YouTube Shorts surge: Is it killing long-form content?

YouTube’s TikTok competitor Shorts may cannibalise the core, long-form video business of the Google-owned video streaming platform, the media reported.

According to a recent report in The Financial Times citing veteran YouTube staff, the short-video platform “risks cannibalising its core business”.

Google recently announced that Shorts now has more than 2 billion logged-in monthly users, giving it an edge over competitors like TikTok and Instagram Reels.

“Recent YouTube strategy meetings have discussed the risk that long-form videos, which produce more revenue for the company, are ‘dying out’ as a format,” the report said.

YouTube staff feel that “content creators are making fewer long-form videos — driven by a lack of consumer appetite and commissions from brands that favour short-form content for product placement”.

YouTube says Shorts was “designed to complement, not compete with, all the other formats creators use” on the platform, such as audio and livestreams.

YouTube’s ad revenue, though improved, had been on a downward year-over-year slide for three straight quarters. The company is still figuring out how to earn more ad money from Shorts.

The latest YouTube Shorts usage is up from 1.5 billion monthly logged-in users for YouTube Shorts announced last year. In its results for the second quarter (Q2) of 2023, Google reported that YouTube brought in $7.67 billion in advertising revenue. This is 4 per cent higher than the same period last year.

The company introduced advertising on Shorts late last year. YouTube now has to support Shorts as it gains immense popularity, like investing in creators and incentivising them to make exclusive content.