Final Draft ends at the script. Decoupage keeps going.
Final Draft is the best-known screenwriting app in the business, and it earned that. But when the script is done, it hands you a file and stops. Everything after — the breakdown, the board, the schedule, the call sheets — happens somewhere else, in something else, that you buy separately.
Decoupage does the whole run in one Mac app, out of one document.
THE DIFFERENCE IN ONE PICTURE
Two apps, or one.
The Final Draft way
- Write the screenplay.
- Tag every element by hand in Tagger.
- Export a
.sexfile. - Buy Movie Magic Scheduling — a subscription, every year.
- Build the stripboard there.
- Find a third tool for call sheets.
Change a scene? Start the export again.
The Decoupage way
- Write the screenplay.
- The breakdown is already extracted.
- Stripboard, in the same app.
- Shooting schedule and Day Out of Days.
- Call sheets, ready to send.
Same app. Same file. Nothing exported. Change a scene and everything downstream already knows.
SIDE BY SIDE
What each one actually does.
| Final Draft 13 | Decoupage | |
|---|---|---|
| Professional screenplay editor | ✓ The industry benchmark | ✓ Industry-standard formatting, dual dialogue |
| Real-time pagination & print-perfect PDF | ✓ | ✓ |
| Revisions for production | ✓ Revision Mode, WGA-standard colored pages | ✓ Revision marks with carry-forward alerts |
| Script breakdown | Tag by hand in Tagger | ✓ Auto-extracted from the script |
| Color-coded stripboard | — Export to Movie Magic | ✓ Built in |
| Shooting schedule & Day Out of Days | — Export to a separate app | ✓ Built in |
| Call sheets | — Separate tool | ✓ Built in |
| Works with Final Draft files | ✓ Native .fdx | ✓ Imports and exports .fdx and Highland |
| Private, on-device reads | — | ✓ Craft checks & scene digests, on your Mac |
| Platform | ✓ Mac & Windows | Mac only (Apple Silicon) |
THE HONEST PART
Where Final Draft still wins.
It's on Windows. Decoupage is Mac only, and Apple Silicon only. If you're on a PC, or on an Intel Mac, this isn't a choice you get to make.
.fdx is the industry's handshake. Every production office, every agency, every contest expects it. Decoupage reads and writes it — but Final Draft is it.
Decades of trust. When a showrunner says "send me the Final Draft," they mean it literally. That's worth something no feature list changes.
Movie Magic is the standard on big shows. If you're scheduling a studio picture with a full AD team, that's the room it's built for. Decoupage is built for the indie and the writer-director — the shoot where the person breaking down the script is the person who wrote it.
THE MATH
Script to schedule — what it costs.
The Final Draft path
Final Draft 13 — $249.99, plus $129.99 for each upgrade.
Movie Magic Scheduling — $279.88 a year. There is no version you can buy outright.
Year one: about $530. Year three: about $1,090. And it keeps going, whether you shoot anything or not.
Prices as of July 2026. Final Draft frequently discounts; the Movie Magic rate above is the standard one, not the introductory offer.
The Decoupage path
Decoupage — $79.99.
Year one: $79.99. Year three: $79.99.
No subscription. No account. No upgrade cycle. Updates are free.
IF YOU WRITE IT AND YOU SHOOT IT
Decoupage is built for you.
If someone else breaks down your script, schedules it, and sends the call sheets, Final Draft plus Movie Magic is a reasonable way to live.
If that person is you — you write it, you board it, you're the one up at midnight rebuilding the schedule because a location fell through — then every export between two apps is a place for your day to go wrong.
Decoupage is one document, from the first slugline to the call sheet.
$79.99, once. Mac. No subscription.
