How Many YouTube Shorts Should I Post a Day?

If you're just getting into YouTube Shorts (and you should), you're tapping into a goldmine of audience engagement. This format has proven it isn't just a trend and it can boost your content’s visibility. Tools like Framedrop speed up YouTube Shorts creation by using AI to automatically find the highlights in long videos and turning them to Shorts.

There’s, however, no magic number for how many shorts you should post daily. Some creators swear by “the more the better" way, churning out a bunch daily, while others post a calculated few. My experience? Both approaches can get the algorithm to pick you up.

In this article I’ll shed light on the mystery behind YouTube Shorts numbers and how you can use them to inform your channel’s strategy.

How Many YouTube Shorts Should I Post a Day?

Short on time? Here are the essentials you need to know about YouTube Shorts posting:

• No magic number for daily YouTube Shorts posts -  it varies among creators.
• Upload at least 2-3 per week for growth;
• Quality > quantity always;
• Stay within YouTube's upload limits - usually around 7 shorts per day;
• Optimal posting time for most channels: 5 PM to 10 PM on weekdays;
• Consider audience behavior for effective scheduling. You can check this in your YouTube dashboard;
• Experiment with different timings and content and see what sticks.

One or Multiple YouTube Shorts per Day?

YouTube Shorts are brands’ best friend and YouTube channels are very much brands in their own way. This trendy content format can expose your channel to new and more engaged audiences. That said, how do you decide how often to post? YouTube’s algorithm acts in mysterious ways at times and, as previously mentioned, there is no one-size-fits-all answer.

So, How Many?

A good starting point can be YouTube’s limit on the number of notifications subscribers receive (3 per day with a 24 hour cooldown period). This means that if you post a 4th video in a day your subscribers won’t be notified about it. You can spread out these uploads throughout the day so that, if you have an international audience, most time zones will be covered.

If you ask Reddit "how often do you post YouTube Shorts?" they’ll tell you you should post at least 2-3 shorts per week. This lower number can still get you tons of views since quality is more important than quantity.

Quality Over Quantity

But what does quality over quantity really mean?. Well, if your viewers don’t like what they see they’ll scroll from your content faster. Faster scrolling means lower retention thus decreasing your retention. YouTube’s algorithm will take this data into consideration and evaluate your content’s quality based on it. Low retention means people don’t like the content and the algorithm will push it less.

Posting quality content will also lead to higher viewer loyalty and as so you will grow in subscribers that will look forward to your future posts.

Ideal Time and Day of the Week

YouTube likes to present fresh content to viewers. That’s why the best time for you to upload on YouTube is when a lot of people are online. Don’t post your content so early that viewers are getting ready for school or work or so late that they are getting ready to go to bed.

Post between 5 PM and 10 PM for most work days. On Fridays and weekends you should post earlier since a lot of people go out to get dinner, to the movies, etc.

But what are the best days to post? You can probably see a pattern here. Since on Friday and weekends a lot of people spend their time on other entertainment, YouTube gets less traffic. This means content that gets uploaded has to compete for viewwrship more than on other days.

So, in summary, for most channels the ideal posting time and days are 5 PM to 10 PM on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. These timings can vary depending on your audience. 

Learning About Your Audience

If you already have a small to medium sized audience, the next step is to learn their ways. Do your viewers come back every day to check new content? If so, post daily. Do they appreciate better content even if it means your uploads are more spaced out? Focus on that instead. Are your viewers all from the United States? If so, keep that in mind when choosing a posting time.

After finding the right timing for your channel it’s all about maintaining the posting schedule. After all, even YouTube itself says it, consistency is key.

Experiment From Time to Time

Channel analytics don’t give all the solutions and audiences are ever-changing and adapting to what content creators put out. As a best practice, so should you. Channels that don’t change and adapt their output and methods usually go stale and eventually die out. Here are a few things you could try to change every week:

• The format and structure of the videos
• The videos’ hook
• Adding calls to action
• Featuring other creators

There’s a ton of things you can change and some will work better than others. Make changes one at a time so that you can easily deduce what it was that improved your viewership and retention.