Skip to content

Quickstart

There are two ways to start. Choose one.

With an AI agent

Paste this into Claude Code or Codex:

Follow https://manimgx.academa.ai/llms.txt to make me a short animation of a square turning into a circle, and open it.

That's it. The agent installs manimgx, writes the code, makes the video and opens it. To get a different video, change the words after "make me". If the agent asks to use the network or the GPU, allow it.

By hand

1. Install manimgx

If you don't have uv, install it:

curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

powershell -ExecutionPolicy ByPass -c "irm https://astral.sh/uv/install.ps1 | iex"

Then close the terminal and open a new one, so that it finds uv. Make a folder for your videos, with manimgx in it (uv also installs Python 3.14 if you don't have it):

uv init --bare --python 3.14 my-videos
cd my-videos
uv add manimgx

You need Python 3.13 or 3.14. Make a folder for your videos, with a virtual environment, and install manimgx in it:

mkdir my-videos
cd my-videos
python3 -m venv .venv      # Windows: py -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate  # Windows: .venv\Scripts\activate
pip install manimgx

If Windows' PowerShell refuses to run the activate script, allow it once with Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope CurrentUser.

2. Set up your editor

Set up ty in your editor. ty checks your code as you type. It completes manimgx's names, shows what each one does, and underlines many of your mistakes before you make a video.

Install the ty extension. Cursor, Windsurf and the other editors made from VS Code have it in their Extensions view too. Then open your folder, my-videos, with File > Open Folder.

Zed includes ty. To turn it on, open your settings file (Cmd+Alt+, on a Mac, Ctrl+Alt+, on Windows and Linux), and paste these lines right after its first {:

  "languages": {
    "Python": {
      "language_servers": ["ty", "!basedpyright", "..."]
    }
  },

Then open your folder, my-videos, with File > Open.

ty finds manimgx in the folder's .venv, which step 1 made.

3. Write a scene

In your folder, make a file named scene.py, and write this code in it:

scene.py
import manimgx as m


class SquareToCircle(m.Scene):
    def construct(self) -> None:
        square = m.Square(side_length=3, color=m.BLUE, fill_opacity=0.5)
        circle = m.Circle(radius=1.6, color=m.PINK, fill_opacity=0.5)
        self.play(m.Create(square))
        self.play(m.Transform(square, circle))
        self.wait()

4. Preview it

Open your editor's terminal (Ctrl+`), and run:

uv run manimgx preview scene.py

With uv, start every manimgx command with uv run. The rest of these docs write the commands without it.

manimgx preview scene.py

In a new terminal, activate the environment first, as in step 1.

A window plays your scene. Put it next to your editor. Each time that you save scene.py, the window plays the new version. Try it: change m.PINK to m.YELLOW, and save.

5. Make the video

uv run manimgx render scene.py

manimgx render scene.py

manimgx writes the video, SquareToCircle.mp4, next to scene.py. It's the video above the code in step 3. For a tall video (Shorts, Reels, TikTok), add -r 1080x1920.

You are ready. Next, The basics explains how a scene makes a video.