they dropped off.

Target Audience

• Marketing teams — product demos for landing pages (up to 5x trial conversion)
• Sales & pre-sales — personalized demos for prospects (2x+ demo conversion)
• Product teams — adoption flows and feature announcements (30% more activated users)
• Customer success — onboarding guides (saves 3,000+ hours)
• Enablement & training — internal education (10x faster than creating a video)

What Is Synthesia.io?

Synthesia.io is the #1 AI video generation platform, trusted by over 50,000 companies including 90% of the Fortune 100. You type a script, pick an AI avatar, and Synthesia produces a professional video — complete with a realistic human presenter — in minutes.

How It Works

Synthesia's workflow is text-to-video:

1. Write or paste a script (or upload a PDF/document and let AI convert it)
2. Choose an AI avatar from 240+ options (or create a custom one from your own likeness)
3. Select a language — 160+ languages with natural-sounding voiceovers
4. Pick a template from 300+ L&D-ready templates
5. Generate — Synthesia renders the video with the avatar lip-syncing your script
6. Edit like a doc — update text and the video re-renders instantly

Learning & Development Focus

Synthesia's L&D product is where it truly shines. Enterprise L&D teams use it to:

• Replace text-heavy training with engaging video content produced in minutes
• Localize at scale — one-click translation into 29+ languages (one customer did "100 hours of translation in 10 minutes")
• Keep content current — edit videos as easily as editing a Google Doc, no reshoots
• Convert existing materials — turn PDFs, slide decks, and web pages into videos automatically
• Add interactivity — quizzes, branching scenarios, and engagement elements within videos
• Track engagement — built-in analytics on views, watch time, and completion rates

Feature Comparison

Pricing

Arcade.software Pricing

Annual contracts for Growth and Enterprise typically range from $5,000 to $70,000 depending on team size and features. Startups (pre-Series A) can request discounts.

Synthesia.io Pricing

Synthesia's entry point is significantly lower ($18/mo vs $32/mo), but API access — crucial for AI agent integration — requires an Enterprise plan with custom pricing.

AI Agent Integration

This is where it matters most for AI-first teams. Can your agents invoke these tools programmatically?

Arcade.software — Limited API, UI-First

Arcade is primarily a UI-driven tool. Its workflow starts with recording your screen — which inherently requires a human (or at minimum, a browser automation agent clicking through a live product). There is no public REST API for creating arcades from scratch programmatically.

What is available:

• Embed API — JavaScript SDK for embedding arcades with custom triggers, callbacks, and viewer identification
• Integrations — HubSpot, Salesforce, Marketo, Slack, Intercom for distributing and tracking demos
• AI Agent (internal) — Arcade's own AI agent that automatically updates demos when your product UI changes
• Webhooks — Track viewer engagement events

For an AI agent to create an Arcade demo, you'd need to:

1. Use Playwright/Puppeteer to navigate your product
2. Capture screenshots at each step
3. Use Arcade's Chrome extension API (if exposed) or upload screenshots manually
4. This is fragile and not officially supported

Synthesia.io — Full REST API, Agent-Ready

Synthesia offers a comprehensive REST API that's purpose-built for programmatic video generation. This is the clear winner for AI agent integration.

API capabilities:

• Create Video — POST /v2/videos — send a script, avatar ID, language, and template → get a video
• Create from Template — use pre-built templates with dynamic variables for personalized videos at scale
• List/Get Videos — poll for rendering status, download completed videos
• Update/Delete — modify scripts and re-render without starting from scratch
• Avatars API — list available avatars, get avatar details
• Templates API — list templates, get template variables
• Webhooks — get notified when video rendering completes

# Synthesia API — Create a video programmatically
curl -X POST "https://api.synthesia.io/v2/videos" \
  -H "Authorization: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "title": "Q1 Training Update",
    "description": "Auto-generated training video",
    "visibility": "private",
    "input": [{
      "scriptText": "Welcome to the Q1 update. Today we cover...",
      "avatar": "anna_costume1_cameraA",
      "avatarSettings": {
        "voice": "en-US-JennyNeural",
        "horizontalAlign": "center"
      },
      "background": "white_studio"
    }],
    "callbackId": "webhook-123"
  }'

# Python — Full AI Agent Workflow with Synthesia
import requests
import time

SYNTHESIA_API = "https://api.synthesia.io/v2"
HEADERS = {"Authorization": "YOUR_API_KEY"}

# 1. Agent generates script from data
script = generate_training_script(quarterly_data)

# 2. Create video via API
resp = requests.post(f"{SYNTHESIA_API}/videos", headers=HEADERS, json={
    "title": f"Training Update — {today}",
    "input": [{"scriptText": script, "avatar": "anna_costume1_cameraA"}]
})
video_id = resp.json()["id"]

# 3. Poll until rendered
while True:
    status = requests.get(f"{SYNTHESIA_API}/videos/{video_id}", headers=HEADERS).json()
    if status["status"] == "complete":
        download_url = status["download"]
        break
    time.sleep(30)

# 4. Distribute — upload to LMS, email, Slack, etc.
distribute_video(download_url)

Full Automation Workflows

What You Can Fully Automate with Synthesia

1. Daily/weekly training updates — Agent fetches data → writes script → calls Synthesia API → uploads to LMS
2. Onboarding videos per new hire — Triggered by HR system → personalized welcome video with their name and team info
3. Compliance training in 29 languages — Create once, auto-translate, distribute globally
4. Product release videos — Triggered by release notes → auto-generated feature walkthrough
5. Customer-facing updates — API-triggered personalized videos for each account
6. Knowledge base conversion — Agent reads docs → converts to video scripts → batch generates

What You Can Automate with Arcade

1. Demo distribution — Auto-embed relevant demos in support tickets, emails, or help docs via integrations
2. Lead scoring — Track demo engagement → route hot leads to sales via HubSpot/Salesforce
3. Demo freshness — Arcade's built-in AI agent auto-updates demos when your product UI changes
4. Collections — Auto-curate demo playlists based on prospect persona or deal stage

Use Cases — Who Should Pick What

Choose Arcade.software If:

• You need interactive product demos — not passive video
• Your goal is sales enablement — personalized demo links for prospects
• You want viewers to click through your actual product UI
• You need lead capture built into the demo experience
• You're focused on product-led growth and trial conversion
• Your team is comfortable creating demos via the UI (not programmatically)

Choose Synthesia.io If:

• You need scalable video production — hundreds of videos per month
• Your use case is L&D, compliance training, or onboarding
• You need multilingual content at scale (160+ languages)
• You want an AI agent to generate videos programmatically via API
• You need AI avatars as presenters (no on-camera talent needed)
• You're building automated content pipelines triggered by data or events

Use Both Together

They're not mutually exclusive. A powerful combo: use Synthesia for training and onboarding videos (automated at scale) and Arcade for interactive product demos (high-touch sales and marketing). Your AI agent generates training content with Synthesia's API, while your GTM team creates demos with Arcade's UI.

Competitors

Arcade.software Competitors (Interactive Demos)

Synthesia.io Competitors (AI Video Generation)

Pros & Cons

Arcade.software

Synthesia.io

Verdict

The bottom line: These tools solve fundamentally different problems. Arcade creates interactive experiences; Synthesia creates video at scale. For AI agent workflows and full automation, Synthesia's API makes it the only real choice. For human-created, high-engagement product storytelling, Arcade is in a league of its own.

The smartest play? Use both. Let your agents automate training and onboarding with Synthesia. Let your GTM team create killer demos with Arcade. Different tools, different jobs — both excellent at what they do.