YouTube to merge Shorts and long-form videos into a single feed

With Shorts generating 70 billion views daily, YouTube aims to explore ways to maximise viewership across all content types. The platform is looking to leverage on the popularity of Shorts by promoting longer video clips within the Shorts feed.

According to YouTube's post, “To try to help viewers better discover content across channels, formats, and lengths on YouTube, we’re running a few small experiments on the Watch Page and with Shorts. If you’re a viewer in the experiment, these new discovery experiences could include a mix of video formats including long-form videos where you’d usually see Shorts (example: the Shorts Feed) or new feeds of long-form videos.”

While the platform aims to leverage the popularity of Shorts to enhance the promotion of longer videos, it’s unclear how horizontally formatted long-form clips will fit into the vertically aligned Shorts feed.

Shorts has been a success for YouTube, driving engagement as viewers become accustomed to bite-sized clips. The platform mentioned that creators might see their long-form videos viewed in the Shorts Feed being categorised as Shorts in YouTube Analytics.

While this could be confusing from both user and creator perspectives, YouTube's strategy could help increase the visibility of longer-form content.