YouTube SEO Guides
How YouTube finds and describes your videos: titles, descriptions, tags, hashtags, chapters and metadata. These guides stick to what YouTube documents and say plainly when something is only observed. Each one points to a free tool that checks the same thing on your own video or channel.
14 guides
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YouTube SEO16 min read
YouTube Captions, Subtitles and Translations Explained
YouTube captions, subtitles and translations: how to add captions, why automatic captions vary, translating titles, dubbing, and what the public API shows.
Subtitles/CCYouTube's own name for both
YouTube SEO17 min read
YouTube Analytics Explained: What Each Metric Means
YouTube Analytics explained: what each Studio tab and metric means, which numbers anyone can see, and what our data shows about likes and comments per view.
7 tabsin YouTube Studio Analytics
YouTube SEO8 min read
YouTube Shorts Length and Size: The Current Limits
YouTube Shorts length and size: the 3-minute limit, which videos count as Shorts, vertical or square shapes, 1080p, and how long real Shorts run in our sample.
3 minmaximum length of a Short
YouTube SEO12 min read
YouTube Thumbnail A/B Test: How Test & Compare Works
YouTube thumbnail A/B testing (Test & compare in Help): who can use it, why watch time picks the winner, why tests end with no winner, how to run one.
Up to 3thumbnails or titles in one test
YouTube SEO8 min read
YouTube Video Size, Resolution and Length Limits
YouTube video size explained: resolutions, the 16:9 aspect ratio, recommended encoding settings, file formats, and the 15-minute, 256 GB and 12-hour limits.
16:9YouTube's standard aspect ratio
YouTube SEO10 min read
YouTube Hashtags and Chapters: Rules, Limits and Data
The published rules for YouTube hashtags and chapters, what 3,242 real videos actually do with them, and how to check a live video. No hashtag generator.
60+hashtags and YouTube ignores them all
YouTube SEO5 min read
Do YouTube Tags Still Matter? How to See Them
YouTube Help says tags play a minimal role in discovery. What they are still useful for, and how to see the tags on any public video.
MinimalYouTube Help's word for the role of tags
YouTube SEO5 min read
How to Embed a YouTube Video: Start Time and Privacy
How to copy a YouTube embed code, start it at a set time, turn on privacy-enhanced mode, and what autoplay changes, with the limits YouTube documents.
?start=starts an embed at a chosen second
YouTube SEO5 min read
YouTube SEO Checklist: Titles, Tags and Hashtags
A YouTube SEO checklist built from what YouTube Help actually says about titles, descriptions, tags, hashtags and chapters, and what it does not say.
Title firstthen thumbnail and description, tags last
YouTube SEO5 min read
YouTube Timestamps and Chapters: How to Link to a Moment
How to make a link that starts a YouTube video at a set time, and the rules YouTube publishes for chapters in a description.
?t=90starts a link at a chosen second
YouTube SEO6 min read
YouTube Title and Description Length Limits
The hard limits for a YouTube title and description, what YouTube advises putting first, and why the cut-off points in search and on mobile only approximate.
100 / 5,000characters for a title and a description
YouTube SEO5 min read
YouTube Video Metadata: What Is Public and What Is Not
Upload date, length, view and like counts and tags: what a YouTube video's public metadata contains, shown on a real example, and what stays private.
Public datawhat any viewer can read about a video
YouTube SEO5 min read
How to Find a YouTube Channel ID (and What It Is)
Where to find your own YouTube channel ID in Settings, how to get someone else's from a handle or link, and how an ID differs from a handle.
UC…how a 24-character channel ID begins
Other topics
Free tools for this topic
The tools these guides send you to, ready to run on your own channel or video.
- YouTube Metadata ViewerUpload date, duration, category and full stats for any public video.
- YouTube Hashtag & Chapter ExtractorPull hashtags and chapters from a video's description and check the chapters against YouTube's rules.
- YouTube Tag ExtractorSee the exact tags a video or channel is using, pulled straight from the source.
- YouTube Embed Code GeneratorBuild an embed code with start time, loop, autoplay and hidden controls.