Check your YouTube Shorts safe zone before you post

Drop one frame of your Short and I draw Google's safe zone on it, scaled to your pixels, so you see at once which caption, logo or price sits where buttons and text can cover it. Box each element and I name the edge it crosses and by how many pixels.

Use the checker in three steps

1. Export one frame. Pause your edit on the frame with the most text, usually the hook in the first two seconds or the last frame with your call to action, and export it as a PNG or JPEG. A phone screenshot of your editor works too, but crop away the editor's own buttons first.
2. Drop the frame in. The page reads its width and height, tells you whether it matches 9:16, and draws the safe zone with the bands to keep clear shaded.
3. Box what matters. Drag a box around your caption, your logo and your price. A box with a solid blue line sits inside the safe zone. A box with a dashed red line crosses an edge, and the list beside the frame tells you which edge and by how many pixels to move it.

Press Download the overlay PNG to keep a transparent overlay at your frame size, then lay it over your timeline while you place text.

Read your result

The clear box is where Google tells advertisers to keep logos, products and on-screen text so overlays do not cover them. On a 1080 by 1920 frame, the box measures 840 by 960 pixels and covers about 39% of the frame. The four shaded bands are the parts to keep free of anything a viewer must read:

The bottom band is the big one: 35% of the frame's height. Put your caption in the middle third of the frame instead of near the bottom edge.

If your frame is not 9:16, the readout says so. I stretch Google's margins to your width and height, so the box stays a close guide, and an export at 1080 by 1920 gives you the exact check.

Know where the numbers come from

Google publishes one set of safe zones for vertical video ads on YouTube in About video ad specs, with a downloadable 1080 by 1920 template. The same diagram appears in Use square and vertical video to engage mobile customers, which says vertical video ads may show up on in-stream, in-feed and YouTube Shorts placements. We measured the clear box on Google's PNG template on October 18, 2026: it runs from x 48 to x 888 and from y 288 to y 1248, which matches the 48, 192, 288 and 672 pixel margins on Google's diagram.

YouTube Help's page on uploading Shorts gives you the length and the shape, up to 3 minutes and square or vertical, and publishes no separate safe zone for organic Shorts. Google's vertical template is the closest published guide, so this checker uses it for every Short.

Fix the frames that fail

• Caption at the bottom. Move it up into the middle third. On a 1080 by 1920 frame, keep its lowest line above y 1248.
• Logo in a top corner. Bring it down below y 288 and in from the right edge, or put it in your last frame instead.
• Price or phone number along the right edge. Pull it at least 192 px in from the right on a 1080 by 1920 frame.
• Before and after split down the middle. Keep both labels inside the box, and let the photos fill the bands.
• Text burned into a photo you reuse. Crop or scale the photo so its text lands inside the box.

Turn a safe frame into a full Short

A clean frame is one part of a Short that works. The length and the beats matter just as much: read how long a YouTube Short should be for the timing of each format, and what makes a YouTube Short go viral for the habits of 1,532 winning Shorts from 15 local business niches.

Outformat makes motion design videos from your business's name, colors, photos and the facts on your website, and delivers each one as an MP4 at 1080 by 1920 with a written caption and hashtags. Paste your website on the home page to see the Shorts formats winning in your niche, such as the ones for barbers or real estate agents.