YouTube
Long-form video and Shorts via the YouTube Data API. Title, description, tags, visibility, made-for-kids.
YouTube uploads through the YouTube Data API v3. Both long-form and Shorts go through the same upload endpoint — YouTube infers Short vs not by the aspect ratio and duration.
What you can post
| Type | Supported | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Video (any length) | ✓ | MP4, up to 256 GB |
| Shorts | ✓ | Vertical 9:16, under 3 minutes |
| Thumbnail upload | ✓ | Up to 2 MB, 1280×720 |
| Community posts | — | Only available to channels with 500+ subs, and not in the API |
| Live streams | — | Not exposed in our integration yet |
Per-post settings we expose
- Title — max 100 characters
- Description — max 5,000 characters; full URL support
- Tags — up to 500 chars combined, comma-separated. Our Tag Generator tool helps with this.
- Visibility — Public, Unlisted, or Private
- Made for kids — required by COPPA; defaults to "Not made for kids." Misclassifying this is a Google policy violation, set it accurately.
- Category — defaults to "People & Blogs"; we surface the full list (Music, Gaming, Comedy, etc.)
- License — Standard YouTube or Creative Commons
Shorts vs. long-form
YouTube detects Shorts automatically based on:
- Aspect ratio is vertical (9:16 or taller)
- Duration is under 3 minutes (Shorts cap was raised from 60s in late 2024)
You don't need to manually mark a video as a Short — uploading a vertical clip under 3 minutes routes it into the Shorts feed automatically.
Title and thumbnail tips
The most common YouTube mistakes we see in scheduled posts:
- Titles over 60 characters — YouTube allows 100 but truncates in the feed around character 55-70. Our Title Checker tool shows you where the cut-off lands.
- Generic thumbnails — the auto-generated thumbnail YouTube picks for you is almost always worse than a custom one. We allow custom thumbnail upload directly from the editor.
- Tags vs. hashtags — tags go in the Tags field (hidden
metadata). Hashtags go in the description with a
#symbol (clickable links above the title). They're different fields; use both.
Quota and rate limits
YouTube's API has a quota system measured in "units" per project. A video upload costs 1,600 units; the default daily quota is 10,000 units. So an account can upload up to ~6 videos per day through the API before hitting the quota.
For 99% of creators that's plenty. If you're running a mass-upload account, you can request increased quota from Google — we surface a banner in the dashboard when you're approaching the limit so you can act before it bites.
Common rejection reasons
quotaExceeded— you've hit the daily quota. Resets at midnight Pacific time.videoChartNotFound— the category ID is invalid. We surface the full category dropdown to avoid this, but a stale form can trigger it.uploadLimitExceeded— your channel has a per-day video cap (15 by default for new channels, lifts as the channel matures).accountNotMonetizable— only happens when you try to set monetisation flags on a non-monetised channel.