The Ultimate Guide to Social Media Video Specs

Table of Contents

Bonus: Sizing your own Vyond video for social media

How to make a square Vyond video + square template

How to make a portrait (vertical) Vyond video + portrait template

Landscape video template

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Imagine a customer scrolling through their LinkedIn feed. They come across a product video that your company posted and stop to watch it. There’s just one problem—the top and bottom portions of your video are cropped out, so the video isn’t watchable. Confused and disappointed, the customer moves on to other content.

This scenario is a nightmare situation for video marketers. When presented correctly, social media videos are a powerful marketing tool. In a Wyzowl report, 77% of buyers reported that they a video persuaded them to buy a product or service. Specifically with social, 70% of people said that they have shared a brand’s video via social media.

This guide will help you capture this engagement by creating an optimal viewing experience for your social media viewers. For each social media channel, we’ll cover these specs:

• • • File size: The minimum and maximum file size of a video that you can upload
    • Aspect ratio: The ratio of width to height on a video
    • Video orientation: The most frequently used aspect ratios (square, landscape, vertical) on social media platforms
    • Resolution: The number of pixels being shown horizontally and vertically
    • Video length: The maximum duration of the video

Understanding the latest social specs, you’ll be set to create videos that are engaging and watchable on all channels and devices.

Facebook videos

Facebook is one of the most valuable platforms with more than 2.3 billion monthly active users covering almost every demographic. Marketers should consider taking extra time and effort to understand the different video options available, and to create videos in the most effective formats for your audience.

Feed and Marketplace Video Specs

Pro-tip: Take advantage of these videos’ minimal spec requirements—no resolution range, several supported aspect ratios—by choosing the format that fits your target audience’s device usage (square for mobile, and landscape for desktop).

In-stream video ad specs

Pro-tip: In-stream videos (mid-roll ads) have to be short, so be sure to convey your main message quickly in the first few seconds of the video.

Messenger Home Specs

Pro-tip: Keep in mind that only landscape videos are permitted for the Messenger home feed.

Instagram Video Specs

With a strong base of teen and millennial users, Instagram is an especially valuable space to share videos if your target customer is young. It’s also a simple video publishing space for marketers to navigate with just two types of videos.

Feed video specs

Pro-tip: Opt for square videos—they’re very popular on Instagram and look great on both desktop and mobile.

Story video specs

Pro-tip: You can publish videos that are longer than 15 seconds. The caveat is that Instagram will clip it and publish multiple 15-second stories.

Story ad video specs

Pro-tip: If you’re publishing a promotional story, Instagram recommends that you leave roughly 14% of the top and bottom of the video without text or logos in case you want to add a call to action or profile icon there. Vertical videos are recommended for both IGTV and story videos. 

LinkedIn video specs

With its professional tone and focus on job searching, LinkedIn is a powerful space to post videos that boost your employer’s brand. Use the specs below to create LinkedIn videos that show job seekers your business’ culture, mission, and other key details. If you’re at a B2B company, consider creating video ads as well since so many potential leads—startup founders, and corporate executives—actively use LinkedIn. Here’s an example of how we promoted our London Vyond Community Meet-up on LinkedIn with a Vyond video:

Pro-tip: Opt for square videos—they’re very popular on Instagram and look great on both desktop and mobile.

Video ad specs

Pro-tip: Be sure to create a horizontal video ad—at this time, LinkedIn permits vertical videos for organic content only.

Organic videos

Pro-tip: Though LinkedIn supports both horizontal and vertical formats for organic videos, we recommend opting for a vertical format since 57% of LinkedIn users are on mobile.

Twitter video specs

Like Instagram, Twitter is an especially great video platform for businesses that cater to younger customers. The platform’s target audience is in their 20s, and posts typically have a punchy, fun tone. Using these spec guidelines, create Twitter videos to provide quick company news updates, promote your blog content, or share industry-related news.

Organic and ad video specs

Pro-tip: Consider taking advantage of their recently introduced square format. 93% of Twitter videos are viewed on mobile, and square videos provide an optimal mobile viewing experience.

Vyond Pro -tip: Twitter is the only social media platform that supports GIF format. Use Vyond to export your videos as GIFs. 

TikTok video specs

Feed video ad specs

Pro-tip: As the premier platform for short-form video, TikTok recommends ads with a length of 9 to 15 seconds. 

Feed video specs

YouTube video specs

YouTube is an ideal video platform for marketers. Users enjoy watching longer, more in-depth content on YouTube, so you can create videos that spend more time conveying your brand messages. Technically speaking, it’s also easy for marketers to format videos for YouTube since its player accepts various video sizes.

Organic video specs

Pro-tip: Be sure to upload videos as close to their original format as possible. Your video will remain at its highest quality, and YouTube’s player can automatically frame the video for optimal viewing.

Third-party video ad specs

Pro-tip: If you’re interested in showing non-skippable ads, keep in mind that YouTube has shortened the maximum length from 30 seconds to 15 seconds.

Bonus: How to size your videos in Vyond

Though Vyond videos are automatically compatible with all social media channels, our platform also makes it easy to reformat videos for optimal viewing on each platform. Here are several tutorials and templates that quickly show how to create square, portrait, and landscape videos in Vyond.

Square videos

Square videos are ideal for any platform with a feed, specifically Facebook and Instagram, as they take up more room and grab users’ attention. As a plus, a square orientation is also mobile-friendly.

Here is a tutorial to learn how to make a square video in Vyond:

Portrait videos

Portrait videos, or vertical videos, are mobile-friendly, so they work especially well on phone-driven platforms like Instagram. They’re also an ideal choice for video ads since the height leaves room for a call to action at the top or bottom.

Here is a tutorial to learn how to make a portrait video in Vyond:

Landscape

Videos in a landscape — or horizontal — orientation are ideal for desktop viewing, given the wider screen. They’re also optimal for YouTube since YouTube’s player automatically displays in landscape orientation.

Solidify your social presence with the right video specs

Video is no longer a novelty—it can be found in all types of businesses on every social platform today. With that said, watchability is a basic expectation of your viewers. Use this guide to make sure that your videos can be optimally viewed across all channels. With the right presentation, your brand gains credibility points, and viewers can fully enjoy your content.

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