Video
Resolution1920x1080 (recommend 2560x1440 or 3840x2160)
CodecH.264 (High Profile) / H.265 / VP9
Bitrate8–25 Mbps (8 min @ 1080p, 16+ @ 1440p)
Frame Rate23.976 / 24 / 25 / 29.97 / 30 / 60 fps
Color SpaceRec. 709 (SDR) or HDR10
Aspect Ratio16:9
HDRNo
Audio
CodecAAC-LC
ChannelsStereo (2.0) or Stereo + 5.1
Sample Rate48 kHz
Loudness Target-14 LUFS integrated
YouTube normalizes DOWN to -14 LUFS if louder — no quality penalty.
If quieter than -14 LUFS, YouTube does NOT boost. Deliver -14 to -16 LUFS max.
True peak: keep below -1 dBTP to survive AAC transcode.
Captions & Subtitles
RequiredNo (recommended)
Delivery MethodSidecar file
Accepted FormatsVTT (.vtt), SRT (.srt), SBV (.sbv)
Max Chars/Line80
Max Lines2
Requirements
YouTube accepts SRT, VTT, and SBV sidecar files.
Auto-captions are ML-generated — NOT delivery-grade; always upload a proper CC file.
Upload via Studio → Subtitles tab — not burned-in.
Quality paradox: uploading at 1440p or 4K yields better final quality than 1080p due to YouTube's VP9 codec selection at higher resolutions.
QC Rejection Triggers
CRITICAL: moov atom at file end causes 'Processing abandoned' on large uploads. Must use FFmpeg -movflags +faststart.
Edit lists in MP4 container cause frame sync warnings and possible dropped frames — strip before delivery.
SRT with non-UTF-8 encoding will silently fail (use UTF-8 without BOM).
VTT files must start with the 'WEBVTT' header line or they are silently rejected.
Interlaced source will process but output quality is degraded — always deinterlace before upload.
Container & Packaging
ContainerMP4 (moov atom at front — Fast Start required)
TimecodeNot required
Required MetadataTitle, Description, Tags
Pipewright Validation Checks
Resolution matches spec (flag 1080p — recommend re-export at 1440p)
Bitrate ≥ 8 Mbps at 1080p (warn if below)
Audio loudness -14 to -16 LUFS (warn if below -16)
True peak below -1 dBTP
Container is MP4 with moov atom at front (Fast Start)
No edit lists in MP4 container
Progressive scan (flag interlaced input)
Caption encoding is UTF-8 (flag BOM or Latin-1)
VTT header line present if VTT format
Duration matches source