How do I turn a long YouTube video into Shorts?

The steps at a glance

A Short cut from a long video is a new edit, not a crop of the old one. The order that works:

1. Finish the long video first.
2. Pick the moments that stand on their own.
3. Trim each one to a complete point.
4. Crop to 9:16 and follow the subject.
5. Keep faces and text clear of the buttons.
6. Add captions that read with the sound off.
7. Check the length and the music before you export.
8. Export at 1080 x 1920 and upload.

Step 1: Finish the long video first

The long edit is where the real decisions happen: which take, which order, where the payoff lands. Cut the Shorts after it is locked, from the same timeline or from the finished export. By then you know exactly where the strongest seconds are, and you won’t cut a Short around a line that later gets trimmed from the main video.

Step 2: Pick the moments that stand on their own

A Short is one moment, not a trailer for the whole video. The usual candidates are the hook and the single best payoff: the reveal, the fail, the punchline, the one tip people will save. A lesson of 5 to 7 minutes usually holds two or three points that make sense without the rest. A 20 minute gaming video might hold more moments, but only a couple that a stranger would get without the setup.

The test for each one: if someone saw only these seconds, would they understand them and want to keep watching? If they need a minute of setup first, it is not a Short.

YouTube Studio can help you find them. The Clips and Shorts tool (Content, open the video, Clips and Shorts, Create clip or Short, then Short) lets you pick the segment by selecting lines in the transcript or by typing timestamps, and in some countries and languages it also suggests segments. Treat its picks as a shortlist.

Step 3: Trim each one to a complete point

Cut the setup down to one line, take out every pause, and end on the payoff instead of fading out. Long-form pacing feels slow in the Shorts feed, where the next video is one swipe away. A trimmed moment usually lands somewhere around 20 to 45 seconds. Longer is fine if the point needs it, as long as nothing in it is filler.

Step 4: Crop to 9:16 and follow the subject

A 9:16 window cut out of a 16:9 frame keeps the full height and about a third of the width:

The free YouTube Shorts Crop Preview shows that window on your own video, inside a phone-sized Shorts frame, without uploading or re-encoding anything. Open the file, then:

• Choose a layout. Fill (crop) cuts the 9:16 window and fills the screen. Fit with blurred background keeps the whole frame over a blurred, darker copy; the picture then covers roughly a third of the phone’s height.
• Place the crop. Drag the box on the full frame or the phone preview, or press Left, Center or Right.
• Follow the action with keyframes. At each moment where the subject moves, set the crop and add a keyframe. Choose Glide for a smooth move between positions, or Jump to switch position at once, the way a cut would.
• Copy the numbers. You get the crop rectangle in your file’s pixels (x, y, w and h), the Premiere Pro Scale and Position for a 1080 x 1920 sequence, every keyframe with its timecode, a CSV, and a 1080 x 1920 PNG of the frame to check on your phone.

Crop when one subject matters: a face, a facecam, one character. Use the blurred background when the whole frame matters: a map, a chart, a wide shot where the joke is at the edge.

Step 5: Keep faces and text clear of the buttons

The Shorts player draws on top of your video in three places: a stack of like, comment and share buttons down the right side, the title, channel and subscribe button across the bottom, and search and menu icons at the top. YouTube gives no pixel measurements for these areas, and they move depending on the device, the app version and how long your title is. The crop tool’s overlay is an approximation (top 7%, a right column 16% wide starting a little below the middle, bottom 20%). Put faces and words in the center band of the frame, never in the lowest fifth or against the right side.

Step 6: Add captions that read with the sound off

Some viewers scroll Shorts with the sound low or off. Large captions in the top two thirds of the frame, one short phrase at a time, timed to the voice, carry the point either way. Keep the same font, size and position across your Shorts so they read as one series. The Studio Clips and Shorts tool adds automatic captions where available, and you can restyle, move or turn them off in its preview.

Step 7: Check the length and the music before you export

Three rules from YouTube Help, read October 19, 2026, decide how the upload is treated:

• The 3 minute rule. On standard channels, any square or vertical upload of three minutes or less, from October 15, 2024 on, counts as a Short. Run a vertical edit past 3:00 and it goes up as a regular video, and a 16:9 video is long-form at any length.
• The 1 minute rule for claims. Once a Short runs past one minute, any active copyright claim on it, manual claims included, blocks it in every country. Music you don’t own matters much more in a 2 minute Short than in a 40 second one.
• The 60 second shortcut. In the YouTube app, Remix and then Edit into a Short turns at most 60 seconds of one of your public long-form uploads into a Short. Private and unlisted videos, and videos with third-party copyright claims, can’t be used. For anything longer, or a crop that follows the action, edit the vertical version yourself.

Step 8: Export at 1080 x 1920 and upload

YouTube Help gives a maximum resolution of 1080p for Shorts uploads, so export at 1080 x 1920, at the same frame rate as the source footage. Write a title that works without the long video, and point viewers to the full video, in the last second of the Short or in a pinned comment. If you create the Short with the Studio Clips and Shorts tool, YouTube adds the source video as its related video automatically, unless the Short is private, unlisted or made for kids.

How I cut Shorts from client videos

For English by Erin Marie I edit one long lesson a week and deliver the Shorts cut from the same recording. Every Short carries a single finished idea from the lesson, reframed vertical, with big captions that follow her phrase by phrase in the middle of the frame, above the title area at the bottom, and no line touching the edge. The long lesson stays the main job.

The crop depends on the footage. With a talking head I center the face, or keep it a little left of center, away from the button column. When two people share the frame, the crop jumps to whoever is speaking, with a Jump keyframe at every change. Gaming footage with a facecam rarely fits face and action in one vertical window, so I choose: a reaction moment gets cropped on the facecam, a gameplay moment on the character, re-placed at each cut so the frame never slides across the screen. In documentary footage, a cropped map or chart stops making sense, so those shots keep the full frame over a blurred background.

When a client asks for Shorts alongside the long edit, I usually suggest a pair per long video: its opening hook and its strongest moment. Pull many more than that from one video and most of them are filler. Do you need a separate Shorts editor? covers when a specialist makes more sense.

Common mistakes

• A trailer instead of a moment. Five clips from across the video, none of them complete.
• A centered crop that cuts off the subject. The action moves; the crop has to follow it.
• Captions or faces under the buttons at the bottom and on the right.
• A 2 minute Short with claimed music, which is blocked under the 1 minute rule.
• Black bars added into the file. Use the blurred background layout instead.
• A long-form preset left on vertical, which turns a 2 minute main video into a Short by accident.

Whether Shorts are worth the effort for a long-form channel is its own question: long-form vs Shorts editing.

Shorts from long videos FAQ

How long can a YouTube Short be?

Three minutes at most. On standard channels, YouTube Help treats any square or vertical video of three minutes or less uploaded since October 15, 2024 as a Short. Longer vertical videos upload as regular videos, and a 16:9 video stays long-form at any length.

What size should a Short cut from a 16:9 video be?

Export it at 1080 x 1920. From a 1920 x 1080 video the 9:16 crop window is 608 x 1080 pixels, and from 4K it is 1215 x 2160. YouTube Help gives 1080p as the maximum resolution for Shorts uploads.

Can YouTube make a Short from my long video automatically?

Partly. In the YouTube app, Edit into a Short works on at most 60 seconds of one of your public long-form uploads. YouTube Studio’s Clips and Shorts tool lets you pick a segment by transcript or timestamps and adds automatic captions where available. For a crop that follows the action, edit the vertical version yourself.

How many Shorts should I cut from one long video?

Two strong ones is a good default: the opening hook and the biggest payoff. A short lesson can hold two or three points that stand alone. Past that, most extra clips need setup the viewer never saw, and they get swiped.

Crop or blurred background: which is better for a Short?

Crop when one subject carries the moment, like a face, a facecam or a single character. Use a blurred background when the whole frame matters, such as a map, a chart or a wide gameplay shot. A 16:9 frame over a blurred copy fills about a third of the phone screen height.

Why was my Short blocked?

If it runs longer than one minute and has an active copyright claim of any type, YouTube blocks it worldwide, according to YouTube Help. Shorts of one minute or less are not affected by that rule. Remove or replace the claimed music, or trim the Short to a minute.

Sources

YouTube Help, Understand three-minute YouTube Shorts: square or vertical up to three minutes from October 15, 2024, 16:9 stays long-form, Shorts over one minute with an active claim are blocked; read October 19, 2026. YouTube Help, Get started creating YouTube Shorts: maximum upload resolution of 1080p; read October 19, 2026. YouTube Help, Create YouTube Shorts from your videos: Edit into a Short, up to 60 seconds, public long-form videos you uploaded; read October 19, 2026. YouTube Help, Video clips and Shorts in YouTube Studio: transcript or timestamp selection, automatic captions, the related video; read October 19, 2026. The overlay percentages are my own approximation, as stated on the crop preview page; none of these Help pages give safe zones in pixels. How I deliver Shorts for English by Erin Marie: the talking head editor page.