Keep a 2-minute video long-form on YouTube: render 1920x1080

If a video is two minutes long and you want YouTube to treat it as long-form, render it wide. YouTube's three-minute Shorts page says square or vertical uploads of up to three minutes after October 15, 2024 are categorised as Shorts, and that to avoid it you should use a wider aspect ratio such as 16:9. Sume Timeline 1.0 renders 1080x1920 by default, so set output.width to 1920 and output.height to 1080 yourself.

What decides the class

The page ties the Shorts class to two properties of the upload: the shape (square or vertical) and the length (up to three minutes), with the date rule on top. Shape is the one you control at render time. A 16:9 file is not square or vertical, so the page's rule does not apply to it, whatever its length.

The Timeline fields

output.width and output.height are even integers from 256 to 2160, which includes 1920x1080. output.fps is 24, 25, 30 or 60; leave it out and the render follows the sources, which is the setting that avoids repeated or dropped frames. Each slot has a fit: cover (the default) fills the frame and crops, contain letterboxes, stretch distorts, and blur fills the sides with a blurred copy. For vertical clips placed in a landscape frame, blur or contain keeps the whole picture visible.

{
  "audio": {
    "url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/voice.wav",
    "duration_seconds": 120
  },
  "video": [
    { "source_url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/a.mp4", "start": 0, "duration": 60, "fit": "blur" },
    { "source_url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/b.mp4", "start": 60, "duration": 60, "fit": "blur" }
  ],
  "output": { "width": 1920, "height": 1080 }
}

What this does not prove

Sume produces the file, and YouTube decides how to label the upload. The page I read states the rule; I have not uploaded test files, so check the first upload in YouTube Studio before you rely on it for a series. Also note that the page says changing classification affects where the video can be monetised: Shorts from the Shorts feed use the Shorts revenue-sharing model, and long-form uses the watch-page model.

Price and limits

Timeline renders are $0.10 per ceil output minute, so a 120 s video is two minutes. The audio spine can be 1 to 1800 seconds and the slot list up to 200 entries. The plan route, POST /v1/timeline-1.0/plan, returns billable_minutes and a cost estimate without creating a job.