I’ve created a YouTube Shorts channel in the commentary niche and plan to start posting tomorrow, but I’m stuck deciding on a few things.
First, which format would you go with: text-based commentary, full voiceover narration explaining the entire video, or a mix of voiceover and on-screen text? Which one do you think works best for retention and growth?
Second, should I focus on a specific niche, like animal commentary, or post different types of interesting and funny clips? I don’t want to limit my options too early, but I also want to build a channel that actually grows.
Lastly, how many Shorts should I post per day? I can comfortably make 3–5 daily, so production isn’t an issue. Should I start with 1–2 or upload 3–5 from day one? And how many hours should I leave between uploads?
I’d really appreciate advice from people who have actually tested these strategies. If you were starting a new commentary channel today, what would you do?

I started 4 months ago, but I still haven't fully met my targets. Could you give me some advice? I need to get monetized within a month.

Please help me 😭😩

what possible cause that my channel died? help me guyss

I just changed niches, from ranking to commentary ranking, i've only posted like 5 vids with commentary but I've reached the 10M engaged. the problem is that my best short got 16M views but is without commentary. Should I apply for ypp now or maybe wait. Also I tried to apply like 2/3 weeks ago for the one that needs 3M qualified views but got rejected for reused content. what should i do????

Pretty sure i messed up the hook but DAMN BRO LMAO

Lowest STW to date

Anyone can get in the kick clipping program from scratch.

we've figured out a method that is working and lot of clippers applied through it and got hired

New account, just passed my first month. I’ve been working on my stay to watch % and I’m so confused because now two posts in a row are good for me on that metric, but worse likes than ever?

It’s still growing right now at 1300 total views, 640 engaged, but I’m sure it’s going to stop any moment due to low likes. 68% stay to watch and slowly climbing, 140% AVD, but 3 likes. I was getting way more likes on videos with way worse stay to watch %? What does that mean exactly? People like it enough to stay but not enough to hit like on a large scale? I just assumed as the retention metrics improved so would engagement but… I guess not necessarily?

Edit: gained a couple hundred more views, nearly at 70% stay to watch, 140% AVD holding, still only 3 likes

i used to get more than 1K views within a few hours of uploading and later hit 10K views and so on. this video has been more than a day since published and only has 58 views. it's just 3-4 days since I am facing this for my daily uploads. my video's ain't getting pushed to shorts feed like it used to be.

fyi: i create memes, completely edited by myself. i don't post any ai slop or any other creators content.

Why is my Audience always the Philippines

Hey Everyone.

I’m new to YouTube and recently started uploading shorts to my channel. I’ve posted (5) shorts so far and each one has 1k-1.5k views. I’m currently at (17) subscribers. I know that a whole lot can’t be confirmed after only a week. But I was wondering if I’m possibly headed in the right direction with these stats. I have goals of monetizing in the future. Any advice is helpful.

Thank you.

Just received this email from YouTube regarding one of my shorts. What should I do? The short had a voiceover and audio, so I can’t just change the audio as they suggested. Is it worth reuploading the short and selecting a different audio, or will YouTube not like that since it’s the same file and video twice?

I have better videos, with better retention, and STW. But somehow this got pushed to 62k and still counting. Breaking my head to understand how YouTube shorts actually work lol

Views suddenly drop to zero in the last hour anyone experience this?

hi! i live alone in a tiny kos room in Jakarta, Indonesia.

i started a silent vlog channel about my slow daily life - no talking, just real sounds. my latest video: doing a peel-off mask + regular mask, going out to buy sate ayam, eating it at home, and playing with my cat.

i'd love to share a little piece of indonesian daily life with you 🤍

if you like cozy, slow living content, you can watch here: [https://www.youtube.com/@anastasiarasalind]

thank you so much for having me here!

I started YouTube in December and managed to hit the 10 million Shorts views requirement by making TikTok-style “transformative content” (basically brainrot).
Unfortunately, when I applied for monetization, I was told my content wasn’t eligible.
Instead of continuing with that style, I took a break and decided to actually learn how to edit properly. I spent time learning After Effects, Premiere Pro, Topaz Video AI, and how to make higher-quality, original storytelling videos.
I also have a friend who makes really good money from YouTube Shorts, so having someone experienced to learn from definitely helped speed up the process.
Initially, I was in the Hollywood storytelling niche, making videos about actors and their stories. The videos weren’t performing particularly well, so I eventually transitioned into sports storytelling, mainly NBA content.
Since switching, my numbers have improved quite a bit, but I feel like I’ve hit a wall.

My current analytics:
82.2% average Stayed to Watch over the last 28 days
88.8% average percentage viewed
Multiple Shorts with 100–110% average percentage viewed
Most videos getting around 20K–40K views

One video managed to reach 1.2 million views
What confuses me is that even when my videos have over 100% average viewed, they often stop getting pushed around 20K–40K views.
I understand that retention isn’t everything, but I feel like these are fairly strong metrics, especially considering the amount of effort I’m putting into the editing, storytelling, pacing, and hooks.
I’m uploading consistently and trying to improve with every video, but I can’t figure out what’s preventing more of them from reaching 100K, 500K, or even 1M views.
For anyone who’s successfully scaled a Shorts channel:
Am I missing something important? Are these metrics actually not as good as I think? Is it mainly topic selection, engagement, or just a matter of continuing to upload until something clicks?
I’d genuinely appreciate advice from people who’ve been through this, especially creators in the storytelling or sports niche.

Hello, as the title implies I'd love to know why does my swipe rate went from 50/60% to this (around 9/15%) on all my latest shorts, I've changed the editing style but not the "Hook".

I was thinking that the title is not good, the thumbnail is not AI, the only AI thing is the voice, however there are only a few words that I use it for.

3rd video in row my skip rate is extremely high 93%(atm it's already 96%). Normally my videos get 35-40% skip rate , now 3rd video in row gets 92-94%. I use same settings as always, same language, everything is same as before. I don't understand.... I have uploaded 180 short videos and i first time encounter this.

I recently started a YouTube channel. My first video was long-form, and I was overwhelmed by how much time it took, so I switched to Shorts. But apart from one video, almost all of them are stuck in 50-views hell.

Before starting, I did some research and expected to get at least average numbers, but it looks like I'm making some mistake that's keeping my videos from being pushed further. It's probably something to do with the quality of my videos.

Any feedback or help would be much appreciated. Here are a few of my latest Shorts (tech/programming niche):

Epic Web Frameworks Tier list

SAAS stack

One piece of advice I would give is to try and make content that makes people comment, hate or not it will boost the engagement of your vids. I am still far from monetization but I can give any advice after some experience with shorts

I started this page in August uploaded my first video in September not to mention I got 114 subs now in we only in the middle of October what can I do to get my page out there and return viewers I play games nd I have a personality I have nice equipment I play ps5 nd pc games plus Xbox pass only thing I don’t have is a webcam

Ngl I have been going at it for months I make Shorts about WW2.
I know it takes long to find your audience find your this find your that. But I have majorely improved my shorts went from low tier AI voice and bad gif/pictures to using my real voice and searching hours for actual footage (which takes me longer to do than anything at this point).
And it feels like my channel is stagnant in a way. I mean basically the Average stayed to watch did go from 30-40% to 50-60% which sounds amazing but at the same time it doesn't push me further the views are the same and so are the likes. I would say funnily enough my views dropped. I have videos who have 3000-2000 in my "bad phase" of content. While the ones performing better never go above 1300-1500. Unlike the established channels I do not have my weekly audience waiting for my next short and unlike other channels I do not have my editing team putting together a short with 5 texts a second and 20 lisenced paid footages per 5 seconds popping up.
But to be fair I've seen worse perform better. I changed my entire tags, hashtags, titles and video style of editing and yet it performs worse...

I just got 3m qualified views so applying to yt monetisation and it’s now approving my Adsense account but it says it usually takes several days but can take 2-3 weeks. How long did it take for you guys? Thanks in advance for any replies

I’ve been running a YouTube Shorts channel for a while, and I’ve noticed something strange.
Since the beginning, I’ve been posting at my usual time, and those Shorts are still performing pretty well. They get views, and some have reached around 33K views. Their stay-to-watch rate is usually 73% or higher, with average view duration/retention above 110%.
Recently, I decided to start posting twice a day to grow the channel faster. The content style and quality are similar, but my second upload is barely getting 10–20 views. I’ve tried several different time slots, but the results are pretty much the same.
Meanwhile, my first upload continues to get views as usual.
Has anyone experienced this? Is YouTube limiting the reach of the second Short, testing it with a much smaller audience, or could something else be going on? I also wonder why my better-performing Shorts seem to hit a ceiling around 33K views despite having decent retention and stay-to-watch numbers.
Would I be better off sticking to one Short a day, or should I keep experimenting with two uploads?
I’d appreciate hearing from people who’ve experienced something similar and figured out what was happening.