April 4, 2022

The Best Time To Post on YouTube: 2022 Scheduling Tips & Techniques

The Best Time To Post on YouTube: 2022 Scheduling Tips & Techniques

For many years, YouTube has been the most popular video platform on the internet. It is the world's second most visited website. And knowing when to post on it, how to create engaging content, and how the platform overall operates… is essential for a successful YouTube channel.

YouTube, like Google, serves as both a social networking platform & a search engine. It takes time for YouTube to index your video and give it more visibility.

So, when you post your video, YouTube requires some time to analyze and process it before making it available to viewers. This is why the time you upload your video is critical to the number of viewers you get.

Statistics on YouTube videos reach

  • The majority of YouTube users are in the United States. However, large nations such as Brazil, Russia, China, India, and the United Kingdom are important markets as well.
  • YouTube now reaches more 18- to 34-year-olds in the United States than television networks do!
  • The indexing mechanism on YouTube isn't quick. If you want a video to be posted at a specific time and be searchable, you must post a few hours ahead of time.
  • YouTube has a massive audience that mostly uses mobile devices to access the content. This makes developing a strong, mobile-first video marketing strategy for your company or influencer career more crucial.

This article will provide extensive information about the best time to post on YouTube. Let's dive in.

When is the best time to post on YouTube? - Studies say:

Constantly posting on YouTube will give good results and allow you to expand rapidly. It is critical to stick to a routine to preserve your subscribers’ attention and loyalty.

A weekly posting frequency of at least once is regarded as fair. However, it pretty much depends on your niche & how long it takes you to produce a single video.

For instance, a vlogger or a gamer might have to post multiple times a week. But if your content requires a lot of research, scripting, fact-checking… Once a week remains a good spot to aim at!

Some studies and surveys can guide you on when the best time is to post on YouTube. Let's take a look at some of them:

Magisto's survey

Magisto’s survey suggests evaluating the demographics of your target audience in order to determine the best time to post your videos on YouTube.

Suppose you've gone through the trouble of creating, filming, and editing a video. Is your video ready to get the attention you want? The answer is a big nope!

You still should do more!

For instance, when you intend to release a video, you should consider the video’s characteristics (long, short, simple, complicated…), your niche, and when you'll upload it. But determining that doesn’t come arbitrarily! There are some actions to take prior to that!

To begin, you must determine which country you’re targeting.

While most YouTube viewers are from the U.S, a fair viewership comes from other countries, including Brazil, the U.K, China, & India. Having a target country will not only tell you what cultural codes to respect when producing the content but also what’s the best time to publish the content.

Moreover, several other reports have stated that YouTube's indexing system takes time. So, if you want a YouTube video to be searchable at a given time, you must post it a few hours beforehand! This will give the algorithms enough time to decipher the content of your video and make it accessible to researchers.

So?

According to Magisto, although younger people watch YouTube more than TV, their viewing patterns remain essentially the same. People generally watch YouTube in the evenings and on weekends, with Sunday being the busiest day.

Accordingly, you should submit your films a few hours before these peak hours so that they can become searchable and receive more views.

Magisto also suggests posting your films in the late afternoon or early evening.

On Sunday, though, they make an exception; on Sundays, videos released early (for example, at 9 A.M.) frequently perform the best.

Frederator Networks' Survey

Matt Gielen of Frederator Networks receives one of the most common questions: "When is the best time to post my videos?"

To answer this question, Frederator Networks compiled data from over 1,300 channels and 120,000,000 monthly views across their network. But before we jump to their conclusion, it has to be noted that the subject matter of their study is male-dominated. 65% of those views are by male audiences.

Also, the average viewer age ranges between 13 and 34 years old. They also notice that 40% of their sample is from the United States. So, whatever findings the study’s found, their truthfulness remains bound to the aforementioned variables.

Regarding the aforementioned factors, Frederator Networks discovered the best times to post on YouTube to be:

  • Mondays through Wednesdays: the best time to post on YouTube is between 2-4 P.M.
  • On Thursdays and Fridays: the optimal time to publish on YouTube is between noon and 3 P.M.
  • On Saturdays and Sundays: You can post on YouTube between 9 A.M. and 11 A.M.

  • The best days to publish are Thursday and Friday.

Misfit Hustler's survey

According to Misfit Hustler, posting a video on YouTube at the right time can result in 2 to 5 times more views. It is critical that you post your videos intelligently rather than randomly.

MH recommends you use your channel's analytics to determine the best time for you. Ideally, you should post on YouTube 2 hours before your channel's primetime on the day when the majority of your viewers are there.

So, how do you find out when your channel's prime time is?

To begin, navigate to YouTube Studio>Analytics>Audience. Look for the report titled "When your viewers are on YouTube"

The day with the darkest purple bars is your most popular one. Take notes of when those bars start and post your videos two hours earlier than that time.

It is important to note that this report only shows when your viewers are on YouTube, not when they are watching your videos.

Choose the day with the darkest purple bars if you only post one video per week. Choose the one with the slightly lighter purple bars if you have more than one such day.

Misfit Hustler also suggests that posting the day before you have the most viewers may be beneficial. This is because videos typically receive the most views in their first two days. If your channel's second-busiest day is the day before its busiest day, post on that day instead. As a result, you benefit from having new content on the two busiest days for your channel.

Summary of these surveys & studies about the best time to post on YouTube:

  • The first aspect to consider when selecting the optimal time to post on YouTube is your target audience. You need to know their locations, genders, and behavioral tendencies, and be aware of all the YouTube marketing metrics.
  • It is necessary to provide Google and YouTube time to index your content. It is recommended that you post your videos a few hours before your peak viewing period. This will allow your video to be indexed and appear in search results in your channel’s prime-time.
  • The importance of your niche cannot be overstated. There is a distinction when it comes to what works best for business channels vs vlogging niches for instance.
    While a company may profit from posting between Tuesday and Thursday, an entertainment channel may benefit most from posting between Friday and Monday.
  • One wonderful technique you can incorporate into your plan is to broadcast the times when you upload new videos to your YouTube channel. This gives your visitors an idea of when they may anticipate your videos.
  • Use YouTube video analytics to find out when your viewers are on YouTube. The day with the deepest purple bars is your most popular. This data should help you choose the optimal time to upload your videos to YouTube.
  • Based on data collected by different businesses, we can conclude that the ideal time to publish on YouTube is between 2 and 4 P.M. on weekdays, and 9 to 11 a.m. (EST) on weekends.

More about YouTube analytics

When your channel gains enough traffic, you'll be able to use the YouTube advanced report feature, which gives you a report of When your viewers are on YouTube.

This report provides a detailed breakdown of your YouTube channel's traffic & performance. The key distinction is that instead of telling you the number of views your videos receive, it offers you a broad picture of when your visitors are on YouTube.

You can see all of the days of the week, along with purple bars indicating the times when your users are exploring the site and watching videos. The darkest bars represent the peak hour when the bulk of your YouTube viewers are online. The fewer viewers there are, the brighter the hue of the bars.

This data allows you to plan your posting schedule and achieve the best outcomes. The darkest bars indicate when your videos will be available to the greatest amount of viewers. This report is very important since it may also help you decide the ideal days of the week to upload your videos.

Note: This report shows relatively accurate results only for big channels with hundreds of thousands or millions of views on videos. If your channel is smaller, or you’re looking for more precise data, we recommend you look for alternative tools such as MySocial’s TubeView.

With TubeView, you may obtain precise information on how your YouTube videos are performing, analyze your traffic, and see when you get the most views, and where those viewers come from. This can certainly help determine when to post on YouTube.

TubeView also gives you the advantage of a seamless way to send your YouTube video analytics to sponsors.

Want more?

MySocial.io has other features like SmartLink & influencer MediaKit creator, both of which can be useful for your YouTube content marketing strategy.

  • Using the SmartLink feature, you can create deep links to route social media followers to your YouTube videos in the YouTube app, instead of the browser.
  • The MediaKit feature allows you to provide potential sponsors with self-updated data in the forms of a link rather than a PDF. The MediaKit includes insights about all your linked social media, including your YouTube channel.
MySocial provides influencers with analytics to determine the best time to post on YouTube

When is the best time to post on YouTube? Based on days:

Your audience's location and behavior determine the optimal time to publish on YouTube. Each user on YouTube has varied content tastes, location, and log-in time to utilize YouTube.

However, many of our readers want to know exactly when to publish content based on days. Well, we should always remember that there’s no magical time that if you post on, the video will magically blow. Remember the aforementioned studies, optimize your videos for YouTube SEO, and most importantly: be patient.

Roughly speaking, these are the best times to post on YouTube based on the days of the week:

The best time to post on YouTube on Monday

The best time to post on youtube on Mondays is between 2–4 P.M.

Remember that YouTube does not index your video immediately. It takes a little bit of time before it is available for viewers.

The best time to post on YouTube on Tuesday

The best time to post on YouTube on Tuesdays is between 2–4 P.M.

Also, the niche of your videos is important. Business-like and educational videos are mostly consumed between Mondays and Thursdays. So your niche should also be a deciding factor when choosing the day to post on YouTube.

The best time to post on YouTube on Wednesday

The best time to post on Wednesday is between 2–4 P.M. Just like Mondays.

During weekdays most people only have time to watch YouTube videos in the evenings. So, posting within this time allows YouTube to index your video before peak viewing time.

The best time to post on YouTube on Thursday

The ideal time to post on Thursdays is usually between noon and 3 P.M.

According to Frederator Networks, Thursdays are one of the best days to publish on YouTube.

The best time to post on YouTube on Friday

The ideal time to upload on YouTube on Friday is between noon and 3 P.M.

According to Frederator Networks, Thursdays and Fridays are the ideal days to publish on YouTube since they are the close of workdays.

The best time to post on YouTube on Saturday

The best time to post on YouTube on Saturday is between 9–11 A.M.

The majority of individuals watch YouTube at the same time they watch television. Because Saturday is a rest day, many individuals take the opportunity to unwind and spend time with family; therefore, there will be plenty of viewers on YouTube.

You will be in an excellent position for people to watch your videos if you publish your video a bit ahead of peak viewing periods.

The best time to post on YouTube on Sunday

The best time to post on Sunday is between 9 A.M.-11 A.M.

According to Magisto's survey, evenings, weekends, and Sundays are the busiest times on YouTube.

Best time to share shorts on YouTube:

YouTube Shorts are similar to long-form videos when it comes to the best time to upload on YouTube.

YouTube shorts, however, are a mobile-only option for YouTube creators to share snappy, off-the-cuff short-form videos with their audience.

YouTube Shorts are vertical videos intended to be viewed on your mobile app. For your video to qualify as a YouTube short, it must meet 2 requirements:

  • It should be no more than 60 seconds long.
  • It should be vertically oriented, either portrait or square.

When determining the best time to upload shorts on YouTube, consider the same criteria that influence posting conventional long-form YouTube videos.

Conclusion

Take ideas from the approaches given, examine your data with YouTube analytics, and pay attention to the most popular best times to publish on YouTube each day. 

Also, keep in mind that publishing at the right moment is only one of the things that can get you noticed. Consider it more of an opportunity to showcase the high-quality stuff you've created. In the end, it all boils down to creating quality content for your target audience.