Eliminating Grey Edges on Video: A YouTube Fix Guide

How to Remove Black Bars from YouTube Videos

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

The black bars appear because the video uploaded by the users may include horizontal black bars at the bottom and top of the video player to fit an aspect ratio of 4:3. The YouTube video player has an aspect ratio of 16:9, so it adds vertical black bars to fit according to the dimension. And in this guide, we will help you get rid of this trouble and remove annoying black bars from YouTube videos.

• Part 1: Removing the black bars before uploading
• Part 2: Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

Remove the black bars before uploading

You can make use of the following software to remove the black bars from your videos.

1. Wondershare Filmora

Filmora supports a large format of videos hence one of the widely used. Follow these steps to remove the black bars:

• Import the video or drag and drop it in Wondershare Flimora.
• Select the video with black bars and right click on it.
• Click on “crop and zoom” which will open the crop window.
• Set your desired frameset (16:9, 4:3 or customized aspect ratio) and see your video in the preview pane.
• Save the new video without the black bars by clicking on “Export”.

Download Mac Version ](https://tools.techidaily.com/wondershare/filmora/download/ )

2. Sony Vegas Pro

One of the most popular and sought after video editing tool, Sony Vegas Pro can help removing the black bars very simply:

• Open the video.
• You will see the video in preview and a timeline beneath, right click on the video clip on the timeline.
• Click on properties, a new window will pop-up, click on disable resample and make sure that “maintain aspect ratio” is unchecked.
• Your video will be without the black bars. Save the video.

3. Windows Live Movie Maker

This inbuilt tool in Windows for video editing can be used to remove the black bars from your YouTube videos.

• Drop and drag the video to windows live movie maker.
• Select the video and you will see a couple of options to set aspect ratio.
• Click on the desired one and the black bars will be removed.
• You can save the video in different formats.

4. Final Cut Pro

Final Cut pro offers you a whole lot of video editing options that includes removal of black bars. Right aspect ratio ensures there are no unpleasant black bars on either side of the video. To get them removed with the help of Final Cut Pro:

• Import the video with black bars.
• Select the video and change its aspect ratio. (Either stretch it or crop it).
• Save the video after it has been corrected.

Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

It is very simple to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or while uploading a video. Click on the Edit button next to the video, and add the most suited instruction in the Tag bar below:

yt:crop=16:9

This tag zooms in on the video because of which the contents at the borders (black bars in this case) do not appear anymore.

yt:stretch=16:9

This tag stretches the video in the aspect ratio of 16:9. It is used to view the video in wide-screen format.

yt:stretch=4:3

if your video is appearing in wide-screen format, but you want it to display in 720 x 480 pixels, apply this tag. It scales down the video 4:3 aspect.

Try any of the above software to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or the new videos and make it pleasant to viewers.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

The black bars appear because the video uploaded by the users may include horizontal black bars at the bottom and top of the video player to fit an aspect ratio of 4:3. The YouTube video player has an aspect ratio of 16:9, so it adds vertical black bars to fit according to the dimension. And in this guide, we will help you get rid of this trouble and remove annoying black bars from YouTube videos.

• Part 1: Removing the black bars before uploading
• Part 2: Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

Remove the black bars before uploading

You can make use of the following software to remove the black bars from your videos.

1. Wondershare Filmora

Filmora supports a large format of videos hence one of the widely used. Follow these steps to remove the black bars:

• Import the video or drag and drop it in Wondershare Flimora.
• Select the video with black bars and right click on it.
• Click on “crop and zoom” which will open the crop window.
• Set your desired frameset (16:9, 4:3 or customized aspect ratio) and see your video in the preview pane.
• Save the new video without the black bars by clicking on “Export”.

Download Mac Version ](https://tools.techidaily.com/wondershare/filmora/download/ )

2. Sony Vegas Pro

One of the most popular and sought after video editing tool, Sony Vegas Pro can help removing the black bars very simply:

• Open the video.
• You will see the video in preview and a timeline beneath, right click on the video clip on the timeline.
• Click on properties, a new window will pop-up, click on disable resample and make sure that “maintain aspect ratio” is unchecked.
• Your video will be without the black bars. Save the video.

3. Windows Live Movie Maker

This inbuilt tool in Windows for video editing can be used to remove the black bars from your YouTube videos.

• Drop and drag the video to windows live movie maker.
• Select the video and you will see a couple of options to set aspect ratio.
• Click on the desired one and the black bars will be removed.
• You can save the video in different formats.

4. Final Cut Pro

Final Cut pro offers you a whole lot of video editing options that includes removal of black bars. Right aspect ratio ensures there are no unpleasant black bars on either side of the video. To get them removed with the help of Final Cut Pro:

• Import the video with black bars.
• Select the video and change its aspect ratio. (Either stretch it or crop it).
• Save the video after it has been corrected.

Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

It is very simple to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or while uploading a video. Click on the Edit button next to the video, and add the most suited instruction in the Tag bar below:

yt:crop=16:9

This tag zooms in on the video because of which the contents at the borders (black bars in this case) do not appear anymore.

yt:stretch=16:9

This tag stretches the video in the aspect ratio of 16:9. It is used to view the video in wide-screen format.

yt:stretch=4:3

if your video is appearing in wide-screen format, but you want it to display in 720 x 480 pixels, apply this tag. It scales down the video 4:3 aspect.

Try any of the above software to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or the new videos and make it pleasant to viewers.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

The black bars appear because the video uploaded by the users may include horizontal black bars at the bottom and top of the video player to fit an aspect ratio of 4:3. The YouTube video player has an aspect ratio of 16:9, so it adds vertical black bars to fit according to the dimension. And in this guide, we will help you get rid of this trouble and remove annoying black bars from YouTube videos.

• Part 1: Removing the black bars before uploading
• Part 2: Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

Remove the black bars before uploading

You can make use of the following software to remove the black bars from your videos.

1. Wondershare Filmora

Filmora supports a large format of videos hence one of the widely used. Follow these steps to remove the black bars:

• Import the video or drag and drop it in Wondershare Flimora.
• Select the video with black bars and right click on it.
• Click on “crop and zoom” which will open the crop window.
• Set your desired frameset (16:9, 4:3 or customized aspect ratio) and see your video in the preview pane.
• Save the new video without the black bars by clicking on “Export”.

Download Mac Version ](https://tools.techidaily.com/wondershare/filmora/download/ )

2. Sony Vegas Pro

One of the most popular and sought after video editing tool, Sony Vegas Pro can help removing the black bars very simply:

• Open the video.
• You will see the video in preview and a timeline beneath, right click on the video clip on the timeline.
• Click on properties, a new window will pop-up, click on disable resample and make sure that “maintain aspect ratio” is unchecked.
• Your video will be without the black bars. Save the video.

3. Windows Live Movie Maker

This inbuilt tool in Windows for video editing can be used to remove the black bars from your YouTube videos.

• Drop and drag the video to windows live movie maker.
• Select the video and you will see a couple of options to set aspect ratio.
• Click on the desired one and the black bars will be removed.
• You can save the video in different formats.

4. Final Cut Pro

Final Cut pro offers you a whole lot of video editing options that includes removal of black bars. Right aspect ratio ensures there are no unpleasant black bars on either side of the video. To get them removed with the help of Final Cut Pro:

• Import the video with black bars.
• Select the video and change its aspect ratio. (Either stretch it or crop it).
• Save the video after it has been corrected.

## Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

It is very simple to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or while uploading a video. Click on the Edit button next to the video, and add the most suited instruction in the Tag bar below:

yt:crop=16:9

This tag zooms in on the video because of which the contents at the borders (black bars in this case) do not appear anymore.

yt:stretch=16:9

This tag stretches the video in the aspect ratio of 16:9. It is used to view the video in wide-screen format.

yt:stretch=4:3

if your video is appearing in wide-screen format, but you want it to display in 720 x 480 pixels, apply this tag. It scales down the video 4:3 aspect.

Try any of the above software to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or the new videos and make it pleasant to viewers.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

The black bars appear because the video uploaded by the users may include horizontal black bars at the bottom and top of the video player to fit an aspect ratio of 4:3. The YouTube video player has an aspect ratio of 16:9, so it adds vertical black bars to fit according to the dimension. And in this guide, we will help you get rid of this trouble and remove annoying black bars from YouTube videos.

• Part 1: Removing the black bars before uploading
• Part 2: Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

Remove the black bars before uploading

You can make use of the following software to remove the black bars from your videos.

1. Wondershare Filmora

Filmora supports a large format of videos hence one of the widely used. Follow these steps to remove the black bars:

• Import the video or drag and drop it in Wondershare Flimora.
• Select the video with black bars and right click on it.
• Click on “crop and zoom” which will open the crop window.
• Set your desired frameset (16:9, 4:3 or customized aspect ratio) and see your video in the preview pane.
• Save the new video without the black bars by clicking on “Export”.

Download Mac Version ](https://tools.techidaily.com/wondershare/filmora/download/ )

2. Sony Vegas Pro

One of the most popular and sought after video editing tool, Sony Vegas Pro can help removing the black bars very simply:

• Open the video.
• You will see the video in preview and a timeline beneath, right click on the video clip on the timeline.
• Click on properties, a new window will pop-up, click on disable resample and make sure that “maintain aspect ratio” is unchecked.
• Your video will be without the black bars. Save the video.

3. Windows Live Movie Maker

This inbuilt tool in Windows for video editing can be used to remove the black bars from your YouTube videos.

• Drop and drag the video to windows live movie maker.
• Select the video and you will see a couple of options to set aspect ratio.
• Click on the desired one and the black bars will be removed.
• You can save the video in different formats.

4. Final Cut Pro

Final Cut pro offers you a whole lot of video editing options that includes removal of black bars. Right aspect ratio ensures there are no unpleasant black bars on either side of the video. To get them removed with the help of Final Cut Pro:

• Import the video with black bars.
• Select the video and change its aspect ratio. (Either stretch it or crop it).
• Save the video after it has been corrected.

Removing the black bars from uploaded YouTube videos

It is very simple to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or while uploading a video. Click on the Edit button next to the video, and add the most suited instruction in the Tag bar below:

yt:crop=16:9

This tag zooms in on the video because of which the contents at the borders (black bars in this case) do not appear anymore.

yt:stretch=16:9

This tag stretches the video in the aspect ratio of 16:9. It is used to view the video in wide-screen format.

yt:stretch=4:3

if your video is appearing in wide-screen format, but you want it to display in 720 x 480 pixels, apply this tag. It scales down the video 4:3 aspect.

Try any of the above software to remove black bars from existing YouTube videos or the new videos and make it pleasant to viewers.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Boosting Subscriber Commitment: Top Strategies for Keeping Viewers Coming Back on YouTube

6 Ways To Increase Audience Retention on YouTube

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

Audience retention is one of your most important stats on YouTube. It is even more important than your view count. Your view count really only tells you how many people are finding and clicking on your videos, not whether they are actually watching them. Audience retention refers to how much of a video a viewer watches before clicking away, which is very useful information to have. If you know when people are leaving your videos then you know what you need to work on.

You May Also Like: How to analyse your and your competitors’ YouTube Channel >>
How to structure a YouTube video >>

• Part 1: What is Audience Retention?
• Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?
• Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?
• Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

Part 1: What is Audience Retention?

To put it in simple terms, YouTube audience retention is about how much of each video your viewers watch. It’s usually expressed as a percentage, so if your viewer gets half way through, they will have a retention of 50 per cent.

For YouTube analytics, audience retention is taken as a mean of the retention figures for each of your viewers. For example, if you post a ten-minute video and half your viewers get to the five-minute mark, that’s a retention of 50 per cent. If the other half watch it right to the end, that’s a retention of 100 per cent. The mean of these two figures is 75 per cent, and that’s what YouTube will use as your audience retention figure.

This retention rate affects how highly your video is ranked on YouTube, with videos boasting higher audience retention rates appearing higher in the search results than those which do not. This is because both YouTube and Google are highly focussed on customer satisfaction, and a long watch time means a very happy customer was watching that video. For this reason, it’s well worth considering how to increase YouTube audience retention as it demonstrates that you’re making great content as well as helping you get more viewers.

Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?

YouTube will produce reports to help you keep track of your audience retention. There are two types of audience retention reports; absolute and relative. Absolute allows you to view a graph of your video’s retention and see when people might be clicking away, or if they are skipping to later parts of your video. If you lose a lot of viewers in the first 15 seconds of your videos then that is a clear indication that your content is not what the viewers who find your videos really want. The relative report is where your video is compared to the average retention of similar videos.

Note that by ‘similar videos’, YouTube means videos of a similar length. There is no way to compare your videos only to other videos in your genre. The relative report will always be somewhat skewed because your videos will be measured against very different content.

To see an audience retention report log into your YouTube account and go to yourCreator Studio. There, selectAudience RetentionunderAnalytics.

vMix 4K - Software based live production. vMix 4K includes everything in vMix HD plus 4K support, PTZ control, External/Fullscreen output, 4 Virtual Outputs, 1 Replay, 4 vMix Call, and 2 Recorders.
This bundle includes Studio 200 for vMix from Virtualsetworks, HTTP Matrix 1.0 automation scheduler, and 4 introductory training videos from the Udemy vMix Basic to Amazing course.

Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?

When you’re considering how to increase YouTube audience retention, it can be good to have a goal in mind. Obviously 100 per cent is going to be the Holy Grail of retention rates, but how many videos are actually going to achieve that? It only takes for one person to ‘accidentally’ click on your video and rapidly click away, or for someone to have to stop for outside reasons, to drag your average down.

According to the YouTube community, a good goal to aim for is around 50 per cent, but as there is a lot which can affect your retention rate, that number may be different for you. Low view numbers sometimes get higher retention rates because it’s mainly subscribers watching, whereas channels with millions of views may suffer due to more people abandoning. Rather than setting yourself a golden number, focus instead on increasing your retention rate from wherever it is now, and celebrate your own success instead of measuring yourself against others.

Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

If you’re serious about learning how to increase YouTube audience retention, here are five of the best ideas for you:

1. Compare your videos

Investigating your audience retention report will highlight the videos where you achieved maximum success. Think about what you did here, and work to replicate that technique. Perhaps you were talking about a product, or maybe your structured your video slightly differently. It’s up to you to dissect your video and find out what it was that kept people watching for longer, so that you can repeat this success in the future. You can also use some influencer marketing platform such as InflueNex to take a look at the videos in your similar channels, and learn the popular videos on their channels.

2. Get on with it

Research shows that YouTube viewers have an incredibly short attention span. Depending on who you believe, you could have as much as six seconds or as little as just three to grab their attention and compel them to carry on watching. If you want to improve your audience retention, coming in with an engaging, attention grabbing statement right at the start is crucial to your success. Nobody wants to waste their time watching someone waffle on for ages about their granny or their favorite hobbies, so get right down to it straight away, by telling them what’s in store.

3. Make it visually engaging

Perhaps all you’ve got is a presentation to make. You’re not a gamer, you’re not showing clips of your cat and you’re not doing a makeup tutorial, so surely all you need is a camera, good lighting and your face, right? Wrong. Viewers like to see the visual content changing, and videos which have a range of scenes are usually far more successful than those where it’s just a person talking to camera. Think about how you can insert cutaways, pop up text, different footage and other graphics to keep it interesting for your viewers.

4. Make it shorter

This one is a no brainer really. If you make a one-minute video, how hard is it going to be to keep viewers watching to the end compared to a 20-minute marathon. However, going too short can be negative too, unless you really do have something very quick and simple to showcase. Long videos work well for YouTubers in the gaming niche, in particular, because viewers want to know the end result, but for most of us, these sorts of viewing statistics are hard to reach.

If you consider a viewer who watches three minutes of your content, would you rather they watched three minutes of a ten-minute video and then clicked away bored, or would you rather they finished an entire video that was only three minutes long? Both in terms of audience retention and of your own reputation, having a viewer finish a short video is much more valuable to you than losing someone half way through a long one. That person probably enjoyed your content to the end and will more than likely watch another one of your videos. Conversely, the one you lost half way through was bored enough to stop watching and will probably not bother viewing any other videos of yours in future.

5. Keep them hooked

Think carefully about your YouTube video structure. Ideally, you will tell them at the very start that you’ve got something amazing to share with them later on. This could be a tip, a tutorial, a new product reveal or even something funny. Whatever it is, tell them they’re going to love it from the start, and keep reminding them to watch from the end to get this gift. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give them great content all the way through, just that you should save a carrot for the end of the ride to reward those loyal viewers.

So, now you know how to increase YouTube audience retention, what are you going to do about it? Have a go at modifying your videos to boost the numbers who will watch to the end and let us know how you got on.

6. Use an Excellent Video Editor

Content is the king. It is necessary to use a powerful video editor to help you edit videos. With an excellent video editor like Filmora, you can custom stunning videos effortlessly.

Jutoh Plus - Jutoh is an ebook creator for Epub, Kindle and more. It’s fast, runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux, comes with a cover design editor, and allows book variations to be created with alternate text, style sheets and cover designs. Jutoh Plus adds scripting so you can automate ebook import and creation operations. It also allows customisation of ebook HTML via templates and source code documents; and you can create Windows CHM and wxWidgets HTB help files.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

Audience retention is one of your most important stats on YouTube. It is even more important than your view count. Your view count really only tells you how many people are finding and clicking on your videos, not whether they are actually watching them. Audience retention refers to how much of a video a viewer watches before clicking away, which is very useful information to have. If you know when people are leaving your videos then you know what you need to work on.

You May Also Like: How to analyse your and your competitors’ YouTube Channel >>
How to structure a YouTube video >>

• Part 1: What is Audience Retention?
• Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?
• Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?
• Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

Part 1: What is Audience Retention?

To put it in simple terms, YouTube audience retention is about how much of each video your viewers watch. It’s usually expressed as a percentage, so if your viewer gets half way through, they will have a retention of 50 per cent.

For YouTube analytics, audience retention is taken as a mean of the retention figures for each of your viewers. For example, if you post a ten-minute video and half your viewers get to the five-minute mark, that’s a retention of 50 per cent. If the other half watch it right to the end, that’s a retention of 100 per cent. The mean of these two figures is 75 per cent, and that’s what YouTube will use as your audience retention figure.

This retention rate affects how highly your video is ranked on YouTube, with videos boasting higher audience retention rates appearing higher in the search results than those which do not. This is because both YouTube and Google are highly focussed on customer satisfaction, and a long watch time means a very happy customer was watching that video. For this reason, it’s well worth considering how to increase YouTube audience retention as it demonstrates that you’re making great content as well as helping you get more viewers.

Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?

YouTube will produce reports to help you keep track of your audience retention. There are two types of audience retention reports; absolute and relative. Absolute allows you to view a graph of your video’s retention and see when people might be clicking away, or if they are skipping to later parts of your video. If you lose a lot of viewers in the first 15 seconds of your videos then that is a clear indication that your content is not what the viewers who find your videos really want. The relative report is where your video is compared to the average retention of similar videos.

Note that by ‘similar videos’, YouTube means videos of a similar length. There is no way to compare your videos only to other videos in your genre. The relative report will always be somewhat skewed because your videos will be measured against very different content.

To see an audience retention report log into your YouTube account and go to yourCreator Studio. There, selectAudience RetentionunderAnalytics.

Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?

When you’re considering how to increase YouTube audience retention, it can be good to have a goal in mind. Obviously 100 per cent is going to be the Holy Grail of retention rates, but how many videos are actually going to achieve that? It only takes for one person to ‘accidentally’ click on your video and rapidly click away, or for someone to have to stop for outside reasons, to drag your average down.

According to the YouTube community, a good goal to aim for is around 50 per cent, but as there is a lot which can affect your retention rate, that number may be different for you. Low view numbers sometimes get higher retention rates because it’s mainly subscribers watching, whereas channels with millions of views may suffer due to more people abandoning. Rather than setting yourself a golden number, focus instead on increasing your retention rate from wherever it is now, and celebrate your own success instead of measuring yourself against others.

Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

If you’re serious about learning how to increase YouTube audience retention, here are five of the best ideas for you:

1. Compare your videos

Investigating your audience retention report will highlight the videos where you achieved maximum success. Think about what you did here, and work to replicate that technique. Perhaps you were talking about a product, or maybe your structured your video slightly differently. It’s up to you to dissect your video and find out what it was that kept people watching for longer, so that you can repeat this success in the future. You can also use some influencer marketing platform such as InflueNex to take a look at the videos in your similar channels, and learn the popular videos on their channels.

2. Get on with it

Research shows that YouTube viewers have an incredibly short attention span. Depending on who you believe, you could have as much as six seconds or as little as just three to grab their attention and compel them to carry on watching. If you want to improve your audience retention, coming in with an engaging, attention grabbing statement right at the start is crucial to your success. Nobody wants to waste their time watching someone waffle on for ages about their granny or their favorite hobbies, so get right down to it straight away, by telling them what’s in store.

3. Make it visually engaging

Perhaps all you’ve got is a presentation to make. You’re not a gamer, you’re not showing clips of your cat and you’re not doing a makeup tutorial, so surely all you need is a camera, good lighting and your face, right? Wrong. Viewers like to see the visual content changing, and videos which have a range of scenes are usually far more successful than those where it’s just a person talking to camera. Think about how you can insert cutaways, pop up text, different footage and other graphics to keep it interesting for your viewers.

4. Make it shorter

This one is a no brainer really. If you make a one-minute video, how hard is it going to be to keep viewers watching to the end compared to a 20-minute marathon. However, going too short can be negative too, unless you really do have something very quick and simple to showcase. Long videos work well for YouTubers in the gaming niche, in particular, because viewers want to know the end result, but for most of us, these sorts of viewing statistics are hard to reach.

If you consider a viewer who watches three minutes of your content, would you rather they watched three minutes of a ten-minute video and then clicked away bored, or would you rather they finished an entire video that was only three minutes long? Both in terms of audience retention and of your own reputation, having a viewer finish a short video is much more valuable to you than losing someone half way through a long one. That person probably enjoyed your content to the end and will more than likely watch another one of your videos. Conversely, the one you lost half way through was bored enough to stop watching and will probably not bother viewing any other videos of yours in future.

5. Keep them hooked

Think carefully about your YouTube video structure. Ideally, you will tell them at the very start that you’ve got something amazing to share with them later on. This could be a tip, a tutorial, a new product reveal or even something funny. Whatever it is, tell them they’re going to love it from the start, and keep reminding them to watch from the end to get this gift. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give them great content all the way through, just that you should save a carrot for the end of the ride to reward those loyal viewers.

So, now you know how to increase YouTube audience retention, what are you going to do about it? Have a go at modifying your videos to boost the numbers who will watch to the end and let us know how you got on.

6. Use an Excellent Video Editor

Content is the king. It is necessary to use a powerful video editor to help you edit videos. With an excellent video editor like Filmora, you can custom stunning videos effortlessly.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

Audience retention is one of your most important stats on YouTube. It is even more important than your view count. Your view count really only tells you how many people are finding and clicking on your videos, not whether they are actually watching them. Audience retention refers to how much of a video a viewer watches before clicking away, which is very useful information to have. If you know when people are leaving your videos then you know what you need to work on.

You May Also Like: How to analyse your and your competitors’ YouTube Channel >>
How to structure a YouTube video >>

• Part 1: What is Audience Retention?
• Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?
• Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?
• Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

Part 1: What is Audience Retention?

To put it in simple terms, YouTube audience retention is about how much of each video your viewers watch. It’s usually expressed as a percentage, so if your viewer gets half way through, they will have a retention of 50 per cent.

For YouTube analytics, audience retention is taken as a mean of the retention figures for each of your viewers. For example, if you post a ten-minute video and half your viewers get to the five-minute mark, that’s a retention of 50 per cent. If the other half watch it right to the end, that’s a retention of 100 per cent. The mean of these two figures is 75 per cent, and that’s what YouTube will use as your audience retention figure.

This retention rate affects how highly your video is ranked on YouTube, with videos boasting higher audience retention rates appearing higher in the search results than those which do not. This is because both YouTube and Google are highly focussed on customer satisfaction, and a long watch time means a very happy customer was watching that video. For this reason, it’s well worth considering how to increase YouTube audience retention as it demonstrates that you’re making great content as well as helping you get more viewers.

Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?

YouTube will produce reports to help you keep track of your audience retention. There are two types of audience retention reports; absolute and relative. Absolute allows you to view a graph of your video’s retention and see when people might be clicking away, or if they are skipping to later parts of your video. If you lose a lot of viewers in the first 15 seconds of your videos then that is a clear indication that your content is not what the viewers who find your videos really want. The relative report is where your video is compared to the average retention of similar videos.

Note that by ‘similar videos’, YouTube means videos of a similar length. There is no way to compare your videos only to other videos in your genre. The relative report will always be somewhat skewed because your videos will be measured against very different content.

To see an audience retention report log into your YouTube account and go to yourCreator Studio. There, selectAudience RetentionunderAnalytics.

Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?

When you’re considering how to increase YouTube audience retention, it can be good to have a goal in mind. Obviously 100 per cent is going to be the Holy Grail of retention rates, but how many videos are actually going to achieve that? It only takes for one person to ‘accidentally’ click on your video and rapidly click away, or for someone to have to stop for outside reasons, to drag your average down.

According to the YouTube community, a good goal to aim for is around 50 per cent, but as there is a lot which can affect your retention rate, that number may be different for you. Low view numbers sometimes get higher retention rates because it’s mainly subscribers watching, whereas channels with millions of views may suffer due to more people abandoning. Rather than setting yourself a golden number, focus instead on increasing your retention rate from wherever it is now, and celebrate your own success instead of measuring yourself against others.

Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

If you’re serious about learning how to increase YouTube audience retention, here are five of the best ideas for you:

1. Compare your videos

Investigating your audience retention report will highlight the videos where you achieved maximum success. Think about what you did here, and work to replicate that technique. Perhaps you were talking about a product, or maybe your structured your video slightly differently. It’s up to you to dissect your video and find out what it was that kept people watching for longer, so that you can repeat this success in the future. You can also use some influencer marketing platform such as InflueNex to take a look at the videos in your similar channels, and learn the popular videos on their channels.

2. Get on with it

Research shows that YouTube viewers have an incredibly short attention span. Depending on who you believe, you could have as much as six seconds or as little as just three to grab their attention and compel them to carry on watching. If you want to improve your audience retention, coming in with an engaging, attention grabbing statement right at the start is crucial to your success. Nobody wants to waste their time watching someone waffle on for ages about their granny or their favorite hobbies, so get right down to it straight away, by telling them what’s in store.

3. Make it visually engaging

Perhaps all you’ve got is a presentation to make. You’re not a gamer, you’re not showing clips of your cat and you’re not doing a makeup tutorial, so surely all you need is a camera, good lighting and your face, right? Wrong. Viewers like to see the visual content changing, and videos which have a range of scenes are usually far more successful than those where it’s just a person talking to camera. Think about how you can insert cutaways, pop up text, different footage and other graphics to keep it interesting for your viewers.

4. Make it shorter

This one is a no brainer really. If you make a one-minute video, how hard is it going to be to keep viewers watching to the end compared to a 20-minute marathon. However, going too short can be negative too, unless you really do have something very quick and simple to showcase. Long videos work well for YouTubers in the gaming niche, in particular, because viewers want to know the end result, but for most of us, these sorts of viewing statistics are hard to reach.

If you consider a viewer who watches three minutes of your content, would you rather they watched three minutes of a ten-minute video and then clicked away bored, or would you rather they finished an entire video that was only three minutes long? Both in terms of audience retention and of your own reputation, having a viewer finish a short video is much more valuable to you than losing someone half way through a long one. That person probably enjoyed your content to the end and will more than likely watch another one of your videos. Conversely, the one you lost half way through was bored enough to stop watching and will probably not bother viewing any other videos of yours in future.

5. Keep them hooked

Think carefully about your YouTube video structure. Ideally, you will tell them at the very start that you’ve got something amazing to share with them later on. This could be a tip, a tutorial, a new product reveal or even something funny. Whatever it is, tell them they’re going to love it from the start, and keep reminding them to watch from the end to get this gift. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give them great content all the way through, just that you should save a carrot for the end of the ride to reward those loyal viewers.

So, now you know how to increase YouTube audience retention, what are you going to do about it? Have a go at modifying your videos to boost the numbers who will watch to the end and let us know how you got on.

6. Use an Excellent Video Editor

Content is the king. It is necessary to use a powerful video editor to help you edit videos. With an excellent video editor like Filmora, you can custom stunning videos effortlessly.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett

Mar 27, 2024• Proven solutions

Audience retention is one of your most important stats on YouTube. It is even more important than your view count. Your view count really only tells you how many people are finding and clicking on your videos, not whether they are actually watching them. Audience retention refers to how much of a video a viewer watches before clicking away, which is very useful information to have. If you know when people are leaving your videos then you know what you need to work on.

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• Part 1: What is Audience Retention?
• Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?
• Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?
• Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

Part 1: What is Audience Retention?

To put it in simple terms, YouTube audience retention is about how much of each video your viewers watch. It’s usually expressed as a percentage, so if your viewer gets half way through, they will have a retention of 50 per cent.

For YouTube analytics, audience retention is taken as a mean of the retention figures for each of your viewers. For example, if you post a ten-minute video and half your viewers get to the five-minute mark, that’s a retention of 50 per cent. If the other half watch it right to the end, that’s a retention of 100 per cent. The mean of these two figures is 75 per cent, and that’s what YouTube will use as your audience retention figure.

This retention rate affects how highly your video is ranked on YouTube, with videos boasting higher audience retention rates appearing higher in the search results than those which do not. This is because both YouTube and Google are highly focussed on customer satisfaction, and a long watch time means a very happy customer was watching that video. For this reason, it’s well worth considering how to increase YouTube audience retention as it demonstrates that you’re making great content as well as helping you get more viewers.

Part 2: How to See Your Audience Retention Report in YouTube?

YouTube will produce reports to help you keep track of your audience retention. There are two types of audience retention reports; absolute and relative. Absolute allows you to view a graph of your video’s retention and see when people might be clicking away, or if they are skipping to later parts of your video. If you lose a lot of viewers in the first 15 seconds of your videos then that is a clear indication that your content is not what the viewers who find your videos really want. The relative report is where your video is compared to the average retention of similar videos.

Note that by ‘similar videos’, YouTube means videos of a similar length. There is no way to compare your videos only to other videos in your genre. The relative report will always be somewhat skewed because your videos will be measured against very different content.

To see an audience retention report log into your YouTube account and go to yourCreator Studio. There, selectAudience RetentionunderAnalytics.

Part 3: What is a Good Audience Retention Rate on YouTube?

When you’re considering how to increase YouTube audience retention, it can be good to have a goal in mind. Obviously 100 per cent is going to be the Holy Grail of retention rates, but how many videos are actually going to achieve that? It only takes for one person to ‘accidentally’ click on your video and rapidly click away, or for someone to have to stop for outside reasons, to drag your average down.

According to the YouTube community, a good goal to aim for is around 50 per cent, but as there is a lot which can affect your retention rate, that number may be different for you. Low view numbers sometimes get higher retention rates because it’s mainly subscribers watching, whereas channels with millions of views may suffer due to more people abandoning. Rather than setting yourself a golden number, focus instead on increasing your retention rate from wherever it is now, and celebrate your own success instead of measuring yourself against others.

Part 4: 6 Ways to Increase YouTube Audience Retention

If you’re serious about learning how to increase YouTube audience retention, here are five of the best ideas for you:

1. Compare your videos

Investigating your audience retention report will highlight the videos where you achieved maximum success. Think about what you did here, and work to replicate that technique. Perhaps you were talking about a product, or maybe your structured your video slightly differently. It’s up to you to dissect your video and find out what it was that kept people watching for longer, so that you can repeat this success in the future. You can also use some influencer marketing platform such as InflueNex to take a look at the videos in your similar channels, and learn the popular videos on their channels.

2. Get on with it

Research shows that YouTube viewers have an incredibly short attention span. Depending on who you believe, you could have as much as six seconds or as little as just three to grab their attention and compel them to carry on watching. If you want to improve your audience retention, coming in with an engaging, attention grabbing statement right at the start is crucial to your success. Nobody wants to waste their time watching someone waffle on for ages about their granny or their favorite hobbies, so get right down to it straight away, by telling them what’s in store.

3. Make it visually engaging

Perhaps all you’ve got is a presentation to make. You’re not a gamer, you’re not showing clips of your cat and you’re not doing a makeup tutorial, so surely all you need is a camera, good lighting and your face, right? Wrong. Viewers like to see the visual content changing, and videos which have a range of scenes are usually far more successful than those where it’s just a person talking to camera. Think about how you can insert cutaways, pop up text, different footage and other graphics to keep it interesting for your viewers.

4. Make it shorter

This one is a no brainer really. If you make a one-minute video, how hard is it going to be to keep viewers watching to the end compared to a 20-minute marathon. However, going too short can be negative too, unless you really do have something very quick and simple to showcase. Long videos work well for YouTubers in the gaming niche, in particular, because viewers want to know the end result, but for most of us, these sorts of viewing statistics are hard to reach.

If you consider a viewer who watches three minutes of your content, would you rather they watched three minutes of a ten-minute video and then clicked away bored, or would you rather they finished an entire video that was only three minutes long? Both in terms of audience retention and of your own reputation, having a viewer finish a short video is much more valuable to you than losing someone half way through a long one. That person probably enjoyed your content to the end and will more than likely watch another one of your videos. Conversely, the one you lost half way through was bored enough to stop watching and will probably not bother viewing any other videos of yours in future.

5. Keep them hooked

Think carefully about your YouTube video structure. Ideally, you will tell them at the very start that you’ve got something amazing to share with them later on. This could be a tip, a tutorial, a new product reveal or even something funny. Whatever it is, tell them they’re going to love it from the start, and keep reminding them to watch from the end to get this gift. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give them great content all the way through, just that you should save a carrot for the end of the ride to reward those loyal viewers.

So, now you know how to increase YouTube audience retention, what are you going to do about it? Have a go at modifying your videos to boost the numbers who will watch to the end and let us know how you got on.

6. Use an Excellent Video Editor

Content is the king. It is necessary to use a powerful video editor to help you edit videos. With an excellent video editor like Filmora, you can custom stunning videos effortlessly.

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett