If you want to share a specific part of a YouTube video with someone, the best thing to do is clip the video. It means you don’t need to give a time code or tell them when to stop watching—everything is contained within the clip.
You can share these clips via social media or directly through methods like email and text. It’s perfect for sharing a bite-sized portion of a longer video or stream.
Here’s how to create a YouTube clip and how to share the clip with friends.
How to Create and Share a YouTube Clip
A clip is a short, looping part of a YouTube video, and can be anywhere from five to 60 seconds long. Any clips you create are stored in your library and can easily be shared with others.
At the time of writing, the YouTube clip feature is only available to a select number of creators, and they need to enable the feature on their videos. As such, you won’t be able to clip every YouTube video.
Here’s how to create a YouTube clip and share it. These instructions work for both desktop and Android:
- Sign in to YouTube. You can’t create a clip otherwise.
- Go to the video you want to clip.
- Beneath the video, select Clip.
- Give your clip a title.
- Input a start and end time for your clip. Alternatively, drag and slide the blue bar across the timeline.
- Select Share clip.
- Choose which social media platform to share your clip to. Alternatively, select Copy to grab the direct link to the clip.
Currently, you can’t create a YouTube clip on an iOS device. If and when you can, it’ll be a very similar process to that for an Android device.
When someone views your clip, it will play on a loop. They can select Share clip to send it to someone else, or Watch full video to seamlessly leave the clip and head to the original video.
To access your previously made clips, select Library > Your clips. For each clip, you can select the three vertical dots to open the menu and then Share and Delete clip as needed.
If you clip a live stream, the clip will only remain available if the creator uploads the stream afterwards. You can’t clip streams over eight hours.
Share YouTube Videos With Ease
Thanks to YouTube clips, sharing videos is easier than ever. It’s an efficient method that’s especially beneficial for longer videos, since you can point people towards the nugget of gold within.