YouTube channels are pulling in considerably more views than a year ago, but the audience is watching less of each video and the platform is paying out less money for it, according to a new study from social media management platform Metricool.
The report analyzed 799,718 videos from 71,177 accounts worldwide, comparing performance in February 2025 against February 2026. It found that long-form video views rose 76% year over year, while Shorts views climbed 127%. Neither gain translated into stronger engagement. Average view duration on long-form video fell 37%, engagement dropped 45%, and Shorts view duration fell 63%, with the average Short now watched for about 16 seconds, down from roughly 48 seconds in 2025. Interactions declined on both formats, down 6% for long-form and 15% for Shorts.
The monetization data tracks the same direction. Ad impressions on long-form video fell 51%, monetized playbacks dropped 44%, estimated ad revenue declined 55%, and estimated YouTube Premium revenue fell 59%. Metricool’s report ties the revenue decline directly to shorter view durations, noting that less time spent per video means fewer opportunities for mid-roll ads to run.
Shorts Now Drive Most Discovery
Shorts accounted for 61% of all organic views in the sample, making the Shorts feed the dominant discovery mechanism on the platform. Subscribers generated just over 11% of views and YouTube search nearly 9%. Only 3% of viewers navigated directly to a channel page to find content, a signal Metricool frames as evidence that algorithmic recommendation, rather than direct browsing, now determines most of what gets watched on YouTube.
Posting Frequency Has a Ceiling for Long-Form, Not for Shorts
The study identifies 2 to 4 long-form uploads per week as the frequency that produces the strongest per-video and monthly view totals. Posting beyond that range does not meaningfully improve results, and channels posting fewer than one long-form video every two weeks saw the weakest monthly performance overall, since a single video’s outcome effectively becomes the month’s total.
Shorts behave differently. Metricool found no clear performance ceiling: individual Shorts perform best at 2 to 4 uploads per week, but monthly view totals continued climbing at higher posting frequencies, which the report attributes to the additional discovery opportunities each upload creates in an infinite-scroll feed.
The two formats also interact. Channels that skip Shorts entirely averaged 4,364 views per long-form video, below the 5,985 global average. Channels posting around five Shorts per month averaged 8,789 views per long-form video, 46% above that average. That lift disappears at higher volume: channels posting 35 or more Shorts a month saw long-form performance fall back to roughly the same level as channels posting none.
Smaller Channels See the Sharpest Swings
Growth toward a higher subscriber tier remained uneven and generally rare: an average of 10.08% of accounts moved up a tier in 2026. Small accounts (2,000 to 10,000 subscribers) had the best odds at 16%, followed by Tiny accounts (under 2,000) at 10% and Medium accounts at 7%. Big accounts, at 100,000 to 1 million subscribers, saw growth slow to 2%.
Account-size breakdowns also show the views-versus-retention split concentrated at the extremes. Tiny accounts posted the largest jump in long-form views, up 267%, but also the steepest drop in view duration, down more than 58%, and the sharpest engagement decline of any tier. Small accounts were the exception: view duration rose nearly 13%, and interactions climbed about 14%, which Metricool describes as the one segment where growing view counts were accompanied by stronger retention rather than weaker retention.
Hashtags Show a Modest Trade-off
Hashtag use produced a small but consistent trade-off in both formats. Long-form videos with at least one hashtag saw views drop 17%, but engagement rise 36%. Shorts with hashtags saw views drop 10% with engagement up 9%. Metricool attributes the pattern to hashtags routing content toward more topic-relevant audiences rather than to broader algorithmic distribution.
Content Lifespan
The report also measured how quickly content peaks. Most of a video’s views and interactions arrive within the first three days of publication, after which performance settles into a slower, sustained pace. Metricool notes this distinguishes YouTube from platforms where content loses relevance within days, since a well-optimized video can continue generating views for months.
The study covers accounts across industry, niche, and subscriber size, segmented into five tiers ranging from Tiny (under 2,000 subscribers) to Huge (1 million-plus), to control for large accounts skewing results for smaller ones.
Image source: Metricool The full report is available here
Dragomir is a Serbian freelance blog writer and translator. He is passionate about covering insightful stories and exploring topics such as influencer marketing, the creator economy, technology, business, and cyber fraud.
YouTube channels are pulling in considerably more views than a year ago, but the audience is watching less of each video and the platform is paying out less money for it, according to a new study from social media management platform Metricool.
The report analyzed 799,718 videos from 71,177 accounts worldwide, comparing performance in February 2025 against February 2026. It found that long-form video views rose 76% year over year, while Shorts views climbed 127%. Neither gain translated into stronger engagement. Average view duration on long-form video fell 37%, engagement dropped 45%, and Shorts view duration fell 63%, with the average Short now watched for about 16 seconds, down from roughly 48 seconds in 2025. Interactions declined on both formats, down 6% for long-form and 15% for Shorts.
The monetization data tracks the same direction. Ad impressions on long-form video fell 51%, monetized playbacks dropped 44%, estimated ad revenue declined 55%, and estimated YouTube Premium revenue fell 59%. Metricool’s report ties the revenue decline directly to shorter view durations, noting that less time spent per video means fewer opportunities for mid-roll ads to run.
Shorts Now Drive Most Discovery
Shorts accounted for 61% of all organic views in the sample, making the Shorts feed the dominant discovery mechanism on the platform. Subscribers generated just over 11% of views and YouTube search nearly 9%. Only 3% of viewers navigated directly to a channel page to find content, a signal Metricool frames as evidence that algorithmic recommendation, rather than direct browsing, now determines most of what gets watched on YouTube.
Posting Frequency Has a Ceiling for Long-Form, Not for Shorts
The study identifies 2 to 4 long-form uploads per week as the frequency that produces the strongest per-video and monthly view totals. Posting beyond that range does not meaningfully improve results, and channels posting fewer than one long-form video every two weeks saw the weakest monthly performance overall, since a single video’s outcome effectively becomes the month’s total.
Shorts behave differently. Metricool found no clear performance ceiling: individual Shorts perform best at 2 to 4 uploads per week, but monthly view totals continued climbing at higher posting frequencies, which the report attributes to the additional discovery opportunities each upload creates in an infinite-scroll feed.
The two formats also interact. Channels that skip Shorts entirely averaged 4,364 views per long-form video, below the 5,985 global average. Channels posting around five Shorts per month averaged 8,789 views per long-form video, 46% above that average. That lift disappears at higher volume: channels posting 35 or more Shorts a month saw long-form performance fall back to roughly the same level as channels posting none.
Smaller Channels See the Sharpest Swings
Growth toward a higher subscriber tier remained uneven and generally rare: an average of 10.08% of accounts moved up a tier in 2026. Small accounts (2,000 to 10,000 subscribers) had the best odds at 16%, followed by Tiny accounts (under 2,000) at 10% and Medium accounts at 7%. Big accounts, at 100,000 to 1 million subscribers, saw growth slow to 2%.
Account-size breakdowns also show the views-versus-retention split concentrated at the extremes. Tiny accounts posted the largest jump in long-form views, up 267%, but also the steepest drop in view duration, down more than 58%, and the sharpest engagement decline of any tier. Small accounts were the exception: view duration rose nearly 13%, and interactions climbed about 14%, which Metricool describes as the one segment where growing view counts were accompanied by stronger retention rather than weaker retention.
Hashtags Show a Modest Trade-off
Hashtag use produced a small but consistent trade-off in both formats. Long-form videos with at least one hashtag saw views drop 17%, but engagement rise 36%. Shorts with hashtags saw views drop 10% with engagement up 9%. Metricool attributes the pattern to hashtags routing content toward more topic-relevant audiences rather than to broader algorithmic distribution.
Content Lifespan
The report also measured how quickly content peaks. Most of a video’s views and interactions arrive within the first three days of publication, after which performance settles into a slower, sustained pace. Metricool notes this distinguishes YouTube from platforms where content loses relevance within days, since a well-optimized video can continue generating views for months.
The study covers accounts across industry, niche, and subscriber size, segmented into five tiers ranging from Tiny (under 2,000 subscribers) to Huge (1 million-plus), to control for large accounts skewing results for smaller ones.
Image source: Metricool
The full report is available here
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