Keyframes are the engine that drives animation in Premiere Pro. A keyframe marks a specific point in time where a property's value is set, and Premiere interpolates the change between two or more keyframes. Properties such as opacity, position, scale, rotation, and audio volume can all be animated this way. To add the first keyframe, the editor clicks the stopwatch icon next to the property name in the Effect Controls panel, moves the playhead, and changes the value to create a second keyframe. Holding Alt or Option while adding a keyframe isolates the property, removing any prior keyframe at the same time so the new value takes full effect without disturbing neighbors.
Interpolation settings determine how motion feels between keyframes. Linear keyframes produce constant, straight-line changes that can look mechanical, while Auto Bezier or manual Bezier keyframes create smooth ease-in and ease-out curves for more natural movement. Ease-in slows the start of an animation, and ease-out slows the end; both are accessible by right-clicking a keyframe. The Pen tool in the Effect Controls panel allows precise manipulation of bezier handles, giving editors fine control over the rate of change. A motion path is the visible line connecting position keyframes, with straight segments indicating constant speed and curves indicating acceleration or deceleration.
Speed manipulation offers another form of temporal control. The Rate Stretch tool (R) changes a clip's playback speed by dragging its edge, automatically adjusting speed to fit a new duration. Time Remapping goes further, allowing keyframed speed changes, speed ramps, slow motion, and freeze frames within a single clip. A freeze frame holds a single video frame for an extended period and can be created via Insert Frame Hold Segment. When slowing footage, editors can choose between Frame Sampling (which duplicates frames and can appear choppy), Frame Blending (which blends adjacent frames for smoother motion), or Optical Flow (which synthesizes new in-between frames using motion estimation for the highest quality).