Video Format for YouTube: Your Questions Answered

No matter what your social media strategy is, if it includes video, then YouTube should be your top priority.
Even with more people watching videos on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, people still watch Approximately 5 billion videos on YouTube daily. Roughly one third of the internet’s users (more than 1 billion people) are on YouTube.
When you start planning your video marketing strategy for business, YouTube should be the first place you consider, followed by when to publish your YouTube video.
To get the most out of the videos you post to YouTube, keep these formatting tips in mind when you upload your videos:
YouTube itself states that the preferred video format is MPEG-2 with MPEG Layer II or Dolby AC-3 codecs. If unavailable, you can still use MPEG-4 format with H.264 video codec and AAC audio codec. Even if your video is in a different format, YouTube also supports the following:
Keep in mind that for the best results, YouTube recommends that you upload videos as close to the original high-quality source format as you can.
One of the biggest advantages of YouTube over Facebook and Instagram is its flexibility when it comes to video sizes, resolutions, and dimensions.
You can upload both vertical and horizontal videos (though the latter is recommended), but YouTube’s default aspect ratio is 16:9. You can upload smaller aspect ratios, but YouTube will automatically pad them with filler to reach the default 16:9.
To get the most out of your video, you can choose from one of the following dimensions:
The first step towards assuring your video looks as good as possible is to check the format and aspect ratio. While you can use any of the formats listed above, you should try to record in MPEG-2 to produce the highest quality videos.
Similarly, trying to get as close to the 16:9 aspect ratio will ensure your videos don’t have any blank borders and display properly.
Here are a 5 tips to consider to achieve the highest possible YouTube video resolution:
Here are three great examples of YouTube videos to help you visualize the potential results.
Red Bull:
These videos may have been filmed by pros, but with great tools such as Videoleap's video editor app, you can produce equally amazing videos.
Before you upload videos to YouTube, make sure you match the guidelines to realize the best results possible.