Check your safe zone

What each app covers

• Instagram Reels: Meta's own specification asks for about the top 14%, the bottom 35% and 6% at each side to be kept clear, for the account name, caption, audio line and buttons.
• TikTok: TikTok publishes its safe area as a template rather than numbers. Scaled to 1080 × 1920 it leaves roughly the top 12% and the bottom third clear of key content, with the button column down the right.
• YouTube Shorts: the checker uses the same guide the Cuecaps studio draws. The like, comment and share buttons run down the right, and the title and channel sit along the bottom.

All three are approximate. The covered area grows with a long description, and the apps change their layouts from time to time. Before posting, check the video on your own phone, for example as a private post.

Where captions belong

Burned-in captions usually sit between the middle and the bottom third of the frame, where the eye already goes. That's also where the apps put their own text, so the sweet spot is narrower than it looks: on Reels, where the bottom 35% is taken, captions belong higher than on Shorts.

If one video goes to all three apps, place the captions where all three boxes overlap: around the middle of the frame, away from the right edge. The checker turns red when the sample caption runs into an app's interface.

Then caption it

Load your video into the checker and the Caption this video button opens it in the Cuecaps studio, still without uploading it. The studio draws a Shorts safe-area guide over the preview, and the caption position you drag there is the one that's exported.

Questions