YouTube has established itself as the benchmark platform for broadcasting audiovisual content, particularly music. By 2025, more than 2 billion monthly active users will be watching videos on YouTube, a significant proportion of which will be music-related, according to Statista. Official clips, live sessions, lyric videos or visual animations, YouTube allows artists and visual creators to showcase their work.
Unlike platforms focused on short-form content such as TikTok or Instagram Reels, YouTube offers a user experience based on attention span. What’s more, the platform takes into account qualitative criteria such as retention rate, video resolution and audio stability, encouraging creators to produce technically polished content.
YouTube technical sheet
File format: MP4
Video codec: H.264
Audio codec: AAC
Ratio: 16:9 (standard), 9:16 (shorts)
Resolution: 1080p minimum, 4K recommended
Video bitrate: 8 to 12 Mbps (1080p), more for 4K
Frame rate: 24 / 30 / 60 fps depending on the project
Recommended resolutions, ratios and encodings
Standard aspect ratio: 16:9
The 16:9 ratio has been the standard format universally adopted on YouTube since 2009. It corresponds to the dimensions of modern screens (1920 x 1080 px in Full HD) and guarantees perfect compatibility with the platform’s native player, without the addition of black bands or automatic cropping. It makes full use of the visual space available, while ensuring good readability on both desktop and mobile devices.
From an algorithmic point of view, YouTube prioritises viewing comfort, which influences retention, and therefore ranking in results and recommendations. Using 16:9 also means ensuring that the video can be easily re-used on other platforms such as Facebook or Vimeo, which support this ratio without alteration. To date, over 90% of videos published on YouTube retain this format, making it an implicit standard for all professional content.
Vertical ratio (9:16) for YouTube Shorts
Since the introduction of YouTube Shorts in 2021, the 9:16 ratio (full-screen vertical format) has become essential for capturing the mobile audience. This format, identical to that of TikTok or Instagram Reels, responds to the current use of vertical scrolling and the rapid consumption of short content.
On YouTube, Shorts are automatically displayed in 9:16 and are favoured by a separate algorithm designed to maximise engagement with videos of less than 60 seconds. For visual artists and designers, this ratio is particularly suited to music video extracts, dynamic typographic animations or illustration teasers. It enables short, punchy content to be broadcast, perfectly suited to frictionless mobile consumption.
In 2024, according to Google, more than 50 billion views per day will be generated on Shorts, illustrating the opportunity that this format represents. Integrating 9:16 into a YouTube strategy means meeting the expectations of the mobile audience, while at the same time promoting native virality.
Resolutions accepted
YouTube supports a wide range of resolutions, but some offer a better compromise between visual quality, file size and accessibility. Today, 1080p (Full HD) is the minimum recommended resolution to guarantee clear rendering on the majority of screens, particularly mobile phones and laptops. It is also the resolution most commonly used on the platform.
For more ambitious projects, 2K (1440p) or 4K (2160p) offers superior image depth and better encoding for YouTube processing. These resolutions enhance the perception of quality, while improving video compression over broadband connections.
Finally, 8K resolution (7680 x 4320 px) remains marginal, used by some top-of-the-range studios for technical demonstrations or immersive videos, but requires a compatible production and playback chain.
According to Google, 4K and 8K videos benefit from adaptive encoding (VP9 or AV1) to improve playback on compatible devices, without degrading the experience on slower connections.
Encoding and file format
To ensure maximum compatibility with YouTube and avoid any loss of quality or functionality when uploading, certain export parameters are strongly recommended. The most stable and efficient video format is still .MP4, which offers an excellent ratio between quality, compression and processing speed. In terms of encoding, YouTube recommends using the H.264 video codec, which is widely supported by all professional editing software.
For audio, the expected standard is the AAC codec, generally in 128 to 320 kbps, with a sampling frequency of 48 kHz. It is also essential to retain the native framerate of the video – whether 24, 25, 30 or 60 frames per second – to avoid motion artefacts or visual desynchronisation.
Any forced conversion can degrade the final rendering, particularly on animated videos or videos with a high frequency of detail. These technical parameters ensure not only smooth playback, but also optimal encoding by YouTube, with no major alterations.
Best practice for optimum rendering
The length obviously depends on the track. A short format (3 to 5 minutes) is ideal for the algorithm and user consumption. For a live session or VJ set, the content should last between 5 and 15 minutes. It will then be able to captivate with narrative or immersive content.
Add subtitles / lyrics
Integrating animated subtitles or visually synchronised lyrics into a YouTube video is a technical, aesthetic and SEO strategy.
From an SEO point of view, adding text to the image enhances semantic understanding by Google and YouTube algorithms, especially if the lyrics, keywords or artist names are clearly legible on screen. This also increases the chances of appearing in rich snippets or suggestions based on voice searches.
In terms of accessibility, these animated subtitles allow deaf or hard-of-hearing people, as well as users scrolling without audio, to follow the content effortlessly.
Finally, they add an engaging visual dimension, particularly in videos featuring typographic motion design, musical illustration or graphic abstraction. If well designed, these subtitles can become a central element of the video’s style, with effects such as synchronisation, rhythm or dynamic transformation over the music.
Working in high resolution from the outset
Working directly in high resolution from the earliest stages of creation guarantees consistent rendering quality, whatever the final distribution channel. Whether it’s a music video, typographic animation or motion design project, producing in native 4K (3840 x 2160 px) avoids loss of sharpness, compression artefacts or blurred effects when exporting or cropping.
This technical choice is all the more relevant if the video is to be used in different formats – YouTube 16:9, Shorts 9:16, Instagram Reels, or Facebook Ads – as it allows clean cropping without damaging the image. In addition, YouTube applies a different encoding (VP9 or AV1) to 4K content, which improves playback quality on high-definition screens and can have a positive influence on the perception of professionalism by both the algorithm and the audience.
By anticipating these quality requirements, creators can ensure that each production is profitable in the long term, by maximising its versatility and distribution.
Provide a safe area for texts
Anticipating a “safe area” for text is an essential practice in video production, especially when aiming for multi-platform distribution. On YouTube, elements such as animated titles, lyrics or credits must be centred in a protected area, generally the central 80% of the image, to avoid being cut off or overlapped by interface elements.
This precaution becomes crucial if the clip is to be recycled for vertical formats such as YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels or TikTok, where automatic 9:16 cropping can obscure side edges and top or bottom ends. Many tools such as Adobe Premiere or After Effects allow you to display title/action safe zones as soon as you start editing.
By respecting these margins, creators ensure optimum legibility, whatever the broadcast format, while avoiding having to re-export or rework the video afterwards. This approach guarantees greater production efficiency and reinforces visual consistency across all media.
Mistakes to avoid on YouTube
Poorly-adjusted ratio (black bars)
An incorrectly adjusted ratio, which generates visible black bars around the video, is detrimental to both the perceived quality of the content and its ranking on YouTube. These borders generally appear when a video with an unsuitable format – such as 4:3 or 1:1 – is exported without adjustment for the platform’s native 16:9 format. The result is a degraded viewing experience, especially on modern or mobile screens, where the wasted space becomes a visual penalty. From an algorithmic point of view, this type of poorly optimised format can reduce the click-through rate (CTR) and viewing time, two signals that YouTube takes into account when ranking videos. It is therefore strongly recommended that you work with the correct ratio from the editing stage onwards, and that you use safety marks or templates depending on the target platform. A well-framed video, with no extraneous borders, immediately conveys a higher level of quality, which has a direct influence on user engagement.
Compressed or badly mixed audio
A poor quality audio mix can completely compromise the impact of a clip, regardless of its visual quality. On YouTube, the platform automatically applies audio compression, but this does not compensate for the defects in the original export. To guarantee a faithful and professional reproduction, it is recommended that the audio be encoded in AAC at 320 kbps, with a sampling frequency of 48 kHz. In addition, YouTube targets an average sound level of -14 LUFS (Loudness Units Full Scale), which makes it possible to even out the volume between videos. A mix that’s too low will sound dull or inaudible on mobile, while one that’s too high may sound clipped or aggressive. These details are particularly crucial for music content, where sound dynamics and frequency balance directly influence artistic perception. In short, a good mix is not an option: it is a criterion of credibility and retention for the audience, but also a quality signal interpreted by the algorithms.
Ignore video metadata (title, tags, description)
Neglecting video metadata on YouTube means missing out on essential SEO levers for referencing and visibility. The title, description, tags and chapters are more than just cosmetic elements: they enable the algorithm to understand the content, categorise it and present it in the relevant results. A clear title, including the right keywords, facilitates indexing in YouTube and Google searches. The description, for its part, should develop the context of the video with secondary key expressions, useful links and possibly timecodes. Tags, although less influential than before, are still useful for clarifying the lexical field of the content. Finally, video chapters (time tags in the description or interface) improve navigation, boost retention rates and are favourably interpreted by the algorithm. In 2024, according to several video SEO studies, videos that were properly enriched with metadata showed an average increase in click-through rates of between 12% and 18%. In short: good content without metadata is like an untitled book on an anonymous shelf.
Focus YouTube Shorts (vertical content)
YouTube Shorts are the platform’s short, vertical format, designed to compete with TikTok and Instagram Reels. The maximum length allowed is 60 seconds, but in practice the best-performing videos are often between 15 and 30 seconds.
The Shorts algorithm favours content capable of capturing attention from the first 2 to 3 seconds, which implies a sustained visual rhythm, a strong hook right from the start and, ideally, an integrated call-to-action before the end. The 9:16 format occupies the entire mobile screen and is designed for an immersive experience.
In 2024, YouTube claimed to be recording more than 50 billion views a day on Shorts, proof of their dazzling popularity. For artists and motion design studios, it’s a strategic opportunity to cut out a clip, animate an extract or tease a project with high viral potential.
If used properly, the Shorts format can generate a flow of traffic to the main channel, improve discoverability and encourage users to subscribe or view longer content.