YouTube is building Shorts into a key feature for the platform’s community of musical artists. In a blog post, YouTube announced Remix, a collection of editing tools that help fans repurpose the biggest moments from their favorite music videos.
By tapping a Remix button that will appear next to YouTube music videos, creators can incorporate elements of those videos in four different ways. The Sound option brings the original audio to the remixed Short; Collab sets up a split-screen response reminiscent of TikTok’s Stitches; Green Screen exports the original video to the background of the Remix; and the Cut tool allows users to clip specific scenes. YouTube’s blog post, attributed to Shorts exec Sarah Ali, specifies that a “five-second clip” is a good size for a Cut.
“It’s not enough to just watch the video – you want to join in on the building hype around the songs and be part of these music movements,” Ali wrote. “And with remixing on YouTube Shorts, now you can, right from the start.”
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YouTube previously discussed Shorts remixes in an August 2023 post that discussed the Collab tool alongside several other incoming features. The enhancements to YouTube’s short-form creation suite build on the platform’s momentum in the music industry. Some Shorts trends based around specific hooks — such as the chorus of the Miley Cyrus track “Flowers” — are reaching millions of viewers on Shorts.
TikTok holds sway of its own in the music world, as evidenced by the launch of the Billboard TikTok Top 50 chart. The Remix suite will bring Shorts creation closer to the experience on TikTok, where editing tools like green screens are the building blocks of memes and trends.
Lyor Cohen, the recording industry vet who serves as the Global Head of Music at YouTube, addressed Shorts’ growing influence in an open letter. Cohen shared two encouraging statistics from January: Shorts tripled the number of unique viewers on an average artist’s videos, and the artists active on Shorts got 60% of their new subscribers from the format.
As TikTok tussles with the world’s most powerful labels, YouTube is touting the steady results of its own short-form music library. Artists like Myke Towers and Jason Derulo are making massive inroads on Shorts — even before the Remixes come in.
