Best practices: Social platforms' video guidelines
When posting videos to any social media platforms via their API (how third-party platforms like Sendible integrate to social sites) you’ll find that there are restrictions in place that will cause your posts to bounce if you exceed them.
This is not the case when logging in and posting directly to your social media accounts (natively), however, all social media platforms apply restrictions for users posting via their API, and these restrictions differ from channel to channel.
This article will outline all these video restrictions and you can jump to the social site you need by clicking on the social site on the right of this article.
Recommended:
- Recommended Video Codec: H.264 High Profile
- Recommended Frame Rates: 30 FPS, 60 FPS
- Recommended Video Resolution: 1280x720 (landscape), 720x1280 (portrait), 720x720 (square)
- Recommended Minimum Video Bitrate: 5,000 kbps
- Recommended Minimum Audio Bitrate: 128 kbps
- Recommended Audio Codec: AAC LC
- Recommended Aspect Ratio: 16:9 (landscape or portrait), 1:1 (square)
Advanced:
- Frame rate must be 60 FPS or less
- Dimensions must be between 32x32 and 1280x1024
- File size must not exceed 512 MB
- Duration must be between 0.5 seconds and 140 seconds
- Aspect ratio must be between 1:3 and 3:1
- Must have 1:1 pixel aspect ratio
- Only YUV 4:2:0 pixel format is supported
- Audio must be AAC with Low Complexity profile. High-Efficiency AAC is not supported
- Audio must be mono or stereo, not 5.1 or greater
- Must not have open GOP (group of pictures)
- Must use progressive scan
- No larger than 250 MB
- Up to 59 minutes in length
- Adding a YouTube link will post as a link preview which when clicked on, will open YouTube in a new tab to play the video.
Note: The following restrictions mainly apply when posting to Instagram Business profiles through Instagram's API, as posting with an Instagram Reminder profile is manual and will still go through the Instagram mobile app natively.
- Format: MOV or MP4
- Frame rate: 23-60 FPS
- File size: 100 MB maximum
- Bitrate: VBR, 5 Mbps maximum
- Duration: 60 seconds maximum, 3 seconds minimum
- Audio codec: AAC, 48 khz sample rate maximum, 1 or 2 channels (mono or stereo).
- Video codec:
- HEVC
- H264
- Progressive Scan
- Closed GOP
- 4:2:0 chroma subsampling
- Picture size:
- Maximum columns (horizontal pixels): 1920
- Minimum aspect ratio [cols / rows]: 4 / 5
- Maximum aspect ratio [cols / rows]: 16 / 9
Important: MOV videos might fail to post in some instances and can be less consistent than MP4 videos, but we are looking to address this ASAP.
YouTube
- No longer than 59 minutes
- Channel icon: 800 x 800 pixels (this will get rendered to 98 x 98 pixels)
- Video thumbnail: 1280 x 760 pixels
- Channel art: 2560 x 1440 pixels
- Make sure you check the template as cropping varies widely from TV to mobile to desktop
Important: Your YouTube account will need to be verified, in order for you to be able to post videos with a duration longer than 15 minutes.
- Native Videos available to Company Pages only (Playing video within LinkedIn.com)
- Up to 200 MB for Company Pages
- Posting videos to LinkedIn Profiles will display as a link (Which when clicked on will open in a new tab outside of LinkedIn.com)
- YouTube links will display normally and will auto-play
Tumblr
- Any video files uploaded will appear as an image which when clicked on, will open in a new page to play the video
Google My Business
Important: Google currently doesn't allow videos to be posted via their API, but this may change in the future.
WordPress
Important: WordPress currently doesn't allow videos to be posted via their API, but this may change in the future.