Who Benefits from 3-Minute YouTube Shorts?

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Back in 2021 YouTube launched “Shorts”, a new feed on the website that consists of sub-60 second videos that have a vertical video format. Since the launch of this new format, YouTube has seemingly pushed this type of content heavily both to viewers and to creators. Now they are extending the maximum length of Shorts from 60-seconds to 3 minutes.

In order to have a short that is longer than 60 seconds, you need to ensure that you have still use a vertical aspect ratio or a square aspect ratio. If your video is sub 3-minutes and it is in a horizontal aspect ratio, it will be published as a regular video and will not be captured by the Shorts Feed.

Why Do I Think They’re Doing This?

I think it’s as simple as: the content creators on YouTube have been asking for longer upload lengths because currently YouTube has the shortest limit at 60-seconds. Instagram allows reels to be up to 90-seconds, and TikTok now allows videos to be up to 60-minutes. So this allows video producers to make a single 90-second video for all 3 platforms without the need to find a way to shave off an additional 30 seconds from their instagram reel.

Who Will Benefit From This?

I think the primary beneficiary will long form video creators on YouTube who have struggled to find ways to make valuable content that fits within that 59 second time constraint. With the additional two minutes it will be much easier to develop a fully executed video idea that offers value to the viewers.

The reason I think this will benefit us is because YouTube has been pushing Shorts heavily for the last 3 years. I have received notifications in YouTube Studio stating something along the lines of: [We’ve noticed creators who publish shorts are growing faster]. So with the extended time limit for short creators like myself will now have easier access to this feed, and HOPEFULLY access to those potential growth opportunities.

But Now YouTube Confuses Me.

Prior to 2021 YouTube was simple. You just had videos and that was it. If your video needed to be 30 seconds, 90 seconds, 5 minutes, 30 minutes, or 12 hours you knew what to do; upload your video and it would be distributed to your audience. But following the introduction of shorts it became a question of: “Do I produce my long form videos, or do I produce short form videos? Does publishing short form videos hurt or harm my channel? Do people want short form or long form? What is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything?” See…Confusing.

Well now it’s more confusing. When you make a 2 minute 59 second video you need to ask yourself: “Do I want this to be on the regular feed or on the shorts feed? Which audience will like this better? Which feed will benefit the channel more? Do I even know what each feed is doing or am I just guessing completely and wishing for the best?”

So in my eyes the Shorts feed is no longer made up of short form content, it really is just vertical video that is automatically fed to the viewer.

Conclusion

Even though I find that this confuses YouTube, I am excited to try this because I have struggled to make valuable shorts even though YouTube has clearly communicated how important shorts are. However, there is one question that remains unasked: Do the viewers of shorts content on YouTube even want longer videos?

Additional reading/viewing