YouTube bitrate ladder: file size of a 3-minute Short by resolution

A 180 second video at YouTube's recommended 1080p SDR bitrate of 8 Mbps is about 180 MB (8 x 180 / 8), or 270 MB at the 12 Mbps high frame rate figure. YouTube says a Short can be up to 3 minutes. The numbers below are YouTube's upload guidance turned into sizes. Sume does not set bitrate, so treat them as a budget to compare your file against, not something to request.

YouTube's numbers

YouTube's upload encoding page lists recommended SDR video bitrates for standard and high frame rates. The Shorts help page says Shorts run up to 3 minutes and that the maximum upload resolution is 1080p. Both pages were read on 2026-10-08.

The arithmetic

Size in megabytes is the bitrate in megabits per second, times seconds, divided by 8. Sizes are decimal megabytes and cover video only. YouTube also lists audio bitrates: 384 kbps for stereo, so 180 seconds of stereo audio adds 0.384 x 180 / 8 = 8.64 MB. A 1080p standard-fps Short therefore lands near 188.6 MB with audio.

The script below does the same sum, so you can change the length or add a row.

ladder = {"1080p": (8, 12), "720p": (5, 7.5), "480p": (2.5, 4), "360p": (1, 1.5)}
seconds = 180
audio_mb = 0.384 * seconds / 8
for name, (std, high) in ladder.items():
    std_mb = std * seconds / 8
    high_mb = high * seconds / 8
    print(name, std_mb, high_mb, round(std_mb + audio_mb, 2))

Where Sume fits

Sume gives you the length and the frame size, not the bitrate. Video trim cuts a range of 0.2 to 900 seconds for $0.02 and, with exact precision, can conform output to a width and height between 256 and 2160 and an fps of 24, 25, 30 or 60. So a 180 second cut from a longer film is one trim job.

To find out what you actually have, read the probe data from video inspect, then divide the artifact size by the duration. A file far above the table is a candidate for a re-export from your editor, where bitrate is under your control.

• Cut to 180 seconds: trim with duration 180, $0.02.
• Conform to 1080 x 1920 at 30 fps: exact precision with an output block.
• Check duration and size afterwards with video inspect.

Limits of this table

The ladder is YouTube's recommendation for uploads, and YouTube re-encodes what you send. A smaller file is not rejected, and a larger one is not guaranteed better playback. The numbers also assume constant bitrate, which real encodes only approximate. Treat the table as an order-of-magnitude check on file size before you upload over a slow link. If you export several ladder rungs yourself, keep the 16:9 or 9:16 shape the same across them so only the size changes.