The Google-owned video site announced that YouTube Stories will be shutting down from June 26, 2023."Starting on June 26, 2023, the option to create a new YouTube Story will no longer be available. Stories that are already live on that date will expire seven days after they were originally shared," YouTube said in a blog post on Thursday.
The firm wants to shift its attention towards other important areas including Shorts, Community postings, and live videos, in addition to its typical long-form material. According to YouTube, creators will be made aware of the shutdown through a variety of channels, including forum posts, in-app messaging, reminders in YouTube Studio, and more.
Following TikTok's success, Stories, which were formerly imitated by almost all social media apps, have lost popularity. Nowadays, services are switching from the more casual and informal Stories style to the short-form vertical video format made popular by TikTok. It should be mentioned that Youtube is not the only one abandoning its story feature. In the past, Netflix attempted a feature in its mobile app called 'Extras' that was similar to Stories and allowed users to post videos and images from popular series and movies.
However, the streamer went on to adopt the vertical video format with features like its short-form comedy video feed 'Fast Laughs' and a related vertical video feature geared towards children. In 2021, LinkedIn also discontinued its Stories function. And while Spotify recently included a feature for artistes' profiles that is similar to Stories, the app's overall design places a higher priority on discovery feeds that are similar to those found on TikTok.
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First launched in 2018, YouTube formally offered Stories to producers with over 10,000 followers. But it never extended access to all YouTube users, preventing casual, personal sharing from taking off. The firm had stated at the time that creators might use Stories to interact with their audience in between uploading more professionally made and polished videos. The stories could be used to post quick updates, vlogs, behind-the-scenes information, sneak peeks at upcoming videos, and more.
However, after the announcement of the shutdown, the company stated that YouTube Community posts could be a great option for creators who want to share brief updates, start discussions, or promote their YouTube content to their audience. Moreover, the company added that YouTube Shorts is the best option if users want to create short video content or reach a new audience, as amongst creators who use both Shorts and Stories, the average number of subscribers for shorts is much higher than that for stories.