Is a 13 inch macbook pro good enough for video editing?

Pretty much any Intel mac will be able to do this. However, I would probably recommend not dipping below 6GB of RAM and at least an Intel I5 (this is what I would consider my bare-bones minimum to prevent me from throwing it at a wall while it takes 3 days to export a 2 minute clip, YMMV). If you're going to have an external hard drive, the 256GB internal may be enough for you. If not, videos and photos take up a lot of space, you may want to up the anty to about 512GB or even the 1TB depending on how much you plan on editing.

As an FYI, almost any computer can apply edits to a video, what takes the most time is going to be exporting/finalizing your projects.

Regards,

Gnomish8

Depends on the level you're planning on working on. For most people, that would be sufficient. I would like to emphasize, though, that videos/images take up a LOT of space. You may want to look at getting an external drive for some of your data, but that's not something that needs to be done right away.

Now, if you're planning on editing Hollywood style videos, you'll probably end up throwing it against the wall. If you're planning on editing some family videos, or doing some indy stuff, you should be fine. That's not a bad machine, it isn't super high performing by today's standards, but it will get the job done. It's more of a question for you, now:

Do YOU have the patience to, in the event of a day+ export for a heavily edited video, wait for it? Why do you want it right now? Why not wait until you can afford something you know will work for you?

This machine WILL get the job done, for most people, it would be more than enough, but if you're a Formula 1 driver looking to race a Toyota Corolla, you're probably not going to have a good time.

Regards,

Gnomish8

The configuration you're talking about will probably be fine, if you stick to what you mentioned: "I'm not going to be using cutting edge effects just some basic things." I've used my older MacBook Pro for minor video editing and rendering and it's certainly no problem except that it takes a while. These days, video applications like FCP and AFter Effects are seriously accelerated by a proper video card, but like you I don't do serious effects for a living. If you did get serious, I think the choices of compatible GPUs are much wider on PC laptops.

Using a laptop (Mac or PC) for this work will tend to max out the cores and RAM, which will generate a fair amount of heat and make the fans come on noisily, so don't be surprised about that. A Mac Pro or PC tower would be able to do this much more quietly due to having space for a heavy duty cooling system.

I had shot several hundred raw format frames as a time lapse and used After Effects to assemble them into a movie. Not many effects were used but it took several hours. The time lapse is only about 30 seconds long.