A YouTube Shorts ad is a vertical video of under 60 seconds that plays between Shorts. For software, it needs the product on screen within seconds. distrorig makes it from a real recording of your product, with an AI creator for the hook, a voiceover and captions, then posts it to your channel as a Short.
What counts as a Short?
YouTube decides from the video's shape, its length and when it was uploaded. From YouTube Help, checked October 2026:
| Video | YouTube treats it as |
|---|---|
| Vertical (9:16) or square (1:1), up to 3 minutes, uploaded on or after October 15, 2024 | A Short |
| Vertical or square, longer than 3 minutes | A long-form video |
| 16:9 landscape, any length | A long-form video |
| Vertical or square, over 1 minute, uploaded before October 15, 2024 | Stays a long-form video |
Source: YouTube Help on Shorts length.
How is a Shorts ad different from a Short?
The video can be the same file. The difference is who sees it and how they leave.
| Organic Short | Shorts ad | |
|---|---|---|
| Who sees it | Your subscribers and the Shorts feed | People you target in Google Ads |
| Length | Up to 3 minutes | Under 60 seconds recommended by Google Ads |
| How viewers leave | Swipe | Swipe, at once; there is no skip timer |
| Where you set it up | Post from distrorig | A campaign in Google Ads, using a video on your channel |
Source: Google Ads Help, About video ad formats. Checked October 2026.
An example Shorts ad, 25 seconds
An example plan for a scheduling tool for clinics. It uses one creator, who also voices the whole ad.
| Time | Picture | Said |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 2 s | Creator in a clinic hallway, shot on Phone | "We stopped losing 6 appointments a week." |
| 2 to 8 s | Recording: the calendar, a patient books a slot from a link | "Patients book themselves from a text." |
| 8 to 15 s | Recording: a reminder goes out; creator as a circle in the corner | "They get a reminder the day before." |
| 15 to 21 s | Recording: the week view, no gaps | "Our no-shows dropped. Our phone stopped ringing." |
| 21 to 25 s | Creator to camera, the product's URL in the captions | "Try it free. Link below." |
How to make it with distrorig
- Start a project in 9:16 and set the length to 15 or 30 seconds.
- Describe the ad in the chat: the product, the viewer and the result to promise.
- Give the product's URL and a demo login. The agent records in a phone layout so the product fills the frame.
- Agree on the plan and approve the creator's still. Nothing is paid for until you switch to Action.
- Pick a caption style. Captions keep the words readable for people who watch without sound.
- Post to your YouTube channel now or at a set time. A vertical video of up to 3 minutes posts as a Short.
- Use it as an ad by picking that video in a Google Ads campaign.
Read what each shot did
After posting, distrorig shows YouTube's audience retention laid over your video's shots. You can see which shot lost viewers and whether the first 3 seconds held them. Change that one shot and post the new version; the other shots are kept.
When it is not the right tool
- If you need horizontal in-stream ads before long videos, that is a 16:9 video. distrorig makes those too, but this page is about Shorts.
- If you want to post the same ad to Instagram or Facebook, distrorig does not post there yet. Download the file and upload it yourself.
- If your product is a native app only, the agent cannot open it. Upload a phone recording as product footage instead.
What it costs
A Pro plan is $49.99 a month or $479.88 a year. Posting and analytics do not use the monthly allowance. See pricing.