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AI YouTube Shorts generator

Type one line, pick 9:16, and MakeAIVideo renders a finished YouTube Short: script, AI voiceover, 15 visual styles, word-by-word captions and optional music. Batch a week of Shorts in one session, then post on the cadence YPP rewards.

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7 day free trial·Credits reset monthly · Credits you buy never expire

Join 690+ creators making AI video

Want to draft first? Try the script generator or the YouTube title generator. Free, no signup.

Prompt to Video example: Cinematic AI scenes from a one-line prompt, made with MakeAIVideo

Real 9:16 Short rendered by the same pipeline.

Watch this example full size

No source footage required

AI Shorts generator: one idea in, a finished YouTube Short out

Most YouTube Shorts tools clip up a long video you already filmed; if you have nothing to repurpose, you can't use them. MakeAIVideo writes the Short from a one-line idea and matches each line to real stock footage, or generates every scene with AI if you prefer, with voice, captions and optional music in the same pipeline. A 9:16 MP4 is usually ready in a few minutes. No filming, no timeline editing, no second tool.

Idea to 9:16 Short.
One line in, a complete vertical Short out, sized for the Shorts shelf, Reels, and TikTok.
Voiceover plus captions.
A natural AI narrator reads the script, with word-by-word captions timed to the voice and baked into the export.
Music if you want it.
Pick a track or generate one, and it ducks under the narration so the voice stays clear.

How it works

How the AI Shorts generator makes a Short in 4 steps

  1. Step 1

    Pick your topic and aspect ratio

    Type a one-line topic and choose 9:16 vertical for the Shorts shelf, Reels, and TikTok. The Shorts generator starts on the line right away; a specific topic gets a specific Short, a vague one gets safe defaults. Set the ratio up front, because captions auto-fit the safe area for the format you pick.

  2. Step 2

    AI writes the Short script

    Your line becomes a paced short-form script with a hook in the first three seconds, a body that holds attention, and a close that lands. Re-roll the script if you want a different angle, or open the editor later to rewrite a single line. The narration matches the words exactly, never a summary.

  3. Step 3

    AI builds scenes, voice, captions, music

    Every line of the script becomes a scene, from real stock footage or generated by AI in the visual style you chose, with a natural AI narrator reading the words and word-by-word captions timed to the audio. Any background music you pick auto-ducks under the voice. Everything happens in one pass, no second tool, no manual sync.

  4. Step 4

    Render and post

    Most Shorts are ready in a few minutes. A watermark-free 1080p MP4 lands in your library; post it to your connected YouTube channel now or on a schedule, or download it for the Shorts uploader. Open the editor first if you want to regenerate a scene, restyle the captions, or re-roll the voice.

Idea to Short

Generate YouTube Shorts with AI, right in your browser

Type the Short idea, keep 9:16, hit generate. The vertical Short lands in your library, watermark-free. Need a narrated explainer for the main channel instead? Switch the ratio to 16:9 or see AI explainer videos.

Length presets.
Pick 15 seconds or a minute for the Shorts shelf, or set a custom length.
Language and voice.
Choose the narration language and a voice before you generate.
Hook-first by default.
The script opens on the line most likely to stop the scroll.

Write the Short

How to make YouTube Shorts with AI that people watch to the end

The pipeline writes a hook-first script from your line, but your idea still picks the angle. Every Short that holds attention has the same three beats. Name them in your one-line idea, or draft openers with the video hook generator first.

  1. Beat 1First 1 to 2 seconds

    Hook

    Give the viewer a reason to stay before the thumb moves. Three openers that work:

    • A specific stake: “If you have $1,000 sitting in savings, watch this.”
    • A pattern interrupt: “You are using ChatGPT wrong. Here is the prompt that fixed it.”
    • A contrarian claim: “Stop chasing the algorithm. Do this instead.”
  2. Beat 2The middle

    Value

    Deliver what the hook promised and cut every sentence that does not move toward it. Three structures that fit a Short:

    • List: “Three things that change everything about compound interest.”
    • Story: “I tried this for 30 days. Here is what happened.”
    • Breakdown: “It is simpler than it looks. It works like this.”
  3. Beat 3Last 3 to 5 seconds

    One ask

    End on a single request. Asking for a like, a share, a comment and a subscribe at once splits the attention you just earned.

    • “Save this for later.”
    • “Subscribe for a money tip every day.”
    • “Comment if you want part two.”

How long should a YouTube Short be?

15 to 30 seconds
About 40 to 90 words
One hook and one tip. The easiest length to hold to the end.
30 to 60 seconds
About 90 to 175 words
Hook, a short body and one ask. The default for most topics.
1 to 3 minutes
About 175 to 525 words
A story or a deep dive, for topics dense enough to carry it.

Shorts can run up to three minutes. Word counts assume a brisk read of about 175 words a minute; check a script with the speech time calculator.

Publish to YouTube

Post from the AI Shorts generator straight to YouTube

Connect your YouTube channel, open a finished video and choose Post to your accounts. A vertical video goes up as a Short and a 16:9 video as a regular upload, now or at a date and time you set. Scheduled posts go out within about two minutes of that time. More on auto-posting video to YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.

Vertical posts as a Short.
No re-upload through YouTube Studio; the MP4 goes straight to your channel.
Room to describe it.
YouTube allows up to 5,000 characters, and the caption is drafted from your script.
Reels and TikTok too.
Tick more accounts and the same Short goes to Instagram as a Reel and to TikTok.

Keep the cadence

A week of AI YouTube Shorts in one sitting

Generate the ideas, make each Short, then schedule every one for its own day. Your library and posts page keep track of what is ready and what has gone out.

Ten ideas per niche

Enter your niche and a tone and get ten Short concepts, each with a hook and an angle. Make this turns one into a video.

One schedule, every post

Each Short you have scheduled or posted, with its status on YouTube and anywhere else it went.

Every Short in your library

See what is ready, still rendering or failed, then reopen any Short to edit, download or post.

All included

Everything you get with the YouTube Shorts generator

Voice, captions, scenes and a 1080p export are bundled into every Short, with music when you want it. Any Short opens in the editor too: regenerate one scene, swap the narrator or fix a word, then export again.

Native 9:16.
Built vertical for the Shorts shelf, not letterboxed or cropped from a wide source.
15 visual styles.
Cinematic, anime, claymation, and more, applied across every AI scene.
Word-by-word captions.
11 caption styles, timed to the voiceover and burned into the export.
Studio AI voices.
A curated library of natural narrators to match your tone.
Ducked background music.
Optional: pick a track and it sits under the narration without burying the voice.
Watermark-free 1080p.
Clean exports ready to post to the Shorts shelf.

Connect your AI agent

Make tomorrow's AI Short from ChatGPT or Claude

Connect Claude, ChatGPT, Grok or any MCP client, describe the Short, and it makes the video with the same pipeline as the app. Ask and it posts it to your YouTube channel too.

Connect your AI assistant.
Add MakeAIVideo to Claude, ChatGPT, Grok, Claude Code, Cursor or any app that supports MCP with one address. You sign in once; there is no API key to paste.
Ask in plain English.
“Make a 50 second Short on why honey never spoils and schedule it to my YouTube channel for Saturday at 10am.” It checks the cost before it spends anything.
It makes the video.
A finished MP4 with the script, voiceover, scenes, captions and any music, in your library to edit or download.
And posts it if you ask.
To the accounts you have connected, now or on a schedule, across 11 platforms.
Start free trialConnect any AI agent

MCP, API and CLI use the same credits and the same balance as the app.

Connector address

mcp.makeaivideo.ai

Works with

Signed in? Connect an AI assistant

What you can make with the AI Shorts generator

A finished faceless Short per idea, ready for the Shorts shelf.

A water drop landing in still blue water, a frame from a faceless explainer Short

Faceless explainers

Build a faceless YouTube Shorts channel without filming yourself. One line becomes a fully voiced, captioned, paced Short you can publish the same day.

Five grey stones in a row on pale sand, a frame from a top-five list Short

List Shorts

Top-5s, common mistakes, surprising facts. The hook-body-close structure is already there; you bring the topic and the angle.

A white lighthouse on a rocky coast, a frame from a history story Short

Story Shorts

Walk through a story or case study in 30 to 90 seconds with narration timed to scenes that illustrate each beat. Useful for history, science, and explainer formats.

White wireless headphones on a grey pedestal, a frame from a product Short

Product Shorts

Frame a feature, a launch, or a use case in one line. The pipeline writes the read, builds the visuals, and outputs a 9:16 clip you can drop into the Shorts shelf or a launch thread.

A white microscope on a bright lab bench, a frame from an educational Short

Educational Shorts

Explain a single concept per Short with narration timed to scenes that illustrate the point. Each beat gets its own visual; nothing drags into the next.

A cup of coffee on a white windowsill in morning light, a frame from a daily faceless Short

Daily faceless posts

Run a consistent posting cadence without source footage. One Short idea per day, one finished Short, no filming, no editing, no clip-mining.

If you want to clip up an existing long video you already filmed, a repurposing tool fits the job better. This is for Shorts built from scratch.

Best practices

Tips for AI YouTube Shorts that survive the scroll

Pick 9:16 before generating

9:16 vertical is what the YouTube Shorts shelf serves; captions auto-fit the vertical safe area. Switching aspect ratios after generating means a re-export, and scenes are framed best for the ratio you generate in, so set it up front.

Write a specific Short idea

'A 45-second faceless explainer about why honey crystallises, casual tone' will outperform 'a video about honey'. Specific topic, specific length, specific angle.

Put the payoff in the title's first words

Shorts titles sit in small type over the video, so lead with what the viewer gets. Keep the description to two or three plain sentences and a few niche hashtags; a long stack of tags adds nothing.

Keep one format for a run of Shorts

Pick one structure, such as a three-tip list or a 60-second story, and stay in one niche long enough for YouTube to learn who your Shorts are for. A channel that changes format every upload is harder to recommend.

Post on a schedule you can keep

A Short every day for a month beats seven in one afternoon and silence after. Make a week of Shorts in one sitting, then schedule each one for its own day; scheduled posts go out within about two minutes of the time you set.

Point Shorts at your long-form channel

Viewers who subscribe from a Short subscribe to the whole channel, and long videos usually earn more per view. Render the same script at 16:9 for the main channel so one topic covers both.

Re-roll one scene, not the whole Short

If a single scene misses, open the editor and regenerate just that scene. Faster and cheaper than re-rendering the entire Short.

Match captions to the platform

Bold, single-word captions pop on the Shorts shelf and Reels; quieter, two-line captions read better embedded in a longer post. The editor has 11 caption styles; pick once and reuse.

More AI video tools like the AI Shorts generator

TikTok Video GeneratorSame product, TikTok-branded.Instagram Reels GeneratorVertical for the Reels tab.Faceless YouTube ChannelLong-form + Shorts workflow.Prompt to videoThe same video in any ratio, from one line of text.AI Explainer VideoNarrated 60-90s explainers for the long-form library.

YouTube Shorts generator guides and tutorials

AI TikTok video generatorThe same vertical pipeline, with TikTok hooks, captions and posting.See the TikTok video generatorFaceless YouTube channelShorts and 16:9 long-form videos from the same script, with no presenter on camera.See the faceless video generatorYouTube automation: the complete 2026 guideHow Shorts fit into the automation pipeline, the team structures behind it, and the costs to scale.Read the YouTube automation guideYouTube CPM and RPM by nicheReal 2026 data on which niches earn what, including a dedicated Shorts breakdown.Read the CPM and RPM guideHow to write a video script60-second template with hook-body-close structure.Read the video script guide

Pricing

AI Shorts generator pricing: plans from $9 a month

Every Short is vertical, posts to your YouTube channel and has no watermark. A 30 second stock-footage Short is about 112 credits, and one with AI scenes and voiceover about 612. Every plan starts with a 7-day free trial that includes 350 credits.

Lite

The easy start. Every tool, one creator.

$9/mo

or $99 a year, 1 month free

600credits every month

Use them on any tool below

Start 7 day free trial

7 days free with 350 credits. Cancel before day 7 and you won't be charged.

  • Post and schedule to 2 social accounts
  • Videos up to 10 minutes
  • 1080p export, never a watermark
  • 1 user

Every tool included

Solo

For one creator posting every week.

$19/mo

or $190 a year, 2 months free

1,100credits every month

Use them on any tool below

Start 7 day free trial

7 days free with 350 credits. Cancel before day 7 and you won't be charged.

  • Post and schedule to 4 social accounts
  • Videos up to 10 minutes
  • 1080p export, never a watermark
  • 1 user

Every tool included

Most popular

Plus

Long-form, your branding and a team of three.

$29/mo

or $290 a year, 2 months free

1,750credits every month

Use them on any tool below

Start 7 day free trial

7 days free with 350 credits. Cancel before day 7 and you won't be charged.

  • Post and schedule to 6 social accounts
  • Stock-footage videos up to 40 minutes
  • Brand Kit: your logo on every video
  • 3 team seats with admin and member roles

Every tool included

Pro

For teams and channels running at volume.

$49/mo

or $490 a year, 2 months free

3,000credits every month

Use them on any tool below

Start 7 day free trial

7 days free with 350 credits. Cancel before day 7 and you won't be charged.

  • Post and schedule to 10 social accounts
  • Stock-footage videos up to 40 minutes
  • Brand Kit: your logo on every video
  • 10 team seats with admin and member roles

Every tool included

Run out in a busy month? Add credits any time, from $5. Credits you buy never expire. See pricing

Every plan includes

  • Captions, music and studio-quality voices, free on every video
  • Full HD 1080p export, never a watermark
  • Post and schedule to 11 platforms
  • Video in 24 languages
  • API, MCP server and CLI for ChatGPT, Claude or any AI agent

AI YouTube Shorts generator FAQs

How the Shorts generator works, what it exports and posts, and what it costs.

Something else? Visit the help center

How do you make YouTube Shorts with AI?

Type the topic and angle in one line, keep the ratio at 9:16 and generate. MakeAIVideo writes a hook-first script, adds an AI voiceover, builds a scene per line from stock footage or AI video, times word-by-word captions to the voice and renders a 1080p MP4 in a few minutes. Fix anything in the editor, then post it to your connected YouTube channel as a Short, now or at a time you schedule.

What is an AI shorts generator?

An AI shorts generator turns a written idea or script into a finished short-form video. MakeAIVideo makes the whole Short from one line: script, AI voiceover, stock or AI scenes, word-by-word captions, and any music you pick, then renders a 9:16 vertical MP4 ready for YouTube Shorts, Reels, and TikTok.

How does the AI YouTube Shorts generator work?

You type a one-line Short idea, pick 9:16 vertical, and choose a visual style. MakeAIVideo drafts a hook-paced Short script, picks a natural AI narrator, builds a scene per beat, times captions to the voice, layers in any music you pick, and renders the finished MP4. A typical Short is ready in a few minutes.

How long does it take to generate a Short?

Most 30 to 60 second Shorts are ready in a few minutes. Longer Shorts take longer, and AI-generated scenes take longer than stock footage. The finished Short lands in your library when it is done.

What aspect ratios can I export?

9:16 vertical for the YouTube Shorts shelf, Reels, and TikTok, 1:1 square for feed posts, and 16:9 landscape for the main YouTube page. Captions auto-adjust to the safe area for each format; pick the ratio before generating.

How much does it cost?

Plans start at $9 a month, and every plan starts with a 7-day free trial that includes 350 credits. A Short uses credits per second, all in: script, voiceover, scenes, captions and export. A 30 second Short built from stock footage is about 112 credits, and a 30 second Short with AI-generated scenes and voiceover is about 612. Solo includes 1,100 credits a month and Pro 3,000. The app shows the exact credit cost before anything is made. Run out? Add credits any time, from $5. See MakeAIVideo plans and pricing.

How long should a YouTube Short be?

YouTube Shorts can run up to three minutes, but most topics fit 30 to 60 seconds, roughly 90 to 175 spoken words. Use 15 to 30 seconds for a single tip and go past a minute only for a story or deep dive dense enough to carry it. Set the length before you generate and the script is paced to fit.

Is there a watermark on the Short?

No. Every Short you export is a clean 1080p MP4, watermark-free and yours to post anywhere. That holds on every plan and during the free trial.

Can I monetize the Shorts on YouTube?

Yes. Shorts you generate are yours to monetize on YouTube, TikTok, Reels, and any other platform. See the full terms.

Is it allowed to use AI to make YouTube Shorts?

Yes. YouTube asks creators to disclose AI content that looks real, such as a realistic scene that never happened or a real person shown saying something they did not say, using the disclosure setting when they upload. Clearly stylised or animated scenes do not need it.

Do Shorts help my long-form channel?

They can. A viewer who subscribes from a Short subscribes to your whole channel, and long videos usually earn more per view than Shorts. Render the same script at 16:9 for the main channel so each topic covers both; see faceless YouTube channel for the long-form side.

How many Shorts should I post?

As many as you can keep up every week. A steady daily rhythm in one niche and one format gives YouTube more to learn from than a burst followed by silence. Batch a week of Shorts in one sitting and schedule each one for its own day.

Can I edit the Short after it generates?

Yes. Open the finished video in the built-in editor to rewrite captions word by word, restyle the caption preset, swap the voice, or re-roll a single scene. The default output is built to post as-is, editing is optional.

Do I need source footage like other Shorts tools?

No. Most YouTube Shorts generators clip up a long video you already have; if you have no source footage, you can't use them. MakeAIVideo writes the Short from a one-line idea, so you can post without filming or repurposing anything. If you already have a written script, Script to video narrates your exact words instead.

How is this different from a clip-from-long-video Shorts tool?

Repurposers cut your existing long videos into shorter slices; MakeAIVideo generates the Short from scratch. That means you can run a faceless Shorts channel without ever filming a long video, podcast, or livestream first. Both approaches have their place; pick the right tool for what you've already shot.

What happens when I run out of credits?

Nothing is lost. Your account and finished videos stay exactly as they are, and your plan's credits reset on your next billing date. Run out? Add credits any time, from $5.

One line in. A finished AI Short out.

Start a 7-day free trial with 350 credits. Plans from $9 a month, and you can cancel anytime before the trial ends.

Start 7 day free trial