Which social media network has one of the largest numbers of users worldwide?
Has a long history of viral videos and creating new stars who go on to become millionaires? Has had such a profound impact on our cultural capital that it has managed to turn its own name into a verb? That's right, YouTube. And mastering YouTube marketing can make a huge difference in your brand's visibility.
YouTube is one of the world's top social media platforms. In fact, it's the second most popular social network after Facebook in terms of monthly active users. The platform is a unique combination of search engine, social media and short video platform where you can find videos from ten years ago that are still doing well. When was the last time you saw another social media post with over a billion views?
In this guide, we'll go over how to differentiate your brand on YouTube, how to approach marketing on such a behemoth platform, and whether timing makes a difference at all.
It all starts with one simple question: What really is the best time to post on YouTube?
Does posting time matter on YouTube?
Let's get something out of the way. There is no absolute best time to post on YouTube. What really matters is the quality of your content, the consistency of your channel's activity, and what your target audience likes.
That said, posting times can matter to some extent. Your ideal audience likely has patterns for when they're online and matching that pattern to your posting schedule helps keep your videos at the top of their list to watch. Although YouTube gets a lot of traffic from its search function, whether the internal search or search engine traffic, there's still a lot of benefit to early engagement.
YouTube functions as a search engine in addition to a social media platform. So, timing will affect certain types of content more heavily than others. For example, evergreen content like tutorial videos is something users might search for over time. In this case, optimizing the title and descriptions for key terms would have more of an impact than the actual timing.
Your following also matters. A large, loyal group of viewers who have subscribed to your channel may be searching for your videos all the time, dampening the effects of timing a bit. To get there, though, you may need to pay attention to timing.
How does YouTube's algorithm work?
The YouTube algorithm works on demand, or as this defining question: what does an audience want to see? It determines this by measuring how much engagement videos have in the beginning. Getting many comments right away? Lots of views and shares? Congratulations. The algorithm now thinks your YouTube video is providing a lot of value and is something others might want to see.
It's a real-time feedback loop that prioritizes getting users on the platform and then keeping them there. Like Netflix or Amazon, it begins to understand how each individual user behaves and then can tailor YouTube video recommendations to that user based on past activity and what users like them interact with.
YouTube's home page and suggested videos help users discover videos to watch. If you consistently get good early engagement with your videos, the platform will prioritize showing your new YouTube posts not only to your followers, but also to others through these two main pages.
The best time to post content on YouTube
YouTube is a little different from content on other social media sites. Even though YouTube Shorts are a popular part of the platform, the average video is still longer than what users might post on platforms like TikTok. This could mean that users wait to watch YouTube when they have more time available.
According to Google, the company that owns YouTube, viewership follows more traditional prime-time TV hours. Even though most users are on mobile, that doesn't mean they're watching quick video shorts during the day. In an average week, YouTube reaches more of the 18-plus demographic than any cable network. That's a powerful presence.
So, the best times in general to post on YouTube will be similar to TV viewership — afternoons and evenings, with other strong peaks happening periodically around 10 pm. Viewership drops off during weekends, as most social media platforms experience, but for some industries starts picking up again on Sundays.
Here's what you can expect day by day.
The best time to post on YouTube on Monday
Around 5 pm is the best time to post on YouTube on Mondays. Users may be busy during the first part of the day as they start their school or work week. Starting around 3 pm, viewership seems to start an upward trend, peaking around 5 pm and then showing a quick resurgence in the late evening around 10 pm.
The best time to post on YouTube on Tuesday
On Tuesdays, 11 am to 2 pm is a great time to post, with some industries seeing a significant increase in viewership. In some cases, those hours extend from 11 am to 4 pm. One explanation for this could be that users have gotten their week started and are now settling into finding either videos to help them get through work or are looking for how-to videos for later in the day.
The best time to post on YouTube on Wednesday
Again, we see that the afternoon hours between 2 pm and 4 pm have strong engagement, but there's a small surprise. 9 am also experiences high engagement rates. Even though YouTube's typical engagement pattern favors afternoons and evenings, maybe users are now comfortably into their week and have a moment to check YouTube before getting started on their day or just after their daily commute.
The best time to post on YouTube on Thursday
By Thursday, we're back to early evening hours, with 6 pm as the best time to post YouTube videos on this day. In some cases, you might also get started just a little earlier, sometime between 2 pm and 4 pm. Check your YouTube analytics to see if your audience is starting to appear online around that time.
The best time to post on YouTube on Friday
If you're doing any kind of marketing or content strategy on YouTube, Friday is going to be a non-negotiable part of that. Fridays experience the highest rates of engagement of the week in general, peaking around 4 pm, making it officially the best time to post on YouTube.
YouTube's long-form content may do particularly well here, as more viewers are starting their weekends and have time to consume a video that's 10 minutes or even an hour or more long.
The best time to post on YouTube on Saturday
Weekends see lower engagement overall, and again, this is true of most social platforms. However, because YouTube also functions as a search engine on its own, this does still provide traffic during the weekends as people are off and looking for project directions or other types of informative videos (and yes, scrolling).
Midmorning, from 9 am to 11 am, is a good time to post to YouTube on Saturdays. You'll catch people while they're getting ready for their weekend plans, and before they're out of the house doing other things.
The best time to post on YouTube on Sunday
Sundays has always been the day when there's the least amount of activity on both YouTube and other social media platforms. However, you'll never know if your audience is the type to break all the rules or not without posting. So put up content around 11 am or at 3 pm to match when most viewers might be sitting down for lunch or having a slow afternoon. Check and recheck your analytics to see if they begin to respond.
The principle of consistency might also apply here. If your audience knows ahead of time that you'll drop a video on Sunday, they may make a point to log on. If your competitors are too afraid of low engagement to post on Sundays, this gives you a near monopoly on your audience's attention because they're on specifically for your content.
Factors that affect the timing of posts on YouTube
Timing is just one of many interrelated factors when it comes to pleasing the algorithm on YouTube. Here are some other things to consider when your audience is likely to be on the platform.
Time zones
We operate in a global economy with many time zones. Your ideal audience might be only one small shift from Eastern time to West Coast time. They might be located in Europe or Asia. Consider your audience demographics and location to help you determine if you should think about your time zone or others when you post videos.
If a majority of your followers or lurkers are in California, but you're posting at 9 am in New York, there's only a small chance they'll be around at 6 am to catch the video when it first lands. However, shifting that posting time to noon on the East Coast suddenly puts your video at midmorning where your audience is. This could make a significant difference in your audience engagement.
Geographic location
Related to time zones, geographic location makes a difference. A predominately European audience might not catch your videos if you're posting on Chicago time. Check time zones and geographic location to help understand when the majority of your target audience is online.
User behavior
Users are not a monolith. They don't all come online on the East Coast at the same time. Some might follow events happening abroad or work on the weekends and have days off when you don't expect them.
Using a social media analytics tool can tell you more about when to post videos on your YouTube channel based on your specific audience. Once you have enough viewer data for your target audience, you'll know when it makes sense to upload YouTube content.
Types of content
The type of content you produce can also influence when you should post. Different audiences gravitate to different types of content, so once you've looked at how your target audience behaves, you'll likely have the type of content they prefer as well. Monitor your followers' behavior regularly to refine your YouTube strategy.
The industry you operate in also influences the ideal time to post. If you post entertainment content, the best time to post on YouTube might be in the evenings from 6 to 10 pm, rather than the typical midmorning or lunchtime schedule. People are looking for entertaining content to unwind after work or school. However, educational content may perform better in the earlier morning hours, from 7 to 10 am on weekdays because this audience needs inspiration or instruction for their upcoming day at school.
Another factor is the format of your content. People have more time to watch longer videos in the early afternoons or evenings but can watch short videos in spurts all day long. A bite-sized video caters to an audience on lunch breaks, in-between tasks, or during a waiting period like the drive-through.
Further, trending or seasonal topics might go against all the guidelines because audiences are actively seeking this content out as it happens. Watching the World Cup in North America might have audiences on YouTube much later than they normally would be because of the time difference. Likewise, if there's a concentrated group of people doing a challenge, they might be on early in the morning or on a weekend day that doesn't traditionally perform well.
How to find the best time for you to post YouTube videos and Shorts
Now that you've worked through your content style and mapped out your audience, it's time to understand when to post your YouTube videos and Shorts. Luckily, YouTube has some built-in tools to help you get started. Here's a step-by-step guide to using Studio to build your channel's ideal YouTube posting schedule.
1. Go to YouTube Studio
First, let's get acquainted with YouTube Studio analytics, your central hub for managing your channel and tracking performance.
- Log in to your YouTube account and navigate to YouTube Studio.
- Explore your dashboard, where there are tools and analytics to guide your timing decisions and help you monitor audience engagement.
2. Check out your YouTube Analytics
One of the best things you can do now is to use both YouTube Analytics and a more comprehensive social media management tool to see how your relationship with your audience grows over time. Analytics is like a conversation between you and YouTube users. Your viewers can provide feedback through their interactions with your channel, and you can then adjust and respond in a way that shows you understand their needs. Here's how:
- In the left-hand menu, click on the “Analytics” tab.
- Analyze the provided data to see when your audience is online. Now, you aren't making educated guesses about how your audience interacts with the platform. You have real, solid (reliable, trustworthy, clear, transparent...insert any adjective you want here, but the result is the same) numbers to determine when the best time to post on YouTube is.
3. Navigate to Audience
YouTube provides you with clear insights into your audience data using a couple of different tools.
- Click on the “Audience” tab in the Analytics menu.
- Look for the “When your viewers are on YouTube” heatmap, which visually represents your audience's activity patterns. The darker the shade, the more active your viewers are at that time.
- Pinpoint a few hot spots to upload videos. Then — and this is wildly important — check back to see if your video engagement really does correspond to those spots on your original heatmap.
Elevate your YouTube videos with Brandwatch
Brandwatch offers intuitive dashboards that front your most important KPIs, like views and average watch time. You'll understand your audience demographics and have access to extensive YouTube data. We give you the ability to pull up to 12 months of YouTube videos and their comments for analysis, and you can see your audience mentions to monitor sentiment.
We also make it easy to find and work with influencers. You can shuffle influencer options based on features like viewership, audience demographics, and follower count. You can also analyze both competitors and industry leaders to identify gaps in their and your content. Benchmark your channel's performance and suddenly, you might find yourself standing out among nearly 2.5 billion monthly users.
FAQs
Some final questions to wrap up.
What is the worst time to post on YouTube?
The worst time to post is on Sundays and during any extreme part of the day, such as early mornings from 4 to 6 am or after midnight. That said, your particular audience behavior might redefine peak hours for your channel.
What is the best time to post YouTube Shorts?
YouTube Shorts do really well on Fridays from 3 to 5 pm and any time when users are likely to have short breaks during the day. Fridays are already peak viewing time for YouTube, and Shorts is no different. Keep in mind that people watch videos when they have free time, so post YouTube Shorts when they can fit them into these brief periods.
How often should I post on YouTube?
General wisdom is that consistency is key, no matter how often you post. It helps your view count if your audience knows when you'll upload new content because many of them will make a point to seek out those videos. So, whether you post once a week or several times a month, just make sure to stay consistent. That said, once you have a large following, you'll probably have more people specifically searching for both your old and new videos, and how often you're posting videos might matter even less.
