There is a new entrant on the Short-form video content platform. And it is the inevitable company that already has the largest platform for video content, i.e. Youtube. It was speculated that sooner or later, Youtube has to enter the newly discovered short-form video content market. It’s now TikTok VS Youtube Shorts.
The key difference between TikTok VS Youtube Shorts is that one is a video-sharing platform that hosts both long and short-form videos, and the other is the one that started the whole video streaming platform but has recently shifted to short-form videos. TikTok has already established itself in the short-form video market but Youtube may have to work a little hard to reap the benefits from short-form video.
As a user, you may be confused about what the differences are between these two platforms. Or if they are the same. And which one should you choose if you want to create your short-form video content. This article will explain in detail the similarities and differences between these two platforms.
TikTok VS Youtube Shorts : Understand Better
The platform that introduced the short-form video content is indisputably TikTok. But it is not true that before TikTok there were no short-form video formats and Youtube didn’t support such format.
But what TikTok did was they introduced a whole platform that can rely on user-generated content with just a smartphone and curated content among those to recommend to other users.
Then came other platforms that saw the interest of users in such content and users flocked to TikTok. Instagram came up with a similar concept called ‘Reels’ allowing users to create and upload content for up to 60 sec.
The latest to foray onto the market is Youtube, a company that already has a monopoly on long-form video content. Youtube named it ‘Youtube Shorts’ and integrated it into the Youtube App. This helped youtube shorts to get audiences from Youtube itself.
Also Read: How To Convert Youtube Videos?
TikTok VS Youtube Shorts: The Similarities
Even if these two platforms are owned by different companies, most of the functionalities of both of them are similar. The similarities between these platforms are listed below.
Both TikTok VS YouTube Shorts Caters To The Short-Form Video Content
Short-form video content which is mainly less than 60 sec long is the main target for both of these platforms.
Both Use Vertical Video Format As The Default
Both TikTok and Youtube Shorts is designed to be viewed in vertical form. The videos appear full screen when viewed vertically.
Users Can Create Videos Within The Apps Themselves And Edit It
You can record and upload videos using the respective app and do not need to have a separate app to record and edit them.
Users Can Also Directly Upload Videos From Their Galleries
You can also upload videos and clips from the gallery directly instead of recording with the app. You can create videos and edit them before uploading them on any of these platforms.
Both Platforms Have Audio Libraries
Both Youtube Shorts and TikTok have audio libraries which users can use to create videos. And also users can simply click the music icon on the bottom-right part of the screen to see all the videos made under that audio.
Both Offer Analytics Tools For Creators
Both TikTok and Youtube Shorts offer analytics tools for the creators to track their performance and growth. It also gives an insight into how each of the videos is being perceived and how much engagement it is getting.
The UI/UX Is Similar In Both Apps
Even with many differences, the user interface and the user experience of both TikTok and Youtube Shorts are similar and easily understood. Even after the fact that Youtube shorts are integrated.
Both Of Them Have A Manual Scroll Feature
In both apps, a user has to manually scroll down to see another video. If not, the video will be playing in a loop. This forces a user to not let their phone off their hands.
Both Of Them Allow Creators To Make Money
Both platforms allow the creators to make money from the platform. Though there are differences in how creators get paid on the platform, the ability to make money from content remains a reality on both.
These were some of the noticeable similarities between Youtube Shorts and TikTok. There can be some more differences as time goes on and both apps update themselves.
Until now Youtube was the central place to go for Long-form video content, now that they have started offering short-form video content too, it has threatened the Business model of TikTok. To counter this, TikTok recently updated its support for long-form videos. Now you can upload a video up to 10 min long on TikTok.
Also Read: How To Share Youtube Videos On Instagram?
Tiktok VS Youtube Shorts: The Difference
As there are the above-mentioned similarities between the platforms and apps, there are still some major differences among them. The differences are listed and explained below.
YouTube Has A Large Audio Library Compared To TikTok
While both of the platforms have audio libraries, youtube has by far the largest one. This is because youtube is the go-to place for video streaming, and the number of songs and audio that the youtube library has eclipses TikTok’s.
TikTok Has Various Filters And Effects Libraries Compared To Youtube Shorts
TikTok was the platform that introduced the short-form video content, so it was the one that set the rules for the entire game. In doing so, TikTok managed to create a massive library of filters and effects. This comes as a success for TikTok because Youtube has no way to replicate the same.
TikTok Has An In-App Analytics Tool Whereas YouTube Needs YouTube Studio For That
The analytics tool of TikTok can be found within the TikTok app itself. But if you want to check analytics for Youtube shorts, you need to download a separate app called ‘Youtube Studio’. This makes it hard for anyone to do everything from the same app.
YouTube Already Has A Massive Audience
Youtube being old and having a massive audience is a good thing for Youtube Shorts. The same audiences of Youtube can be converted to the audiences of Youtube Shorts. While TikTok has to create its own audience from the ground up, Youtube Shorts had it easy to attract audiences.
TikTok Has A Chinese Origin Whereas YouTube Shorts Is Based In The US
The fact that TikTok originated from china is not a good thing for TikTok. China is not known for its transparent legal system and protection of consumer rights. This means a bad PR for TikTok. While Youtube Shorts enjoys the goodwill that comes from Youtube, its parent Google and also its country of origin US.
All these differences between these two platforms are observed and analyzed. This also means that these differences will get widened and both platforms will make their own distinctive brand in the future.
Tiktok VS Youtube Shorts: Which One To Choose For Your Benefit?
So if you have to choose between these two platforms, which one will you choose?
As already mentioned that TikTok is the one that introduced short-form video content as a major product. So it gave TikTok a chance to lay the foundations for how will people interact among themselves and others. This made TikTok very good in what it had to offer to its users.
While Youtube shorts also has similar features and functionalities, it does not have a polished version like TikTok. The TikTok app has been designed to support everything that a user needs to create, upload and engage with the videos. But the Youtube Shorts hosted inside the Youtube app is not created taking it into mind. So it will be harder for youtube to integrate them both.
But this does not mean that youtube will not improve it. They certainly will as they have all the resources needed to do so, from budget to engineers in abundance.
So for you, it will be a great idea to create the videos you want to create using a separate video editing app. Now you can use that videos to upload on both TikTok and Youtube Shorts. This is a better idea as you will have to do almost the same amount of work to upload on a single platform and both platforms.
It will also help you get exposed to both audiences from both platforms and hopefully increase the revenue too.
Also Read: How To Monetize TikTok Videos On Youtube?
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Some frequently asked questions related to the topic are taken from the internet. Please go through the questions and their answers to understand more about the topic.
Is YouTube Shorts Better Than TikTok?
Youtube shorts do have a massive library of audio to choose from. Whereas TikTok has a big library of special effects and filters. The TikTok app is also better suited to creating and editing a video and uploading it without any use of an external tool.
Are YouTube Shorts Successful?
Yes, youtube shorts has been growing and crossed 5 trillion views earlier this year. This can comfortably make youtube shorts a direct competitor of TikTok. And also the public suspicion of TikTok not adhering to safeguarding user data is helping Youtube shorts to make grounds for further competition. So we can comfortably say that Youtube Shorts is Successful.
Can I Earn Money From YouTube Shorts?
Yes, youtube shorts make money from the shorts fund youtube. While it is not as big as how much youtube pays its creators, the shorts funds will increase as the users increase on the platform. So yes, you can earn money from youtube shorts.
Conclusion
Therefore, this article presented a brief description of the youtube shorts and TikTok. It also presented the similarities of both the platforms and pointed out the differences between them.
The case for why you need to select both platforms for your videos is also presented in this article.
Some frequently asked questions are also included and answered in brief. Please go through the article to find the answers.
