YouTube Shorts: The Surprising Rise of Short-Form Video on TVs
Short-form videos are taking over the living room! Find out how YouTube's popular Shorts format is dominating TV screens and driving viewer engagement.
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When you think about short-form video, smartphones might come to mind. But according to new data from YouTube, these vertical videos are quickly becoming a hit on big-screen TVs.
According to YouTube, viewers are watching over 2 billion hours of Shorts — the platform's three-minute clips — on televisions every month. This trend is especially impressive considering that Shorts were initially designed for mobile devices. Kurt Wilms, YouTube’s senior director of product management for YouTube on TV, commented: “The living room is YouTube’s fastest-growing screen, and the Shorts experience is further helping connect viewers with the world’s most active creator community from the comfort of their couch.”
“We’ve found that audiences increasingly want to watch their favorite content on the biggest screen at home, whether it’s long-form content, a podcast, or a Short,” Wilms added.
The living room has emerged as a major growth target for YouTube. U.S. viewers alone are watching over 200 million hours of YouTube content daily. To capitalize on this trend, Google TV recently introduced a “Short videos for you” row in its feed, further boosting watch time.
Because TVs offer more screen real estate than smartphones, YouTube has updated the viewing experience to show comments alongside Shorts. This tweak aims to make engagement even easier and more immersive for fans of the content they love.
“By tailoring Shorts for the big screen, we unlocked a more immersive way for fans to engage with their favorite content while also creating a massive new stage for creators to reach global audiences and scale their businesses,” said Sarah Ali, VP of product management for YouTube Shorts, in a press release.
The trend has extended beyond just video content. Even podcasts, traditionally an audio-first medium, are finding success on televisions. According to YouTube, viewers watched over 700 million hours of podcasts each month on living room devices in 2025, up from 400 million per month in 2024.
Streaming giants like Netflix are also getting into the action, signing deals with major studios to produce video podcast content. Netflix's investment in this space suggests a growing belief that podcasts can become the new daytime talk show — something people can watch while still listening to the audio from another room.
