On a 1080 x 1920 vertical frame, keep 288 px clear at the top, 672 px at the bottom, 48 px on the left and 192 px on the right. Google publishes these as pixels rather than percentages, inside diagrams and downloadable templates rather than in page text, which is why so many spec sheets say YouTube publishes nothing (Google Ads Help, 16 August 2026).
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Sample creative
Formatdetected 16:9
Placement4 of 11 placements take 16:9
Overlay
No published safe-zone figure is wired up for this placement.
Your logo
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Call-to-action buttonYouTube In-Stream
Apply Now
YouTube takes free-text button copy on video ads, up to 10 characters including spaces, so there is no list to pick from. Apply Now fits at nine.
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Or click any text inside the mockup to edit it in place.
One YouTube placement is in the tool: in-stream at 16:9, what Google calls horizontal, the format pre-roll buys use. Shorts is not in the tool, though its specs are on this page. Masthead, in-feed video and Google Display formats are out of scope.
Why the safe-zone overlay is off here. This placement is in-stream at 16:9, and Google's horizontal safe zone is a stepped shape with notches cut out of both top corners, so drawing it as a rectangle would show you something Google never published. The interface overlay is on instead. The vertical figures are settled and are in full below. Why the horizontal numbers are held back
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YouTube is the one platform here that gives exact pixels against a stated reference frame. It is also the one whose numbers you cannot find by reading its pages: they sit inside diagrams and inside the transparent areas of three downloadable templates.
Vertical, 1080 x 1920: 288 top, 672 bottom, 48 left, 192 right
These four numbers are the best corroborated safe zone on this site. They are labelled on the vertical diagram embedded in Google's video ad specs page, and measuring the transparent region of Google's own downloadable vertical template returns the same four values independently.
The Type column is empty on purpose. Google classifies its spec figures as Recommended, Accepted or Callouts, and the safe-zone section sits outside all three with no enforcement verb attached.
The asymmetry is the part to carry into a design. The right reserve is exactly four times the left, 192 px against 48 px, because the controls sit on the right. Meta's vertical guidance is symmetric at 6% each side, so reusing Meta's side margins on a YouTube vertical asset puts your elements under YouTube's controls.
Google writes two sentences about the safe zone, and no more:
“Overlays, call-to-actions, and buttons may appear in different places depending on the format, campaign type, and screen.”
“Use these images as a reference to ensure important elements like your logo, product, supers, and others are within the red safe area to avoid risk of elements being covered within certain inventory or download transparent PNG templates for horizontal, vertical, and square videos.”
Note what is missing from both: no must, no required, no consider leaving. The consequence Google names is a risk of elements being covered, not a rejection at upload. Whether the zone is a rule or a recommendation is something Google never says, so it is listed as a gap rather than answered on Google's behalf.
Horizontal, 16:9: why there are no numbers here
Google does publish a horizontal safe zone, on three diagrams (phone landscape, television, desktop) carrying identical numbers. Two things keep those numbers off this page. First, the shape is not a rectangle. Notches are cut out of both top corners, so the centre of the top edge is safe much higher up than the corners are. Drawing that as a single rectangle would show you something Google never published, which is why the overlay above stays off for this placement.
Second, the readings do not agree yet. Two dated readings of Google's own files exist: one from a Google-hosted PDF on 5 August 2026, one from the diagrams on the specs page confirmed against the downloadable template on 16 August 2026. Both agree the corners are notched and the right side is reserved more than the left. They disagree on the depth of the bottom reserve and on the notch dimensions, which are materially different shapes. Publishing a figure that cannot be reconciled is the exact behaviour this page exists to correct.
What you can use today: the corners of the top edge are reserved deeper than its centre, the right side is reserved more than the left, and roughly the bottom third is reserved on every shape Google draws. Exact numbers go up once the PDF, the diagrams and the templates have been read on one day and reconciled.
Square, 1:1: the template exists and the figure does not
Square is one of Google's three recommended ratios, and Google offers a square template to download. It publishes no square diagram and no square number anywhere, so the specification is distributed and never stated. Worth knowing before trusting any square figure you find elsewhere.
What sits in the reserved space
Google reserves the space and almost never names what goes in it. The stepped horizontal shape implies two elements in the top corners and a large bottom bar, and Google names none of them. The five-second skip is the most famous fact about YouTube advertising, and Google publishes no dimension, position or label for the control that delivers it.
“The RHS panel includes like, dislike, comment, and share buttons.”
That sentence, about the Shorts right-hand panel, is the only place Google names the furniture sitting inside a reserved area. It also explains the 192 px on the right.
“Unlisted videos used as advertisements won't display the YouTube channel logo, name, or information.”
Worth knowing if you compare this mockup with what you see in Google Ads: Google's own previews do not draw the ad badge either, so a mockup that omits it is behaving the way Google's previews behave.
Does YouTube crop your video? Yes, and it says how
This is where Google publishes more than any other platform here. It documents five rendering behaviours by name, and one of them is a straight statement that your vertical creative is cropped on the first impression.
“For both square and vertical videos, when the user interacts with the YouTube app, such as by scrolling through related content under the video, the video player can compress up to a 1:1 aspect ratio. This will crop the displayed video at the bottom and top and allow the user to interact with the content they chose below.”
“When a mobile device is rotated and held horizontally after a vertical video ad has played, the vertical video ad would appear with black bars to either side of the video.”
Two more from the same page: a 9:16 ad covers about 75% of a phone screen with organic content beneath it, going to 100% if the viewer taps fullscreen in portrait, and an image caption describes the portion of a 9:16 video cropped for the initial impression. One general line elsewhere in Google's documentation reads like a promise that nothing is cut off. These five specific behaviours are the ones to design around, because Google's own pages contradict that line three times over.
Published specs
YouTube in-stream and Shorts ad specs
Google classifies its figures in three columns of its own: Recommended, Accepted and Callouts, and those words are kept in the Field column below. The Type column is filled only where Google's wording supports it. Rows Google lists as accepted only, and the safe zone, which sits outside all three columns, carry no type.
Google's own wording on standard definition, verbatim: “For optimal quality, we don't recommend using SD”. One figure on this table conflicts with another on the same page: the thumbnail is recommended at 16:9, and the stated minimum of 1280 x 640 is 2:1. Google does not say which is right. The 4:5 vertical ratio appears on this page only; the skippable and non-skippable pages list 2:3 alone.
That sentence sits in Google's Callouts column, where it prints notes rather than rules, and it still reads as a hard limit with a stated consequence, so the Type cell is left empty rather than reclassified. The YouTube TV tolerance is the only precision tolerance Google publishes for video ads anywhere: a 30-second ad must run between :29 and :31 or it does not serve.
“Video ads can be up to 3 minutes long, though only the first 60 seconds will play on the Shorts feed, with an overlay appearing at 50 seconds that allows the user to watch the rest of the ad on the YouTube watch page.”
Shorts is the vertical surface, so the vertical safe zone above is the one that applies to it, and Google publishes no separate Shorts safe zone. Organic Shorts, for contrast, get no published aspect ratio and no safe zone at all: the 9:16 figure exists only in the advertising documentation.
Covered here: in-stream, skippable and non-skippable, which is the placement in the tool, plus bumper as a length rule and Shorts as a spec table. Not covered: YouTube Masthead, in-feed video and Google Display formats. Those are different products with their own specs.
What Google does not publish
Google gives no figure for any of these, across Google Ads Help, YouTube Help, Display & Video 360 Help, Ad Manager Help and the Advertising Policies centre. If a spec sheet hands you one, it did not come from Google.
What Google does not publish
Not published
Pages checked
Accessed
Any position, size or on-screen coordinate for the skip button (only the 5-second timing is published)
Google Ads Help, YouTube Help, Display & Video 360 Help, Ad Manager Help, Advertising Policies
16 Aug 2026
The skip button's own label text as a canonical string
All five Google help centres above
16 Aug 2026
Which interface element occupies which part of the reserved area
The video ad specs page and all five safe-zone diagrams
16 Aug 2026
Whether the safe zone is a requirement, a recommendation or neither
The video ad specs page (the section sits outside Google's own three columns)
16 Aug 2026
Any square safe-zone diagram or figure (only a downloadable template exists)
Google Ads Help, Display & Video 360 Help
16 Aug 2026
Any percentage expression of the safe zone, or how to scale the pixels to another frame size
The video ad specs page and the square and vertical video page
16 Aug 2026
A safe zone for 4:5, 2:3 or 4:3, all of which Google lists as accepted ratios
Google Ads Help, Display & Video 360 Help
16 Aug 2026
Any video or audio codec, bitrate, frame rate or caption requirement for ad creative
Google Ads Help, Advertising Policies
16 Aug 2026
Any spec that distinguishes pre-roll from mid-roll or post-roll
Every advertiser-facing in-stream page (all say before, during or after other videos)
16 Aug 2026
Any position, size, colour or wording for the on-screen ad badge
Display & Video 360 Help, Google Ads Help
16 Aug 2026
Any aspect ratio or safe zone for organic Shorts (the 9:16 figure exists only in the ad documentation)
YouTube Help, Get started creating YouTube Shorts
16 Aug 2026
Which number to use
Three YouTube figures that depend on the page you read
The first two sit between pages Google publishes today. The third is TikTok's, kept here because it is the same trap in another company's documentation. Here is the number to build to, with the sources under it.
Google publishes six different maximum lengths for non-skippable in-stream ads.
Use 30 seconds in auction and 60 seconds in reservation, and name the buying type when you quote it.
One Google page says Shorts ads have no headline, another recommends a 40-character one.
Provide the 40-character headline, and attach the qualifier Google gives with it: it surfaces in the mobile call-to-action overlay card, which is the newer of the two mechanisms and the one the Shorts page explains.
Match the table to how you buy. Auction In-Feed allows up to 10 minutes at a 516 kbps floor and accepts .avi; reservation requires 5 to 60 seconds at 2,500 kbps and drops .avi.
Use 30 seconds in auction and 60 seconds in reservation, and name the buying type when you quote it. That is the only figure Google publishes as enforcement, under its own heading for what is not allowed. A flat maximum with no buying type attached contradicts one Google page or another whichever number is chosen. A seventh page, the YouTube TV formats article, separately lists :06, :15, :30 and :60 as available lengths.
Last checked 16 Aug 2026
Source conflict
One Google page says Shorts ads have no headline, another recommends a 40-character one
Two Google-owned pages, read on the same day. Direct contradiction, not a difference of emphasis.
Provide the 40-character headline, and attach the qualifier Google gives with it: it surfaces in the mobile call-to-action overlay card, which is the newer of the two mechanisms and the one the Shorts page explains. Do not quote 40 characters as a bare Shorts headline limit.
Last checked 16 Aug 2026
Source conflict
TikTok In-Feed specs differ by buying type
Auction and reservation are different products behind the same placement name. One spec table cannot describe both.
Match the table to how you buy. Auction In-Feed allows up to 10 minutes at a 516 kbps floor and accepts .avi; reservation requires 5 to 60 seconds at 2,500 kbps and drops .avi.
Last checked 5 Aug 2026
The buying-type split in the first one is not unique to Google. TikTok publishes two different figure sets for one placement name depending on whether it is bought at auction or on reservation. See the TikTok page · All platforms on the hub
Every source on this page
Each figure above carries its source inline. The full list, all read 16 August 2026:
Last verified 16 August 2026. Volatile figures (the safe zones, character limits, Shorts behaviour and the non-skippable length rules) are re-checked quarterly; stable ones (recommended resolutions, aspect ratios, file formats) annually. The safe-zone figures have to be re-read from the diagrams and the templates, not from the page text: that section's text contains no numbers, so it will look unchanged forever.
Other platforms
Safe zones and specs for the other placements
Each page carries that platform's published specs and its safe zone, sourced and dated. Facebook is the natural next stop: Meta publishes percentages where Google publishes pixels, and it publishes two of them.
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Instagram, Facebook and Meta are trademarks of Meta Platforms, Inc. TikTok is a trademark of ByteDance Ltd. LinkedIn is a trademark of LinkedIn Corporation. YouTube is a trademark of Google LLC. Snapchat is a trademark of Snap Inc. X is a trademark of X Corp. RecruitmentAds.com is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by any of these companies. The placement previews on this page are illustrative recreations built from published specifications. They are not screenshots of the apps and may differ from the current product. Specification figures are quoted from each platform’s own documentation with the date they were read.
