This article explains How to Link to a Specific Time in a YouTube Video on a desktop browser. It also includes information about a solution for mobile devices and how to do a manual timestamp.
- Go to YouTube in a browser desktop > click Share > select the check boxevCheck Start at > enter the start time of the video > Copy.
- A link to the specified time in the video is now stored in the clipboard.
How to Link to a Specific Time in a YouTube Video
Linking to a specific time in a YouTube video is a great trick when you want to show a specific segment of a video, especially if the video is long and the segment you want to share appears several minutes after it starts playing.
It’s easy to link to the exact part of any YouTube video in a desktop browser. go to YouTube.Com, Find the video you want to share and follow these instructions.
- click on Share directly below the video.
- In it popup Box, check the box next to Start in.
- Enter the time you want the video to start. The correct time may already be listed if you hit the share button at the exact time you want the video to start.
- Select Copy to copy the timestamped URL. You may notice that the link has changed to include some extra characters. These extra characters are used to tell YouTube to link to the specific time you’ve chosen.
- Paste the link wherever you want or select any of the social share buttons to share it. Anyone who opens your link will start watching the video at the time you specified.
Share a link at a specific time in a YouTube video on mobile
On the official YouTube mobile app, both for iOS and Android devices, you can notice that there is a share button that allows you to copy the link of the video and share it on social apps, but there is no Start In check box or field. . This feature is only available when watching a YouTube video from a web browser.
So if you want to link to a specific moment in a YouTube video while using your smartphone, you have a couple of options:
- Open the video from your browser app, like Chrome, and change your browser settings to load YouTube’s desktop site instead of its mobile version (choose Desktop Site from the Chrome menu). Then follow the steps above to create the timestamped URL.
- Link at a specific time manually creating a timestamp.
Link to a specific time in a YouTube video by creating a timestamp
You can manually link to a specific time in a video by adding ? t=00m00s at the end of a short YouTube link. Substitute 00m for the minute marker and substitute 00s for the seconds marker. For longer URLs that already have a question mark in the URLadd an ampersand (&): &t=00s.
If the video is short enough not to last more than a minute, you can skip the part «00m». For example, the link https://youtu. Be/dQw4w9WgXcQ becomes https://youtu. Be/dQw4w9WgXcQ?t=42s when a time marker is added to start at 42 seconds.
For long videos, hours are also supported, using 00h. For example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZZ7oFKsKzY&t=8h10s (Warning, this links to a video of Nyan Cat.)
YouTube makes it quick and easy enough that you don’t have to do it manually, but it doesn’t hurt to learn it anyway. Knowing how it works manually also allows you to better understand what those extra characters mean.
Why it is Important to Link to a Specific time?
Internet users have short attention spans, so forcing someone to sit through even a 4 or 5 minute video where the best part doesn’t start until halfway through can be enough to make them give up and impatiently close the video. video out of frustration
YouTube is home to thousands upon thousands of amazing videos worth sharing that can last from several minutes to over an hour. If you share a video of an hour-long public speaking presentation on Facebook, your friends will probably appreciate the fact that you’ve linked to the exact specific moment in the video where the talk focuses on a relevant topic you’re talking about. could be interested.
Now more than ever, people are watching YouTube on their mobile devices (which goes a long way to explaining the shorter attention span). They don’t have time to put up with a long introduction and other irrelevant bits before they get to the good stuff.
When you decide to share a video at a certain time, viewers can restart the video if they want to watch it in its entirety, so you’re not doing anyone a disservice by linking to a relevant point. The video player of Youtube Start to buffer and play at the time you set without any modification of the video.
