✳ FREE SPEC CHEAT SHEET
YouTube Shorts video spec cheat sheet
Shorts reserves less overlay space than TikTok or Reels - mainly the subscribe button and progress bar at the bottom - but the title is a separate, indexable field that matters for search as much as the caption does.
- Resolution
- 1080 x 1920px
- Aspect ratio
- 9:16 or 1:1
- Max length
- up to 3 minutes
- Max file size
- 256 GB overall upload cap; Shorts duration rules still apply
- Caption limit
- 5,000 characters
- Title limit
- 100 characters
- Safe zone
- Covered by the app interface: top 15%, bottom 35%, left 4.4%, right 17.8%. Safe zone overlay
Frequently asked
What aspect ratio does YouTube Shorts use?
YouTube Shorts is built around 9:16 or 1:1. Shorts reserves less overlay space than TikTok or Reels - mainly the subscribe button and progress bar at the bottom - but the title is a separate, indexable field that matters for search as much as the caption does.
What's the max video length on YouTube Shorts?
up to 3 minutes (180 seconds).
What's the caption character limit on YouTube Shorts?
YouTube Shorts caps captions at 5,000 characters, with a separate 100-character title field.