In our last post we tried finding the recipe for the SEO optimized YouTube titles by analyzing 50K+ trending YouTube video titles.

However, that study did not differentiate between the long format videos and the Shorts.

This time we’ll focus specifically on YouTube Shorts and try to uncover the characteristics of a winning Shorts title that maximizes SEO performance and boosts visibility.

Keep reading!

Hi, I’m Mik from TunePocket. This post was based on the actual trending YouTube Shorts meta data collected over the course of 6+ months. Read below to see what data was collected and how we performed the analysis.

Key takeaways

• We’ve analyzed 10,000+ of trending YouTube Shorts titles.
• Shorts titles don’t show in the Shorts player, it’s still a key element of discoverability and SEO.
• After removing hashtags, most Shorts titles fall between 4–6 words and 20–40 characters, which appears to be the sweet spot for mobile-friendly, high-visibility content.
• Over 30% of Shorts titles include emojis, especially in categories like Music and Sports suggesting visual elements help catch attention.
• Only 1.9% of titles use strong emotional or “power” words, meaning most creators rely on clarity rather than clickbait phrasing.
• “#Shorts” appears in just 17% of titles, which shows most creators depend on YouTube’s tagging system rather than including it in the title.
• Science & Technology Shorts use the highest average number of hashtags hinting at a stronger reliance on keyword discovery.
• Don’t rely on the video title alone, use all available metadata to boost your video’s discoverability (see some free YouTube SEO tools later in the post).

How Shorts are different from long format videos on YouTube

YouTube Shorts and long-form videos serve distinct purposes and offer different experiences.

Shorts are designed for quick, vertical content consumption, often under a minute (recently YouTube expanded the maximum length of Shorts to up to three minutes).

This change allowed creators more flexibility while still sticking to the quick-consumption format that defines Shorts.

While Shorts are primarily consumed on mobile devices and are often discovered through the Shorts feed, long-form videos are typically accessed via search, recommendations, or subscriptions.

Are video titles important for Shorts?

YouTube Shorts titles are not visible when users scroll through the Shorts feed. You only see the video and channel name.

So, some creators might assume the Shorts titles don’t matter.

We concluded, that’s not entirely true. Here’s why:

While Shorts titles are not shown in the vertical feed itself, titles still play a crucial role in how the video is discovered and categorized by YouTube’s algorithm.

Titles are used in search results, home page recommendations, and on your channel page, just to name some places where viewers do see them.

More importantly, titles help YouTube understand the content and context of your Short, which affects how and where it gets surfaced.

Even if the title isn’t immediately visible to the viewer in the Shorts player, it’s still a key element of discoverability and SEO.

How we conducted the research

To find out the characteristics of the optimal YouTube Shorts video title for SEO, we conducted extensive research by collecting and analyzing the titles of over 10,000 trending YouTube Shorts.

Our analysis included Shorts specific factors, such as title length, use of hashtags, emojis, and how well the title supported search visibility outside the feed through the placement of terms like “#Shorts”.

Trending Shorts data sample

Here’s a small snapshot of the data we’ve collected for the analysis:

What exactly we analyzed

Title Length (Characters and Words)
Measured the length of Shorts titles to identify common character and word count ranges across categories.

Use of Emojis in Titles
Analyzed how often emojis are included in Shorts titles and whether certain types are more common.

Presence of Numbers or List Formats:
Checked how frequently Shorts titles use list-style structures (e.g., “Top 3”, “5 Tips”) to attract views.

Use of Hooks and Power Words
Tracked attention-grabbing phrases like “must-watch” or “insane” to determine their popularity in Shorts titles.

Use of “#Shorts” in Title
Assessed the inclusion of “#Shorts” within titles to understand if creators are optimizing for search and categorization.

Hashtag Count per Video
Measured the number of hashtags used in each Short to find typical usage patterns.

Most Common Hashtags
Identified and ranked the hashtags most frequently used across the Shorts dataset.

Use of Category-Specific Hashtags
Analyzed how often hashtags are relevant to the video category (e.g., #fitness for Sports, #comedy for Entertainment).

Title Trends by Category
Compared title length, format, and style across categories like Entertainment, Sports, and News.

Hashtag Usage by Category
Studied how hashtag strategies differ across various Shorts categories.

Emoji Usage by Category
Explored which categories favor emojis in titles and how frequently they’re used.

Most common characteristics of YouTube’s Shorts trending titles

After crunching the data, here’s what we found:

Optimal Shorts Title Length

The average length of titles of trending YouTube Shorts videos is 51 characters and 8 words.

Average Title Length: 51 characters

Average Word Count: 8 words

Percentage of Titles with Emojis: 32%

Percentage of Titles with Numbers: 13%

Percentage of Titles with Power Words: 2%

Percentage of Titles Including “#Shorts” in Title: 17%

Average Number of Hashtags per Video: 4

Let’s dig a bit deeper:

Title Length (Characters and Words)

We measured the length of Shorts titles to identify common character and word count ranges across categories.

The average YouTube Shorts title is approximately 51 characters long and contains about 8 words.

Let’s see the exact distribution:

Word Count Distribution (incl. hashtags)

1–3 words: 5.59%

4–6 words: 29.56%

7–9 words: 31.94%

10+ words: 32.91%

Character Count Distribution (incl. hashtags)

Less than 20 characters: 5.18%

20–40 characters: 35.98%

41–60 characters: 27.40%

61–80 characters: 16.06%

Over 80 characters: 15.38%

The majority of YouTube Shorts titles fall between 4–9 words (including hashtags!), with nearly 65% of titles in that range, suggesting creators favor short, punchy messaging.

In terms of characters, over 63% of titles are between 20–60 characters, aligning with best practices for mobile readability and SEO visibility.

Very short or overly long titles are less common.

If we exclude hashtags from the title most titles fall into tighter, more optimized ranges: 20–40 characters and 4–6 words, which may align better with user scanning behavior and mobile search visibility.

Use of Emojis in Titles

We analyzed how often emojis are included in Shorts titles and whether certain types are more common.

About 31.74% of Shorts titles included emojis.

This shows that a substantial portion of creators use visual symbols to stand out in feeds, especially where thumbnails or descriptions are limited.

Presence of Numbers or List Formats

We checked how frequently Shorts titles use list-style structures (e.g., “Top 3”, “5 Tips”) to attract views.

Only 12.82% of Shorts titles contain numbers, so looks like this isn’t a dominant trend.

Use of Hooks and Power Words

We tracked attention-grabbing phrases like “must-watch” or “insane” to determine their popularity in Shorts titles.

Only 1.89% of titles include common power words, suggesting Shorts titles lean more on visual cues and concise messaging than sensational language.

Use of “#Shorts” in Title

We assessed the inclusion of “#Shorts” within titles to understand if creators are optimizing for search and categorization.

Just 17.45% of creators included “#Shorts” in their titles. This shows that while some aim to signal format type for discoverability, most rely on platform tagging and metadata instead.

Hashtag Count per Video

We measured the number of hashtags used in each Short to find typical usage patterns.

On average, Shorts include 4.31 hashtags, indicating that creators actively use tags to improve content visibility, trend alignment, or audience targeting.

Most Common Hashtags

We aimed to identified and ranked the hashtags most frequently used across the Shorts dataset.

By large #shorts hashtag dominated, along with channel-specific or niche tags.

Use of Category Specific Hashtags

We analyzed how often hashtags are relevant to the video category (e.g., #fitness for Sports, #comedy for Entertainment).

Category analysis indicated varying hashtag strategies. For instance, Science & Technology had the highest average hashtag count (6.82), implying creators in this niche may lean more heavily on topic-aligned tags.

Title Trends by Category

We compared title length, format, and style across categories like Entertainment, Sports, and News.

Title lengths varied slightly by category. For instance, News & Politics Shorts had the longest titles on average (61 characters), while Nonprofit & Activism had the shortest.

This may reflects different content styles: informational vs. punchy or viral.

Hashtag Usage by Category

We studied how hashtag strategies differ across various Shorts categories.

Science & Technology, Nonprofit & Activism, and Entertainment categories used the most hashtags per video, suggesting creators in these categories lean on tagging to enhance reach or add context.

Emoji Usage by Category

We explored which categories favor emojis in titles and how frequently they’re used.

Sports and Music categories showed the highest emoji usage (47% and 46%, respectively), which may reflect their expressive and youth-oriented audiences where visual language boosts engagement.

generate catchy YouTube video titles (now optimized for Shorts!)

Related: YouTube Video Titles: 15 Best Practices

don’t rely on the title optimization alone if you want to succeed you YouTube!

Using the optimized video title is definitely an important tool in your YouTube content tool chest.

However, don’t forget to optimize your channel, as well as each video’s metadata!

Here are some free tools and resources that can help:

The rule of thumb: just make good videos that people want to watch!

Related: How to pick the best name for your YouTube channel based on data research

Questions?

We hope you find our research helpful.

Have another burning question about YouTube? Post it in the comments and we’ll do the data crunching.