Chat story script templates

How to pick a template

Start from what you want the viewer to do, not from the genre name. Each genre does one job well, and the template titles tell you which situation it starts from.

• Drama gets comments: someone is lying and the viewer picks a side. Start with The betrayal.
• Horror keeps people to the end and earns replays. Wrong number and Text from myself hold the question until the last message.
• Comedy gets shared: Dad jokes and Autocorrect strikes are sent to the person they remind you of.
• Romance suits late-night posting. 3 a.m. confession is built around one long pause.
• Mystery sets up a part two: The locked box and The mystery key end on a question, which is how a series starts.
• Family works on recognition. Mom found this and Grandma’s wifi land because every viewer has that family chat.
• Work speaks to the office crowd: Boss at 11pm and Wrong chat are about the message you should never have sent.
• Money starts arguments. Pay me back and Neighbor’s crypto tip are about a debt, and everyone has an opinion on debts.

How long the video will be

A template has five to seven messages. At the default pace a message with its typing indicator takes about three seconds, so the finished videos run from about 16 to 30 seconds: the five-message scripts are the shortest, and the family, work and money ones are among the longest. The editor shows the exact length while you edit.

Under twenty seconds suits a feed that loops, because a short video often gets watched twice. For a minute or more, add steps to the middle rather than backstory at the start, or take a complete story from the chat library: the funny ones run about a minute, the scary ones a minute and a half to two.

Changing names and details

Change the names first. Short, common names read at a glance, and the contact name at the top of the chat is the first thing a viewer sees, so let it say who this person is: Mom, an unknown number, a first name. Then change the one detail that makes the story yours, the place, the object or the time on the clock. Keep the line where the turn happens, and keep the last message short.

Do not use the names or phone numbers of real people. A chat that looks like someone’s real private messages invites reports, and an invented name costs nothing.

Pauses and pace

The pauses already sit where the turn happens, and most are just over a second long. Move a pause only together with its line: before the reveal it builds tension, after the reveal the same pause just slows the video down. In a twenty-second script, anything over two seconds looks like a frozen screen. If the whole video feels slow, change the overall speed in the editor instead of deleting pauses one by one.

Before you export

A quick check that saves a second export:

• The first message makes sense on its own within two seconds.
• Every reveal has its own pause, and no message reveals two things at once.
• The names and the one key detail are yours, not the template’s.
• The last message is short and nothing comes after it.
• The look matches the story: a dark theme for night, a light one for a daytime family chat.
• You have watched it once in the preview at full speed, the way a viewer will.