What Is YouTube Shorts? Specs, Where Shorts Appear, How the Feed Works and How to Start

What is a YouTube Short?

A YouTube Short is a square or vertical video of up to three minutes that plays in the Shorts feed, where viewers swipe from one video to the next. YouTube describes the feed as a never-ending stream of short videos, personalized to what each viewer is likely to want next. Shorts are part of YouTube itself, so one channel can publish Shorts, long videos and live streams side by side.

YouTube announced Shorts in September 2020 with a beta in India, when a Short was 15 seconds or less, and brought the beta to the United States in March 2021. Since 15 October 2024 a square or vertical video on a standard channel can run up to three minutes and still be a Short. On 23 September 2026 YouTube began rolling out Shorts series to creators, which group Shorts into seasons and episodes with sequential playback.

How is a Short different from a regular YouTube video?

A YouTube Short differs from a regular video in its frame and length, the player it plays in, and how its views count and earn. A Short is square or vertical and three minutes at most; anything wider or longer is published as a regular video.

• Player: a Short plays in the Shorts player, one after another; a regular video opens on a watch page with Up Next suggestions.
• Watch hours: watch time from Shorts in the Shorts feed does not count toward the 4,000 watch hours of the YouTube Partner Program; Shorts have their own route, measured in qualified Shorts views.
• Earnings: a Short earns from the ads shown between videos in the Shorts feed, pooled every month and separate from the ads on a regular video's watch page.
• Channel: Shorts and long videos sit on the same channel, and YouTube says Shorts performance doesn't negatively impact long-form recommendations.

How does YouTube decide that a video is a Short?

YouTube decides whether a video is a Short by its shape and length: on a standard channel, any video uploaded on or after 15 October 2024 with a square or vertical aspect ratio and a length of up to three minutes is categorized as a Short (for Official Artist Channels the date is 8 December 2025). You do not pick the category; it follows from the file.

Videos uploaded before that date stay long-form videos, so a two-minute vertical video from before then is still a regular video. To keep a new vertical clip out of Shorts, YouTube suggests a wider aspect ratio such as 16:9. The limits YouTube lists for Shorts, as of October 2026:

• Aspect ratio: square or vertical.
• Length: up to three minutes.
• Resolution: up to 1080p.
• Title: up to 100 characters.

Where do YouTube Shorts appear?

YouTube Shorts appear in the Shorts feed, on a Shorts shelf on the home page, in search results, on channel pages, in the Subscriptions feed and in notifications, on phones, computers and the YouTube app for most smart TVs, game consoles and streaming devices. Each place picks Shorts its own way:

• Shorts feed (Shorts at the bottom of the app, or on the left of the website): ranked by each Short's performance and its relevance to the viewer.
• Home page: a Shorts shelf with the Shorts YouTube thinks a viewer is most likely to enjoy.
• Subscriptions: the latest Shorts from the channels a viewer subscribes to.
• Search: ranked by how well the title and other details match the search, and by whether viewers click and watch.
• Channel pages: your Shorts are featured on your channel's home page.
• Sounds and hashtags: using a popular sound from YouTube's Audio Library can raise a Short's chance of appearing on that sound's page, and each hashtag links to a page of videos that share it.

How does YouTube decide which Shorts to show?

YouTube matches each viewer with the Shorts they are most likely to watch and enjoy, so a Short is ranked by how viewers respond to it and how well it fits their interests, not by its format. YouTube says its system has no opinion about what type of Shorts you make.

For the viewer, it looks at the Shorts and channels they enjoyed before, the topics they watch and the trending songs or sounds they engaged with. For the Short, it looks at what happens when it is shown: whether people choose to watch it, ignore it or tap Not interested, how much of it they watch, and whether they enjoyed it, judged from likes and post-watch surveys.

Some reach is outside your control: YouTube names interest in the topic, competition from other channels' Shorts and the time of year.

YouTube Studio Analytics shows the first step for your Shorts: how many times each was shown in the Shorts feed, and the percentage of times viewers chose to view it rather than swipe away. Our guide to going viral on YouTube Shorts explains what to do with those numbers.

How big is YouTube Shorts?

YouTube Shorts averages more than 200 billion views a day, according to YouTube. CEO Neal Mohan announced the figure in June 2025 (YouTube's creator site dates it to April 2025), and YouTube repeated it in January and August 2026; as of October 2026 it is the latest daily figure.

The latest official audience number is older: in September 2023 YouTube said Shorts had over 70 billion daily views from over 2 billion signed-in users every month. YouTube changed how Shorts views are counted on 31 March 2025, between the two figures, so they may not be like for like.

Since 31 March 2025 a Shorts view counts every time a Short starts to play or replay, with no minimum watch time, and since 24 August 2026 every format counts a view the moment a video starts. Partner Program earnings still use engaged views and eligibility uses qualified views, not the public count.

How do you watch, create and upload Shorts on a phone or a computer?

On a phone you watch Shorts by tapping Shorts at the bottom of the YouTube app and make them with the Shorts camera or by uploading a video; on a computer you click Shorts on the left of the YouTube website to watch, and upload in YouTube Studio.

These are the mechanics; for what makes a Short worth watching, from the first line to the captions, see our guide to creating YouTube Shorts from scratch.

• Watch on a phone: open the YouTube app, tap Shorts and swipe to the next one. Live streams can appear there too.
• Watch on a TV: open the YouTube app and press down for the next Short, up for the previous one. The Shorts player may not work on some devices released before 2019.
• Record on a phone: tap Create, then Short, and record one or more clips that add up to three minutes. The Shorts camera is not available on tablets for now.
• Upload on a phone: tap Create, then Upload a video, and pick a square or vertical video; Edit into a Short trims a longer one. The YouTube Studio app uploads Shorts too.
• Upload on a computer: in YouTube Studio, click Create, then Upload videos, and pick square or vertical files of up to three minutes, up to 15 at a time.
• From your own long video: on the watch page of a public video you uploaded, tap Remix, then Edit into a Short, and use up to 60 seconds of it; the Short links back to the original.

YouTube Shorts vs TikTok vs Instagram Reels: how do the platforms differ?

YouTube Shorts, TikTok and Instagram Reels are all feeds of short vertical videos; the main difference is where each one lives. Shorts are part of YouTube and sit next to long videos; Reels are part of Instagram; TikTok is its own app built around the For You feed.

One vertical video can go to all three. Upload the original file to each rather than a copy saved from another app with its watermark, and write the title and caption for each platform; our guide to Instagram Reels covers that side.

• YouTube Shorts: square or vertical, up to three minutes, on the same channel as your long videos, which a Short can link to as a related video once the channel has advanced features. Shorts earn from the ads between them once the channel is in the YouTube Partner Program, and YouTube says they can help discovery but can't hurt your long videos.
• Instagram Reels: clips can add up to 20 minutes, but Instagram says reels over three minutes won't be recommended to new audiences, and that it is less likely to recommend reposts of reels already on Instagram and content with noticeable watermarks.
• TikTok: its For You feed is, in TikTok's words, a stream of videos curated to your interests, and TikTok said in 2020 that follower count is not a direct factor in its recommendations.

Can you make money from YouTube Shorts?

YouTube Shorts can make money: channels in the YouTube Partner Program that accept the Shorts Monetization Module earn a share of the revenue from ads shown between videos in the Shorts feed, and Shorts can also earn from YouTube Premium, Super Thanks, products tagged through YouTube Shopping and brand deals.

As of October 2026, joining through Shorts takes 1,000 subscribers and 10 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days; in the countries where the expanded program runs, fan funding and Shopping open at 500 subscribers, three valid public uploads in 90 days and 3 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days. From 1 February 2027 new applicants need 1,000 subscribers and 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days (or 8,000 watch hours in 365 days), and earning from the Shorts Creator Pool each month needs 10 million qualified Shorts views over the last 90 days.

Shorts feed ad revenue is pooled each month, part of it covers music licensing, and the rest, the Creator Pool, is shared by each creator's share of engaged views in each country; creators keep 45% of what is allocated to them. Only engaged views of original, advertiser-friendly Shorts count. Our guide to monetizing YouTube Shorts covers every route.

How do you start a YouTube Shorts channel without showing your face?

You start a faceless Shorts channel by letting a voice, captions and pictures carry each Short instead of a person on camera. What YouTube's monetization policies ask for is original, authentic content: your own creation, not mass-produced, generic or repetitive.

A simple plan:

• Pick one subject you could make a hundred Shorts about, and one format viewers will recognize, such as one fact or one story per Short.
• Choose one voice and one look, and keep them across the channel.
• Build each Short around one idea with the payoff in the first seconds; our creation guide has the steps.
• Keep every Short different in substance: YouTube's inauthentic content policy names image slideshows and templated storylines with minimal or no narrative or educational value, and AI content made from generic templates that gives the impression of mass production.
• Answer Yes to AI use in YouTube Studio when a Short makes a real person appear to say or do something they did not, or shows a realistic scene that did not happen; YouTube says disclosing won't limit a video's audience or its eligibility to earn money.
• After a day or two, check how many viewers chose to view each Short, and rework the opening of the next one if that share is low.
• Publish on a schedule you can keep; YouTube says no minimum posting cadence is required for Shorts to perform well.

How does FacelessCast make a faceless Short?

FacelessCast makes a whole Short from one sentence you type: a hook-first script, an AI voice, a picture under every line, word-synced captions and music, delivered as a vertical MP4 with no watermark that you upload yourself.

You describe the Short in the studio chat and see the plan and its price before anything starts; planning is free, including a storyboard of the scenes. Scenes are real stock footage, or AI video where every scene moves. Stock-footage Shorts are unlimited on every plan, from $10 a month, within a fair-use limit of 10 videos a day on Starter; an AI video Short uses credits, about 140 for 30 seconds at standard quality. Narration comes in 37 languages, and every Short comes with a publish kit: title options, a description, hashtags and tags.

What it does not do: it does not upload or post to YouTube for you, cut clips from an existing long video, clone your voice or recreate a real person's face. There is no free plan.

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