Can YouTube Shorts Be Longer Than a Minute?

The short version: Yes, YouTube Shorts can be up to three minutes long, a change YouTube rolled out in 2024 and has kept through 2026. The old one-minute limit still exists technically, in that any vertical video under 60 seconds qualifies as a Short, but you're no longer capped at a minute if you want more room to tell a story.

I get people asking me this a lot because the rules changed and nobody told anyone. For years the whole identity of a Short was "under a minute, vertical, square-ish thumbnail." That was the deal. Then YouTube quietly moved the goalposts and a lot of creators are still filming like it's 2023.

What the actual length limits are right now

Here's the bit that trips people up: there are two different things going on.

• Classification: any video 60 seconds or under, filmed or formatted vertically, gets treated as a Short automatically, whether you want it to or not.
• Maximum length: you can now upload a Short that runs up to three minutes. It'll still show up in the Shorts feed, still get the Shorts shelf treatment, still pull from that audience.

So the confusing bit of language in YouTube's own help docs is that "Shorts" now means two things at once: the strict under-60-second format, and the wider up-to-three-minutes format. Both live in the same feed. Both count toward Shorts monetisation. Functionally, for a creator deciding what to film, the number that matters is three minutes, not one.

A worked example: the 90-second tutorial problem

Say you run a small bakery account on YouTube and you want to post a quick recipe tip. Under the old one-minute rule, you'd have had to cut your sourdough-folding demo down to fit 60 seconds, which usually meant speeding up footage or cutting out the bit where you explain why the dough looked wrong in the first place. That's the bit people learn from.

Now, with the three-minute allowance, you film the whole demo at 90 seconds, keep the explanation in, add text captions over the slow parts, and upload it vertically. It still drops into the Shorts feed, still gets the swipe-up browsing behaviour, but you haven't gutted the useful part of the video to hit an arbitrary time limit. That extra 30 seconds is often the difference between a video that gets watched and one that gets finished and rewatched, which matters more to the algorithm than raw view count.

Step by step: how to upload a longer Short

1. Film or edit your video in a vertical 9:16 ratio (1080x1920 is the safe spec).
2. Keep total runtime under three minutes. Anything longer gets treated as a regular long-form upload, not a Short, no matter the aspect ratio.
3. Upload through YouTube Studio or your phone using the same process as any other video, which I've walked through in detail in how to upload a video to YouTube.
4. Add #Shorts in the title or description as a belt-and-braces signal, though YouTube mostly detects it from the aspect ratio and length now.
5. Check the preview before publishing. If it shows up as landscape or square in your library, it won't register as a Short even if it's under three minutes.

Why this matters more than people admit

Most posts on this topic stop at "yes you can go longer now, hooray." What they don't say is that longer Shorts often perform worse, not better, because the audience behaviour in the Shorts feed is built around rapid swiping. People open Shorts expecting a quick hit. If your three-minute video doesn't earn its length in the first ten seconds, the swipe-away rate climbs fast, and a high drop-off on a longer video hurts your average view duration stats more visibly than the same drop-off would on a 20-second clip. In other words, the extended limit is a tool, not an instruction. Using the full three minutes because you can, rather than because the content needs it, is a common way to tank your own numbers while thinking you're doing more for the algorithm.

There's also a format confusion issue worth naming plainly: a lot of creators assume longer Shorts automatically get pushed into the main feed alongside subscriptions and home page recommendations. They don't, by default, which connects to a separate but related frustration I've covered in why the YouTube feed is so short now, since Shorts and regular feed content are still ranked by different signals even after the length change.

Does length affect monetisation?

Shorts monetisation works through the Shorts ad revenue pool rather than mid-roll ads, regardless of whether your video is 15 seconds or 2 minutes 50. That's different from long-form content, where ad placement and watch time both shape payout directly. If you want the full breakdown of how the money works once you're approved, I've laid it out in what YouTube pays once you're monetised. The short version is that going longer doesn't automatically mean more revenue per Short; what matters more is total views and how the revenue pool is split across creators that month.

Practical editing fixes once you have more room

• Use the extra time for context, not padding. One clear example beats three vague ones.
• Keep captions on screen throughout. Most Shorts get watched with sound off, especially on longer ones where people get impatient.
• Avoid awkward zooms and jump cuts just to fill time. If you've ever wondered why your YouTube keeps zooming in, forced pacing to hit a longer runtime is often the cause.
• Test an upload at both 55 seconds and 2 minutes for the same topic if you're unsure which performs better for your audience. Compare swipe-away rate in YouTube Studio, not just total views.
• If a video shows a black screen or fails to render after export, check your codec settings before re-uploading; I've covered common causes in why YouTube shows a black screen.

Where this fits in your wider content plan

If you're building out a content strategy across platforms, it's worth remembering that Shorts still sit under the YouTube umbrella for reporting purposes, which answers a question I see a lot alongside this one: does YouTube count as social media for the purposes of your marketing plan and reporting. It does, and Shorts length decisions should be made with your overall platform mix in mind, not in isolation.

Frequently asked questions

Is the YouTube Shorts limit still 60 seconds in 2026?

No. The 60-second rule now only applies to the strict definition of a Short for classification purposes. The actual upload limit for content that appears in the Shorts feed is up to three minutes.

Will a 2-minute video automatically go into the Shorts feed?

Only if it's filmed or formatted in vertical 9:16 and sits under three minutes total. Landscape videos of any length won't be classified as Shorts.

Does a longer Short earn more money than a short one?

Not automatically. Shorts are paid from a shared ad revenue pool based on views and engagement across the platform, so length alone doesn't increase your payout per video.

Should I always use the full three minutes now that I can?

No. Longer Shorts that don't hold attention in the first few seconds tend to see higher swipe-away rates, which can hurt performance more than keeping the video tight and under a minute.