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Have You Noticed YouTube Thumbnails Constantly Changing Lately? (Patreon)

Published:
2024-07-14 23:22:02
Imported:
2026-06

Content

The reason for that is that YouTube has added an A/B/C testing feature for creators to try out multiple thumbnails at once. It tracks which of them performs the best over a period of time, and then implements that one after the testing period is over.

Overall, my feelings on the feature are mixed, but I do love new little toys to play with, so I've been messing around with it and probably will keep messing around with it for the next few months. Above, you can see the three thumbnails we're going to test for the Windhelm unemployment video tomorrow. My gut says that either #1 or #2 will do best, but I wanted to throw in a "bad" one as well just to see if it really does make a difference. Which do you think will ultimately be most effective?

Longer term, I think I'll go back to trusting my gut and making thumbnails that feel good first and foremost, but this tool is definitely a good way to sharpen the skills and check in with the audience. Best not to worry about it too much though-- time and energy is usually better spent just making another great new video, rather than obsessing over every little color and shape in a thumbnail.

Austin

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Comments

Dat Guy

TFW I picked the “bad” one in the last post. RIP. But let’s see the numbers for the A/B/C results. I still think it’s the dark horse to win.

Luke Holladay

The third is actually my favorite because of the clear image of the city, and the closer shot of you. But I do enjoy that the first one has ol' what's his name in there. Either way I'm super excited for the video.

Horsethe

Throw one with a pog face and the text "this WINDHELM employment surveyor CHEATED his WR" up for shits and giggles.

Austin

The good news is I have no idea what I’m doing so you very well could be right

Hal Mag

The first one just has a vibe to it that I dig

TrysKits (formerly Refkins)

Thank you for confirming this because i thought this must be happening (across creators throughout the platform) but for a while there i felt like i was losing it cause id see one thumb and then later randomly another thumb for the same vid, lol I will say the one issue i foresee with the way this has been implemented (ie, changing the thumb that each user sees rather than dividing the users into cohorts and keeping it consistent which thumb each cohort sees) is that users like me are likely to skew the data. i’m on the site a lot browsing for stuff for different purposes at different times which means i may see a video (with a thumb i am drawn to) but not engage with it at that moment (or even the next 5 moments) because whatever im doing, it isn’t the right kind of video for that activity (for ex, if i need background noise, im not going to pick something i want to pay attention to). Since this feature kicked in, ive had a lot of videos go from a thumb i thought positively of to a clickbaity one i would’ve ignored had i not already seen the video and noted it (in my head) for later consumption. since that process is happening brain-side, not platform-side, it’ll look on the platform side as a preference for the second thumb, when in fact the first was the one that caught my interest. i imagine i’m not the most representative user out there cause i’m not for most things, but i work in QA and that aspect of the implementation is a glaring flaw in the design to my eyes. kind of hoping it gets sorted before the thumbnail landscape on the ol’ youtube gets more exhausting than it already was

Matthew Bakke

That’s cool insight, thank you