Ad specs / YouTube
YouTube in-stream ad size
A YouTube in-stream ad is 16:9 at 1920 × 1080 pixels recommended, 1280 × 720 minimum, up to 256 GB. Skippable ads have no maximum length (under 3 minutes recommended) and can be skipped after 5 seconds; non-skippable ads are 15 to 60 seconds on Google's video ad formats page and 15 or 20 on YouTube's creator help page. Google's reference overlay keeps 3.5% of the top, 35.8% of the bottom, 2% of the left and 8.4% of the right clear, plus two blocks in the top corners.
| Scope | Skippable and non-skippable in-stream ads. The file rows are from Google's video ad specs page; the length rules, from its video ad formats page, differ by format |
|---|---|
| Recommended resolution | 1920 × 1080 pixels (1080p) |
| Minimum resolution | 1280 × 720 pixels (720p); 640 × 480 SD is accepted, and Google says it doesn't recommend SD |
| Aspect ratio | 16:9 for horizontal; 9:16 vertical and 1:1 square also run, and 4:3 (SD), 2:3 and 4:5 are accepted |
| Skippable length | No max length (under 3 minutes recommended); viewers can skip the ad after 5 seconds (Google's video ad formats page) |
| Non-skippable length | Google's video ad formats page: 15–60 seconds, depending on the campaign subtype (its prose says 60 seconds or shorter). YouTube's creator help page: 15 or 20 seconds depending on regional standards, and on TVs only may be 30 seconds. The two pages give different figures |
| File type | .MPG (MPEG-2 or MPEG-4) recommended; .WMV, .AVI, .MOV, .FLV, .MPEG-1, .MP4, .MPEGPS, 3GPP, WebM, DNxHR, ProRes, CineForm and HEVC (H.265) also accepted; audio-only files (MP3, WAV, PCM) can't be used |
| Maximum file size | 256 GB |
| Video reach campaigns | 15 seconds recommended for skippable in-stream (Google's video ads specs and format requirements page) |
| Demand Gen campaigns | Videos under 10 seconds are ineligible to serve on YouTube in-stream (Google's Demand Gen asset specs page) |
| Headline | 30 characters in Video action campaigns (Google's video ads specs and format requirements page); 40 in Demand Gen campaigns (Google's Demand Gen video assets and ad format guidelines page, which says the headline is used in the skippable in-stream format) |
| Other text limits | Long headline 90, description 90 and call to action 10 characters in Video action campaigns (Google's video ads specs and format requirements page); Final URL: 'Any' in Google's table; no display URL limit stated |
| Companion banner | Desktop only: 300 × 60 pixels, JPEG, GIF or PNG, up to 150 KB, a GIF under 5 frames per second; no custom image on Performance Max (Google's companion banner page) |
| Safe-zone files | Google's files draw three 16:9 shapes: the overlay PNG on Google's video ad specs page (drawn here; its diagram labels the top-right block 475 px wide, the file is 476), the Demand Gen video template (dated 2026-08-11), the newest of these files, with a 344 × 183 top-right block and a 36 px top, and an older stepped-bottom overlay still on Google's site. Terrads' in-stream page draws the file Google's video ad specs page links today |
Download as a template: a transparent PNG or SVG for your editor.
Source: Google Ads Help — About video ad specs, as of ; the safe zone from Google's horizontal safe-zone overlay (the transparent PNG template on its video ad specs page), as of . Platforms revise specs without notice; check the source before you build a template on it.
Related reading
Check a file against this size in the free ad size checker, and see what YouTube’s buttons and captions cover in the safe zone checker. Terrads composes each placement for its own frame, instead of cropping one master down to it.