Free tool
YouTube character counter.
A YouTube video description can be up to 5,000 characters. Paste yours to count it the way YouTube does.
0 / 5,000
5,000 left
How it counts
How YouTube counts characters.
It counts bytes: plain English letters are 1, accented, Greek, Cyrillic and Arabic letters 2, Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters 3, and emoji 4 or more.
- An English sentence counts the same as its length. Accents and other scripts use the limit up faster.
- Each emoji takes at least 4 bytes.
| Example | Text | Counts as |
|---|---|---|
| A word | Hello | 5 |
| Accented | Café | 5 |
| An emoji | 🌙 | 4 |
| A family emoji | 👨👩👧👦 | 25 |
| A flag | 🇨🇦 | 8 |
| Japanese | 日本 | 6 |
| A link | https://example.com/spring-sale | 31 |
Limits
YouTube post limits.
Text is only part of it. These are the limits a YouTube post has to fit, as SocialHelper checks them.
Source: YouTube API reference ↗ Posting to YouTube with SocialHelper: YouTube integration
- Text limit
- 5,000 characters, counted as described above
- Text
- Optional
- Images per post
- None
- Videos per post
- 1
- Media
- Every post needs a video
- Video formats
- MP4, MOV, WEBM, MPEG, AVI, WMV, FLV, 3GP
- Largest video
- 1.0 GB
FAQ
About the YouTube limit
What is the YouTube character limit?
A YouTube video description can be up to 5,000 characters. It counts bytes: plain English letters are 1, accented, Greek, Cyrillic and Arabic letters 2, Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters 3, and emoji 4 or more.
Do emoji count as one character on YouTube?
Not always. A moon emoji (🌙) counts 4, and a family emoji (👨👩👧👦) counts 25.
Do links count toward the limit?
Yes. A link counts its full length, so a 31-character link uses 31 characters.
Is my text sent anywhere?
No. The counter runs in your browser, and nothing you type leaves this page.
Why do counters disagree?
Many counters count every symbol as 1. YouTube doesn’t, so their number can be off for emoji, links or other scripts. This one uses the same counting code SocialHelper runs before it posts to YouTube.
Does SocialHelper check this before posting?
Yes. Every post is checked against these limits for each account before it goes out. If anything doesn’t fit, nothing is posted and you see every problem at once.
Post to YouTube, checked first.
SocialHelper is invite-only during early access. Join the waitlist: the first 100 people to sign up get a Founding account with higher limits, free for 12 months.