YouTube

YouTube’s TikTok-style ‘Shorts’ coming to US in March

Damien Wilde | Feb 17 2021 - 6:49 am PT

After initially only rolling out the feature to India in beta, YouTube has confirmed that its TikTok-style “Shorts” video feature will be coming to the US in March.

The rise in popularity of TikTok and its Vine-copycat looping videos over the past 18 months has been one that will have no doubt been a concern to the powers that be at YouTube. We’ve seen Instagram tackle TikTok head-on with its own “Reels” feature with some success.

However, YouTube Shorts will likely help creators tap into their audiences directly from within YouTube, leveraging an existing subscriber base while also sitting alongside longer-form content and media. Clearly, the Indian beta phase for YouTube Shorts has been a success with a whopping 3.5 billion daily global views for the shorter-form content.

Every year, increasing numbers of people come to YouTube to launch their own channel. But we know there’s still a huge amount of people who find the bar for creation too high. That’s why we’re working on Shorts, our new short-form video tool that lets creators and artists shoot snappy videos with nothing but their mobile phones.
Currently, Shorts is available in beta in India. Since the beginning of December, the number of Indian channels using Shorts creation tools has more than tripled, and the YouTube Shorts player is now receiving more than 3.5 billion daily views globally. In the coming weeks, we’ll begin expanding the beta to the US, unlocking our tools to even more creators so they can get started with Shorts.

US creators will therefore be able to start uploading Shorts from the YouTube mobile app in March. The beta is set to expand, but this is not a “full” rollout. You can upload from your camera roll, record directly from your camera, add audio/music, and adjust the playback speed. It’s a pretty standard affair.

There was no confirmation of YouTube Shorts rolling out wider than India and the US, but expect to see your subscription and home feeds filled with even more obnoxious influencers than ever before.