YouTube Shorts bitrate and file size limit: the help page lists none

The YouTube help page on Shorts length does not list a bitrate or a file size limit, so there is no official number there to meet. What it does list is a length of up to three minutes, a square or vertical aspect ratio, and a rule about copyright claims on Shorts over one minute (YouTube Help, read 2026-10-09). If you need a number for bitrate, this page will not give you one.

What the page does say

Videos with a square or vertical aspect ratio, up to three minutes, are categorized as Shorts. To avoid Shorts classification, use a wider aspect ratio such as 16:9. A Short over one minute with an active copyright claim is blocked globally, not playable or recommended and not eligible for monetization. Shorts under one minute have no change to copyright limitations.

What that leaves for a Sume render

Since the page sets only length and shape, those are the two things to control. Shape: Timeline 1.0 outputs 1080x1920 by default, and you can set any even width and height from 256 to 2160, so 1080x1080 (square) and 1080x1920 (vertical) both count. Length: audio.duration_seconds is 1 to 1,800, so keep it at or below 180 for a Short.

A 3-minute (180-second) timeline render bills ceil(180/60) = 3 minutes, so 3 x $0.10 = $0.30. A 61-second render bills two minutes ($0.20) and a 60-second render bills one ($0.10).

Do not invent a spec

Articles often quote 8 Mbps or 1080p for Shorts. Those figures are not on this page, so this post does not quote them. If you want a resolution cap or a bitrate recommendation, you need the page that publishes it, and you should cite that page. See the 1080p maximum post for a separate YouTube page that covers resolution.

You can still do a sanity check on file size yourself. Sume has no bitrate field and rejects codec and crf, so you render, read the file size, and upload. If the upload fails, the error will come from YouTube, not from Sume.

The 60-second line

The one number on the page that affects how you cut is one minute, for the claim rule. If your Short uses music that may be claimed, a video trim with duration set to 59 keeps it under a minute. A trim costs $0.02. The billing post shows how that interacts with timeline minutes.