Project File Details¶
Kdenlive projects consist in a singe .kdenlive file (in XML format), gathering :
target video and audio properties
references to all the source materials (and to their lighter proxies work copies)
clips arrangement on the timeline, with effects applied, and everything to get the final result
Project files are associated with a working directory, in which Kdenlive will generate proxies and thumbs, so that an overview of your media always shows up quickly (if you move your project file, you should declare the directory change in the project properties).
When Kdenlive opens a project file that upgrades the document version, like with 20.08.0 or 23.04.0, it automatically creates a backup copy of the original project file. When a project was created with an older document version, like Kdenlive < 20.08.0 or < 23.04.0 and you opened it, look into the project folder. You should have a file called myproject_backup.kdenlive. This is a copy of the original project file before the upgrade and you should be able to open it correctly either with Kdenlive 20.04.x or 22.12.x or the newly release 23.04.0 version.
Otherwise, Kdenlive also keeps a copy of all saved versions of your project files. Go to and you should see a list of the archived versions. More details see Sicherung.
Neu in Version 20.08.0: A major refactoring of the project file fixes a long standing issue with the decimal separator (comma/point) conflict causing many crashes.
Warnung
Projects created with 20.08 forward are not backwards compatible, that is, you won’t be able to open your .kdenlive project files with older versions.
Neu in Version 23.04.0: With introducing sequences the project file version is 1.1 (from 1.04 -> 1.1) and is not backward compatible. Once opened in 23.04 you cannot open the project file in older versions.
Warnung
Projects created with 23.04 forward are not backwards compatible, that is, you won’t be able to open your .kdenlive project files with older versions.