YouTube Shorts hashtags: three show, 60 is the limit, and #Shorts

On YouTube, up to three hashtags appear next to a Short's title, and they are picked from the hashtags in your description. YouTube Help says those three are the ones "considered most engaging", so you do not choose which three show. The hard ceiling is 60: if a video or playlist has more than 60 hashtags, YouTube ignores every hashtag on it.

As for #Shorts, the help page on hashtags does not mention it. This post only states what the pages I read say: Find playlists & videos using hashtags for hashtag behaviour and Upload YouTube Shorts for what makes an upload a Short. Both were read on 2026-10-03. Sume makes the video file; it does not publish to YouTube or fill in your description, so hashtags stay a step you do in YouTube.

Where do hashtags show on a YouTube Short?

The hashtag help page describes two places. Hashtags in the title and description link to a results page of other videos that share the hashtag, and up to three of the ones from your description appear by the video title. When you add text to a Short and start typing a hashtag, YouTube shows suggestions, based on signals such as your past uploads and, in some countries, the text you entered.

Does a Short need the #Shorts hashtag?

The pages I read do not make #Shorts a requirement or a rule. The Shorts upload page says the video should be a square or vertical aspect ratio, up to 3 minutes. It does not mention a hashtag in that definition, and the hashtag page is silent on #Shorts, so I cannot tell you YouTube Help requires or ignores it. If you add it, it counts like any other hashtag toward your 60.

The length and shape rules are the ones worth checking before you upload. YouTube Shorts video specs covers the format side, and How to stop YouTube making my video a Short covers the reverse case.

What can Sume do about hashtags?

Nothing on the YouTube side. Sume's docs describe a clip you download as an MP4; none of the pages cited here describes a way to post it or to set a description. The hashtags go into your Studio description or the Shorts text tool when you publish.

One trap is worth naming. Sume can burn text into the picture: Video captions takes a public video URL and either transcribes it or burns the cues you supply, at $0.20 per job for videos up to 60 seconds. A hashtag burned in that way is pixels. The hashtag page describes hashtags typed in the title, description, or the Shorts text tool, and says nothing about text baked into a frame, so do not expect a burned-in #tag to link anywhere. Use captions for words viewers should read; keep hashtags in the description.

A small check before you paste your description

Since 60 is a cliff rather than a soft limit, a tiny lint before you paste is cheap. This script counts hashtags in a description and flags the case the help page names: more than 60. It only reads text, so it makes no call to Sume or YouTube.

import re

def lint(description):
    tags = re.findall(r"#\w+", description)
    problems = []
    if len(tags) > 60:
        problems.append("more than 60: YouTube ignores all of them")
    return tags, problems

text = "Quick fix for sticky drawers #homefix #diy #howto"
tags, problems = lint(text)
print(len(tags), "hashtags", problems or "ok")

Putting it together

Write the description with the three hashtags you most want shown first in mind, keep the total far below 60, and let YouTube decide which three surface. Make the clip in whatever tool you like, burn in only the words people must read, and add the tags where YouTube reads them. For a trim to fit the Short's length before upload, Video trim cuts one range into a new MP4 for $0.02 per job.