On LinkedIn, video uploads rose by 34% in a year, according to Microsoft’s results for 2024. The year after, it was the time spent watching them that went up by 36%, according to those for 2025. No other format is growing as fast there.
For a consultant, a coach or a founder, it is where the clients are. You still need to know what the platform expects. The benchmarks that follow come from LinkedIn’s help pages, read on 1 October 2026. They change: the links are at the bottom of the page.
What LinkedIn accepts
Here are the limits LinkedIn gives for a video posted by a member, on its help page about sharing videos on LinkedIn.
| Criterion | Limit |
|---|---|
| Maximum length | 15 minutes |
| Minimum length | 3 seconds from a computer, 2 seconds from the mobile app |
| Aspect ratio | from 1:2.4 to 2.4:1 |
| Resolution | from 256 × 144 to 4096 × 2304 pixels |
| File size | from 75 KB to 5 GB |
| Frame rate | from 10 to 60 frames per second |
As for the file format, LinkedIn’s help pages do not all give the same list. MP4 is in every one of them: it is the safe choice.
A post holds one video only.
Vertical, square or horizontal
The range of aspect ratios is wide: it covers 16:9 horizontal, square and 9:16 vertical. LinkedIn recommends no ratio for members’ posts.
There is, however, a feed of full-screen vertical videos in the mobile app. LinkedIn sets out how it works:
- you cannot post to it directly. You post a video as usual, and it may be picked up there depending on its relevance and its performance;
- a video whose aspect ratio does not match the screen may be cropped or adjusted there;
- this feed is not yet offered to all members, nor on desktop.
Our advice: post in 9:16 vertical. That is a choice, not a LinkedIn rule. Three reasons stand behind it: the format fits within what LinkedIn accepts, it fills a phone’s screen, and the same file can be posted as it is on TikTok, Reels and YouTube Shorts. We go through this format in The 9:16 vertical video format.
Safe zones
LinkedIn covers the edges of a video with elements of its own: your name, the text of the post, the buttons. So it asks you to keep the top, the bottom and the sides of the picture free of anything important, text or logo.
Its help page illustrates those margins with a diagram. On a vertical picture of 1080 × 1920 pixels, it reads 260 pixels at the top, 560 at the bottom, 112 on the left and 210 on the right. Those values appear on the diagram, not in the text of the page: take them as an order of magnitude.
In practice, put your face and your captions in the middle half of the picture. The bottom quarter belongs to LinkedIn.
What length to aim for
LinkedIn recommends no length for members’ posts. What it does publish is about ads, and it is instructive all the same.
- For video ads, it recommends videos of 15 to 30 seconds.
- In its tips for advertisers, it urges them to show what matters in the first ten seconds, and states that videos of 7 to 15 seconds are watched to the end far more often, with a gain of up to 300% according to its 2025 data.
- In the feed, a video of less than 30 seconds plays on a loop.
These figures are about ads, which people sit through. An advice video, which people choose to watch, can take a little longer. Our benchmark: between 30 and 90 seconds, the time it takes to ask a question and answer it. Beyond that, there are usually two ideas, and so two videos. We talk about it in How long should a short be?
Whatever the length, the subject has to be clear from the first sentence.
Captions are not optional
LinkedIn writes it on its page about autoplay: some videos start with the sound off as people scroll through the feed. With no text on the picture, your first sentence does not exist.
You have three ways of adding captions.
Automatic captions. LinkedIn can generate them when you upload, for all members, in ten languages, French and English among them. Read them through: a name or a trade term it got wrong shows.
A caption file. From a computer, you can attach an SRT file to your video.
Captions burned into the picture. They are part of the video: the viewer cannot hide them, they keep the style you chose, and they follow you to every platform. LinkedIn itself advises advertisers to burn in their captions, pointing out that a large share of its members watch with the sound off.
The first two are captions that anyone can show or hide. The third is the only kind whose look you control. We compare these approaches in Video captions: making a short work with the sound off.
What to post when you sell your expertise
The specs are not the subject. On LinkedIn, people watch you to find out whether you are the right person to call. What shows it:
- an answer to a client’s real question, asked in their own words;
- a mistake you often see, stated precisely;
- a case told without a name: the situation, the decision, the result;
- a rule you apply, with its reason;
- a price or a lead time said plainly.
These are passages you already say, on calls, every week. According to the Edelman and LinkedIn report, nearly three decision-makers in four judge a company’s capabilities on its expert content rather than on its marketing materials. A precise answer to a client is expert content. See Document, don’t create for the method.
The check before you post
- The video is an MP4, vertical, and lasts less than 15 minutes.
- The subject is stated in the first sentence, on screen as well as out loud.
- The captions are readable and have been read through.
- Nothing important sits in the bottom quarter or against the edges.
- The text of the post says in one line who the video is for.
- Nobody appears in it without having agreed.
And where Dailies comes in
Dailies records the calls you hold in Chrome, in French or in English, and cuts 9:16 vertical shorts with burned-in captions from them, 12 to 90 seconds long. Its extension’s interface is in French. You download them in Full HD and post them on LinkedIn yourself: Dailies posts nothing for you.
Key takeaways
- LinkedIn accepts up to 15 minutes and every common aspect ratio. A vertical MP4 is the safest choice.
- You do not post to the full-screen video feed: a video is picked up there, or it is not.
- Keep the bottom quarter and the edges free.
- Always add captions. Burned-in captions are the only ones whose look you control.
- Aim for 30 to 90 seconds, and a subject stated in the first sentence.
Sources
- Microsoft, quarterly results FY2024 Q4 and FY2025 Q3.
- LinkedIn Help: sharing videos, full-screen vertical video, automatic captions, closed captions, autoplay, video ad specifications, read on 1 October 2026.
- LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, tips for video ads.
- Edelman and LinkedIn, 2024 B2B Thought Leadership Impact Report, 2024.