Photo Credit: YouTube

YouTube Shorts announces some new features, including adding 15-second music clips to image posts and enabling users to double their playback speed.

YouTube has announced some new functionality to expand YouTube Shorts and further vie with TikTok and Instagram Reels. Image posts, including carousels, can now appear in the Shorts feed to help creators’ audiences further connect with them. Image posts can also be paired with up to 15 seconds of background audio, and users can select from YouTube’s library of licensed music, royalty-free tracks, or create custom soundtracks using YouTube’s AI-generated Dream Track tool.

“We know you’re looking for new, meaningful ways to connect with your audience and share your creativity without needing to upload a full video every single time,” reads YouTube’s announcement. “Whether you want to share a quick behind-the-scenes look or tell a deep visual story, you can create these image posts directly in the YouTube mobile app.”

Notably, only image posts shown in the Shorts feed count as views, reported under the Posts content type. Traffic from the Home feed, Subscriptions tab, Watch Next, or channel spaces won’t add to creators’ view counts. Updates are rolling out to eligible creators on the YouTube mobile app.

The announcement comes just days after YouTube started rolling out other changes, such as a new method to shorten the duration of short-form videos. Shorts now include a setting enabling users to double their playback speed—making an already brief short-form video experience even shorter.

The company also removed the “dislike” button from Shorts, meaning users will have to rely on the “Not Interested” and “Don’t recommend this channel” functions to tweak their algorithm.

These changes and more, which YouTube says are forthcoming, are rolling out in an effort to create what the company calls “a more intuitive Shorts experience.”

YouTube Shorts launched on the platform in 2020 and has leveraged an impressive audience since then in the ever-evolving short-form video landscape. Last summer, YouTube CEO Neal Mohan said at his keynote in Cannes that Shorts averaged 200 billion daily views. Users are also increasingly watching Shorts on TV screens, with as much as 2 billion hours being consumed per month in this way.