Facebook Posts
While crafting quality content and mastering your social media strategy, you might find yourself wondering what’s the ideal length of social media posts for each platform. So, we’ve done the research for you. Facebook posts can be up to 63,206 characters long, but the truth is, shorter posts usually receive more likes, comments, and shares. People like it when a message makes its point quickly and concisely. It’s satisfying. Organic posts length: 1 to 80 characters
We scoured the web for research, and the most recent study is from 2016, but it’s all we have to work with. In 2016, BuzzSumo analyzed over 800 million Facebook posts. According to their findings, posts with less than 50 characters were more engaging than long posts. Another study by Jeff Bullas found that posts with 80 characters or fewer received 66% higher engagement. There are a couple of reasons for this… Barrier to entry: Facebook cuts off longer posts with an ellipsis, forcing users to click “See More” to expand the text and read the entire message. This extra step may not seem like much, but it will reduce engagement. Every time you ask the audience to take action, a percentage of people will lose interest. Barrier to comprehension: The longer a person reads, the harder their brain must work to process information. Content that demands less work to consume and understand will enjoy higher engagement rates. Paid posts length: 5 to 19 words
Every Facebook ad needs three types of content: a headline, ad text, and a link description. After analyzing 752,626 Facebook ads in 2018, AdEspresso found that ads did best when the copy in each element was clear and concise. According to the data, the ideal length for a headline is 5 words, ad text is 19 words, and link description is 13 words. Here’s a great example from Airbnb. No words are wasted here. The bottom line: Whether the post is organic or paid, brevity seems to drive engagement. Capitalize on this by keeping your ad copy concise: don’t use two words when one will do. And keep it clear: omit adverbs, jargon, and the passive voice from your copy.
X (formerly Twitter) Posts
X posts can be up to 280 characters long, but the truth is, shorter posts usually receive more likes, comments, and shares. People like it when a message makes its point quickly and concisely. It’s satisfying. Organic and promoted post length: 71 – 100 characters
Whether you’re running an ad or not, data from Buddy Media shows that X posts containing less than 100 characters receive, on average, 17 percent higher engagement than longer tweets. This is, in part, because shorter posts are easier to read and comprehend. There is a way to get around the character limit on X:
Back in 2022, Warby Parker cleverly combined a long list of short tweets to get the best of both worlds by creating a long thread for the longest day of the year. X hashtag length: 6 characters
“The best hashtags are those composed of a single word or a few letters,” writes Vanessa Doctor from Hashtags.org. “Experts recommend keeping the keyword under 6 characters.”
Again, this length is about reader comprehension, especially since hashtags don’t support spaces.
TikTok Videos
People have downloaded TikTok more than 3 billion times, which means you’ve got a lot of short attention spans out there in the world to appease. For most users, the max video length on TikTok is 10 minutes, though the platform has been experimenting with video lengths of 20, 30, and even 60 minutes. But just because you can do something doesn’t necessarily mean you should. On TikTok, brevity thrives. Organic TikTok video length: 7 to 15 seconds
To hook a viewer and keep their attention, aim for a 15-second video. That said, you may still want to try out TikTok’s 7-second challenge. When our social team tried it, their video received half a million views. TikTok ads length: 21 to 24 seconds
For top performance of ads, TikTok recommends 21-34 seconds. But of course, length isn’t everything: content and quality formatting matter, too.
Instagram Posts
Unlike Facebook and X, Instagram was founded on visual content. The platform was made to showcase compelling pictures and videos, but the right combination of words will promote engagement on any post. Engagement, of course, is crucial to maximizing your content’s reach, since Instagram’s algorithm places posts with the most likes and comments near the top of your followers’ feeds. Organic Instagram post caption length: 138 to 150 characters
A successful Instagram caption adds context, shows off your brand’s personality, entertains audiences, and compels your followers to take action. The Instagram caption limit is 2,200 characters, but you’ll only need a fraction of that limit to move the needle. Most people scroll through their feed quickly, so it makes sense to keep your captions clear, concise, and punchy. Brief copy is easy to consume. It also doesn’t get cut off with an ellipsis.
YouTube Videos
At the end of the day, YouTube is a search engine, meaning it relies on text to organize and rank the nearly 500 hours of video uploaded to its servers every minute. Therefore, in addition to optimizing video length, marketers must front load their content’s title and description copy with relevant keywords—and that means keeping an eye on character count. YouTube video length: 7 to 15 minutes
Whether you’re watching videos on YouTube or anywhere else, one of the most important KPIs is retention. How long do people actually watch? Are viewers finishing your videos at a high rate? If so, you’re doing something right. Statista reports that the average video is 11.7 minutes long, and the Social Media Examiner endorses this as the ideal, writing that videos between 7 and 15 minutes have the best performance.
Pinterest Posts
On Pinterest, image size matters. So does the length of your description. Pinterest images: 1000 X 1500 pixels
According to Pinterest best practices, images on the platform should have a 2:3 aspect ratio, which is how the height and width of an image relate. Description length: 200 characters
Studies show that descriptions containing about 200 characters receive the most repins. Your Pinterest caption is your chance to add context, persuade, and sell. It’s your chance to tell a story and conjure emotion, to make a promise. A well-written description is also an opportunity to get discovered, so make sure to brush up on your Pinterest SEO best practices.
Snapchat Videos and Captions
Given how brief the limits are on Snapchat captions and videos, it’s almost impossible to go too long. To really thrive with engagement on this platform, it’s really more about what you’re posting, not how long that content plays for. Ideal Snapchat Story length: 15 seconds
Snapchat Story videos can be up to 60 seconds long, but it’s pretty rare for engagement to be high for those (relatively) long-form pieces of content. Instead, aim for short-and-sweet videos that hit hard off the top. Ideal Snapchat video caption length: 50 characters
Captions for snaps can be up to 80 characters, but they’re really secondary to the visual content, so don’t stress too much about making the most of this.
LinkedIn Posts
More than 1 billion professionals use LinkedIn, and as the platform’s user base grows, it becomes increasingly difficult to win organic attention. Marketers must continually optimize their messaging for quality, timing, and of course, length. Organic and paid updates length: 25 words
The research on this topic isn’t very recent, but Hootsuite finds that, as with all other types of social updates, it’s best to keep LinkedIn updates short. The LinkedIn post character limit before the “See More” button is 140. Your message will be cut off at the 140-character mark — like Shopify’s ad here did. As a general rule of thumb, we stick to 25 words or fewer. In fact, we’d recommend making sure your message is clear within the first 150 characters.
TikTok Reels
TikTok Reels can be up to 90 seconds long, but it’s all about the quality of your content, not the length. Organic TikTok Reels length: 7 to 15 seconds
To hook a viewer and keep their attention, aim for a 15-second video. TikTok ads length: 21 to 24 seconds
For top performance of ads, TikTok recommends 21-34 seconds.
Conclusion
While crafting quality content and mastering your social media strategy, it’s pivotal to nail the length of your message. By optimizing the length of your content, you’ll be more likely to engage and convert your audience. Use the research from this guide to inform your content strategy, and don’t be afraid to experiment and try new things. Remember, every social account is a unique beast, and you know it (or can learn to know it!) best. Time and experimentation will reveal what resonates best with your specific followers and users. Try running A/B tests to help you determine if the suggested character counts in this guide are, in fact, ideal for you. Use Hootsuite to share quality content on all your social media channels from one dashboard. Grow your brand, engage customers, keep up with competitors, and measure results. Try it free today.