TikTok expands most video size to 10 minutes

Is TikTok nonetheless a short-form video platform? It appears much less and fewer so, after the corporate introduced at the moment that it’s increasing the utmost size for uploads to 10 minutes. TikTok has been testing ever-longer uploads for years, just lately introducing three-minute movies final July, however this newest replace is the most important enhance but, and can now roll out globally.

“We’re always thinking about new ways to bring value to our community and enrich the TikTok experience,” mentioned an organization spokesperson in a press release given to The Verge. “Last year, we introduced longer videos, giving our community more time to create and be entertained on TikTok. Today, we’re excited to start rolling out the ability to upload videos that are up to 10 minutes, which we hope would unleash even more creative possibilities for our creators around the world.”

Some customers got the information as a notification inside the app, as shared on Twitter by social media marketing consultant and analyst Matt Navarra:

Although TikTok’s meteoric rise to reputation was based on a endless stream of quick movies tailor-made to catch customers’ consideration, the corporate has been pushing longer content for a while now. Longer movies permit TikTok to higher compete with YouTube (which skews closely towards prolonged content material) in addition to seize an older viewers and enhance total engagement time on the app. At the identical time, a swap to longer content material might damage the agency by limiting the quantity of information it could accumulate on customers’ watching habits, which is what permits it to customise the algorithms it makes use of to draw customers within the first place. In different phrases: getting the size of content material proper is one thing of a balancing act.

Ironically, as TikTok expands to supply creators and customers longer content material, its rivals — spurred by TikTok’s success — have accomplished the other. Instagram launched short-form movies within the type of Reels, YouTube has the aptly-named Shorts, and Snapchat provides what it calls Spotlight. All these corporations are attempting to get the components proper.

Speaking to The Verge, Navarra says longer-form content material is, generally, “easier to monetize and keeps people on platform longer.” But he says TikTok will now must work out precisely tips on how to place and current these movies on its platform. “They could do with a dedicated home for longer-form content as [it] doesn’t sit so well in the vertical feed with shorter stuff people are used to whizzing through at speed,” he says.