It’s like a small revolution or an evolution rather. After years of “mocking” vertical videos, they are now making their way onto Facebook. And it actually makes perfect sense.
Just a few days ago I wrote about how to optimise video content for the mobile News Feed on Facebook. In that post, I mention that videos should be square, rather than wide. It makes perfect sense, right? Right. Square videos work best on the mobile feed. To be honest, nobody wants to turn their device on its side. A quick look through my Facebook feed shows that there are only a few brands that have understood this. And now, Facebook is bringing vertical videos to its mobile app.
I don’t know why we haven’t talked about this before. Despite being detested by many, vertical is actually the natural way to record video on our mobile devices. Snapchat, Instagram Stories, Facebook Live. Why hasn’t it also become the natural way to watch video? Well, I will blame she shift from TV or computer screen to the mobile device screen. We’re used to viewing things in 4:3 or 16:9 horizontally.
Do User Need To Be Trained To Watch Vertical Videos?
Do we need to be trained? I’d say so. And Facebook is about to do so. So, now that it has started showing vertical videos in its mobile app, will more people watch video this way? Well, it seems that people are already doing so. Facebook has actually found that users watch “vertical videos for longer time periods and with audio when they were presented vertically in News Feed”.
When seen in the News Feed vertical videos do not however take up the entire screen – they appear at 2:3 aspect ratio (vertically). Users will still have to click on a video to see it in all its glory. Clicking on the video starts to show the full vertical video with sound. As most of you will be aware, all vertical videos appeared as squares before users clicked on them.
Image credit: AdWeek
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