Shorts feed vs other traffic sources in YouTube Analytics

In YouTube Studio, open Analytics, choose a video, and use the Reach tab to see traffic sources; for Shorts, YouTube lists the Shorts vertical viewing experience as its own traffic source, separate from Home and subscriptions, search, and external sites. The Shorts content tab adds two Shorts-only numbers: how many times your Short showed in the Shorts feed, and what share of those showings turned into a view rather than a swipe away.

This is read from Understand your YouTube video reach and Content tab analytics tips - Shorts, both read on 2026-10-03. If you make several variants of one Short with Sume, those two pages are what you compare them on. Sume makes the variants; it has no connection to YouTube Analytics.

Which numbers separate Shorts feed from everything else?

The reach page says traffic comes either from within YouTube or from external sources, and it lists the types: browse features (Home, subscriptions, Watch Later, Trending/Explore), and Shorts, described as traffic from the Shorts vertical viewing experience. The Shorts tips page describes where audiences find Shorts as overall sources, external sites and apps, YouTube search terms, suggested videos, and playlists.

How should I compare variants of one Short?

A variant is a different upload with its own numbers, so the comparison is by video, not by a setting. Both pages give you the starting points: for each variant, read Shown in feed and How many chose to view, then look at the traffic source split to see whether a variant earned its views from the Shorts feed or from search or elsewhere. Keep the formats the same: the tips page tells you to compare videos of the same type, so compare Short against Short.

Do not read more into the pages than they say. Neither states a minimum sample, a minimum number of days, or what a good swipe-away rate is, and I will not invent one. If one variant was posted to your subscribers first and another was not, the browse features source will differ for reasons that have nothing to do with the edit. Change one thing per variant, post them under similar conditions, and write down which upload is which. How does YouTube count Shorts views covers what a view means, and YouTube A/B testing three cuts covers the Studio test for cuts.

How do I cut the variants with Sume?

The cheapest variant is a different first few seconds of the same take. Video trim cuts a range out of one clip on Sume's media host and returns a new MP4; it costs $0.02 per job and the source is untouched. If you need a variant with a different order of shots or a different audio bed, Timeline 1.0 assembles clips into one MP4 at $0.10 per rounded-up output minute, and its default output is 1080 by 1920. Each call needs an Idempotency-Key, and a distinct key per variant keeps a retry from creating a second copy; see Jobs and results for polling.

The script below submits three cuts of one master, each starting at a different second, and prints the job ids so you can label which upload used which.

import json, os, urllib.request

MASTER = "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/master.mp4"
starts = {"a_cold_open": 0, "b_after_intro": 4, "c_midpoint": 12}

for name, start in starts.items():
    body = {"video_url": MASTER, "start": start, "duration": 30}
    req = urllib.request.Request(
        "https://api.sume.com/v1/video-trim",
        data=json.dumps(body).encode(),
        headers={
            "Authorization": "Bearer " + os.environ["SUME_API_KEY"],
            "Content-Type": "application/json",
            "Idempotency-Key": "variant-" + name,
        },
        method="POST",
    )
    with urllib.request.urlopen(req) as resp:
        job = json.load(resp)
        print(name, resp.status, job.get("request_id"))

What Sume cannot tell you

Sume does not read your YouTube Analytics, upload the variants, or decide a winner. Write the variant name into your upload title or a note, then read the numbers in Studio. If views fall across all your Shorts rather than between variants, that is a different question, covered in Did the Shorts originality update cut my reach.