How To Add Chapters On Youtube

What Are YouTube Chapters?

YouTube's video chapter feature allows you to split your YouTube video into multiple sections, similar to how individual headlines break this article downward.

Each YouTube chapter has a unique timestamp, title, and preview prototype highlighted on the video progress bar.

Video chapters are a great tool to organize your YouTube videos into easily accessible subtopics.

They provide an outline of your video that allows viewers to jump to specific timestamps within your video to quickly find the data they are looking for.

You can manually add YouTube chapters to your video or allow YouTube's AI generate them for you lot under certain atmospheric condition.

Here is an example of what a regular YouTube video without video capacity looks like:

And hither is a video with video capacity enabled:

In this article, I am going to share what YouTuber chapters are, how they are able to aid you lot abound your YouTube channel, and how to enable them by adding timestamps to your YouTube videos.

What Are the Benefits of Using YouTube Chapters?

Meliorate viewer experience

YouTube chapters salve your viewers a ton of fourth dimension.

Ordinarily, users looking for a specific bit of information would not know where to find it within your videos, especially if it is a very long video.

Timestamps allow you to characterization dissimilar sections of your videos so that viewers know exactly where to notice what they are looking for.

They can only click on i of your capacity or anchor points on your timeline to jump straight to the relevant timestamp in your video instead of watching your entire video.

Increased video watch fourth dimension and more subscribers

Did you know that very long videos such as podcasts or recorded Zoom meetings ofttimes have a poor watch time performance among non-subscribers?

The trouble is that near viewers who are not subscribers yet do not know enough about you lot to evaluate if information technology is worth their time to watch an hour-long video, especially if they are merely looking for a specific bit of information.

Since they don't know where to observe what they are looking for, they volition normally only watch the offset 30-60 seconds of your video.

If they do not notice what they are looking for, they will frequently hitting the back push button to spotter someone else's video from YouTube search results.

Past providing video chapters with timestamps, y'all allow non-subscribers to jump straight to the good parts of your video.

Because of the much higher relevance of certain sections of your video, they will lookout longer, and more viewers will catechumen into subscribers.

College visibility on Google

With YouTube chapters, your videos are more likely to be indexed by Google and appear more than prominently in search results.

In contempo years, Google has shown more and more than instant answers in the form of featured snippets inside its search results, particularly for searches such equally "How to", "What", "Where," etc.

The thought is to provide viewers with just enough information then they don't have to leave Google. If they desire to learn more than, they tin visit the original source.

That does not only apply to articles. With Google'south acquisition of YouTube, YouTube videos have started to appear in Google search results as well.

With YouTube chapters, nosotros tin have the idea of featured video snippets to an entirely new level.

Google can now link to specific timestamps within 1 of your videos. The search intent and relevant answers match perfectly within your video content.

This strategy works even better if you map out an unabridged YouTube content cluster strategy, and so Google understands that yous are a key thought leader inside your niche.

How to Proper noun Your Video Chapters for YouTube SEO

If yous want to get your video to rank on the first page of Google y'all need to have some other trick up your sleeve.

You have to optimize the names of private video chapters of your YouTube video for SEO.

I recommend signing upwards for Semrush trial and using its Keyword Magic Tool to identify mutual keywords, phrases, and related questions around a specific topic.

Alternatively, you tin as well effort out TubeBuddy, vidIQ, or Morningfame with like keyword inquiry tools specifically aimed at YouTube content creators.

Write down a list of keyword ideas that complement each other well and could exist covered in one of your side by side videos.

Employ the key phrases as futurity capacity in your video outline. And and then add more bullet points to map out each chapter.

I recommend signing up for a costless Workflowy account to map out your video outlines.

Allow me give you a practical case.

Suppose yous are creating a video virtually blistering bread with gluten-gratis flour alternatives.

Instead of using single-word keywords such as "coconut flour", or "almond flour", endeavor to incorporate full sentences or questions.

For example: "How to make gluten-free breadstuff with almond flour?".

This way y'all dramatically increase the probability of Google linking to this particular chapter of your newly published video when someone types in a similar question as your affiliate title into search.

Outline your video chapters in Workflowy.

How to Edit Your Videos for YouTube Chapters?

To make your life easier, I recommend planning video chapters while editing.

If y'all desire to utilize car-chapters, I recommend adding transition sequences with text overlays to represent the chapter name.

YouTube's AI is smart enough to recognize transitions as chapters and can extract burned-in text overlays via OCR and apply information technology for transitions, especially if y'all add a music track to your transitions and don't talk.

YouTube may also pick up central sentences from your YouTube subtitles for chapter titles. So make certain to speak out specific questions y'all are going to answer in each new segment.

To set upward your titles manually, I recommend adding affiliate markers in Terminal Cut Pro Ten or Adobe Premiere Pro at the start of every transition.

This way, you lot can revisit your editing timeline and jump from one chapter marker to another, and just write down the timecode from your timeline.

How to Add Capacity to YouTube Videos?

Adding chapters to your YouTube videos is very straightforward.

Outset, you take to log in to your YouTube account and open YouTube Studio for your channel.

From the left carte du jour, select the Content tab.

Select i of your videos and so scroll down to the Description text field.

In the video description, add a list of timestamps and titles.

YouTube chapters utilize the following format for timestamps.

MINUTES:SECONDS chapter title

Here is a practical instance:

00:00 Welcome

00:x What are YouTube chapters

01:30 How to add YouTube capacity to your video

Make sure that the first timestamp starts at 00:00, and that your video contains at least three timestamps in ascending order otherwise, YouTube will not brandish whatever of your timestamps.

In one case yous accept added all your timestamps, click save, and you lot are done.

YouTube may take a few minutes to update your video and display your chapters on the video timeline.

How do you add automatic chapters to YouTube videos?

YouTube's avant-garde AI is capable to add chapters automatically based on video overlays, pauses, transitions, and video subtitles.

This feature is turned on by default for all new uploads, just here is how you can enable automatic chapters for older videos.

Open any video of your choice by clicking on the video thumbnail or the pencil icon.

Ringlet to the bottom of the page and click on View More.

Scroll downward further until you see "Automated Chapters".

Enable the checkbox on the left of "Allow automatic chapters (when available and eligible)"

Salve your video, and you are done.

How to Edit Automatic YouTube Capacity?

Once YouTube adds automatic chapters to one of your videos, how tin you edit them?

The solution is that yous must override them by calculation chapter markers in your video clarification.

Fortunately for y'all, YouTube gives yous a one-click pick to import all existing auto chapters into your video clarification.

You can access this part by signing into YouTube Studio.

As always, head over to the Content tab and open a video with auto-capacity.

At the lesser of your video clarification, yous volition find a little icon with stars and the text "Chapters available" adjacent to information technology.

To import your auto-generated chapters click on it.

Y'all will see a preview popup like the example below.

Click on Add Chapters to import the auto capacity to the stop of your clarification.

If you are already close to the v,000-character limit, y'all might have to shorten your description before importing.

How to Opt-Out of Automatic YouTube Chapters?

If you lot don't like to utilize automatic YouTube chapters you can disable this feature for private uploaded videos, also as the upload default settings for all future videos.

How to opt-out of automatic video capacity for a specific video.

To remove automated chapters from a specific video, open the video in YouTube Studio.

Click on "Prove More" at the lesser, and so scroll down to Automatic Capacity, and unselect "Allow automated chapters (when available and eligible)".

Click on "Save" and YouTube will no longer show or generate any chapters for this video.

How to opt-out of automatic video chapters in bulk.

Doing this one-past-one can speedily become a tiring endeavor, especially if you take a large number of videos.

Luckily, at that place is an easier way to exercise this in bulk.

First, log in to YouTube Studio and open the Content tab.

Scroll down and change the number of displayed videos from 30 to 50.

Curl upwardly once more and click on the "Select All" checkbox. This will select the showtime 50 videos and open up the bulk editing toolbar.

Click on Edit and then select Automated Capacity.

You tin now change the setting from "Permit" to "Don't allow" to disable this feature.

Finally, click on "Update videos" on the correct and wait for YouTube to complete the bulk processing.

In one case this is washed, you tin can click the "Side by side page" push at the lesser right of the table then repeat the same process for the next 50 videos, until your entire video library has been updated.

How to opt-out of automated video chapters for all future videos by default.

To turn off automatic chapters by default, open YouTube Studio and so click on "Settings".

In the popup, switch to the "Upload defaults" tab.

Then, nether "Advanced settings", uncheck "Allow automatic chapters (when available and eligible)" and save.

New videos will now no longer enable car-chapters by default.

Frequently Asked Questions Near YouTube Capacity

Why are my YouTube chapters not working?

There are several reasons why YouTube capacity might non work for your video, including:

Some of your timecodes may have incorrectly used "." as the divider, instead of ":".
The content of your video may non exist appropriate for all viewers.
Timestamps are not listed chronologically.
You did not include a 00:00 fourth dimension stamp.
Y'all have added fewer than 3 chapters.
You accept ane chapter that is shorter than ten seconds.
Your channel has less than 1,000 subscribers.
Your aqueduct might accept one or more agile copyright strikes.

Should all videos have YouTube chapters?

No, having capacity just makes sense if your video contains at least three different sections and all chapters are more than 10 seconds long.

That is usually only truthful for longer videos that are more structured.

Are YouTube capacity available in all countries?

Yeah, YouTube video capacity are available worldwide.

Volition YouTube capacity reduce your video watch fourth dimension?

Non necessarily. Information technology may fifty-fifty increase your lookout man time. Here is why.

It is truthful that someone who jumps to a specific section of your video usually watches everything leading upwardly to the selected chapter.

But it is also true that many people would only watch the starting time 10-30 seconds of your video and then leave.

By giving viewers what they desire, you increment the hazard that they kickoff sentry the selected chapter and and then jump back to the kickoff to watch the entire video if they actually resonate with what yous had to say.

Does it matter where you lot add YouTube chapters in your video description?

No, it does not thing where you lot add YouTube affiliate timestamps in your video clarification. You can add them to the first line of your description, somewhere in the centre, or all the way to the end.

What is important is that your first timestamp starts with 00:00, that y'all add one timestamp per line, that all timestamps are sorted chronologically from start to cease, and that in that location are no empty lines in between.

How to Grow Your YouTube Channel

YouTube chapters are an first-class tool that volition help you lot to improve your viewing experience and to meliorate rank your videos in search.

If yous desire to accelerate your YouTube channel growth I also recommend checking some of my other YouTube growth articles that will help yous go the nigh out of your YouTube channel.

How to get more YouTube subscribers?
How does the YouTube algorithm work?
How to get 4000 hours of YouTube sentry time?
How to increase the number of video views?
How to make money with your YouTube aqueduct?
How to join the YouTube Partner Program?
How to write amend video titles?
How to pattern better video thumbnails?
How to boost your video click-through charge per unit?
How to optimize your videos for the YouTube algorithm?
What are the best YouTube growth tools that every YouTuber should take?

For even more topics, check out my YouTube growth web log here.