Open on your buyer's problem, keep it under two minutes, and don't judge it by its views. That's what we found when we went through 1,697 Launch YC posts with a video, from June 2022 to October 2026.
What we looked at
Launch YC is the page where Y Combinator startups post their launch. Most posts carry a short video.
We saved every post that links a video, with its upvotes, and pulled each YouTube video's length and views on October 20, 2026.
That gives 1,697 posts with a video anyone can play. Videos posted only on X, Loom or other sites have no length or views, so they're left out.
A YC batch is the group of startups YC takes in at one time, like Fall 2025.
We aren't part of Y Combinator. This is our own count of its public launch page.
The most upvoted launch videos
Startup and YC batch
Upvotes
Length
Brickwise, Fall 2025
3,092
72 seconds
Oxus, Winter 2026
2,437
82 seconds
Better Auth, Spring 2025
2,197
43 seconds
QueryPie AI, Winter 2020
2,038
618 seconds
Ruma Care, Winter 2026
1,857
92 seconds
Four of the five run under two minutes. None of them has 3,000 YouTube views: Better Auth has the most, 2,894, and QueryPie AI the fewest, 474.
Short is normal now, so it won't set you apart
The typical launch video runs 80 seconds. Half are shorter and half are longer.
76 of the 100 most upvoted run under two minutes. Across all 1,697 it's 78 in 100, about the same.
Long can hurt. Of the 49 videos that ran five minutes or more, only 2 reached 140 upvotes, the mark of the top tenth of posts.
Launch videos get shorter every year:
Year posted
Typical length
Under two minutes
2022, from June (26 posts)
144 seconds
38%
2023 (64 posts)
120 seconds
50%
2024 (231 posts)
81 seconds
69%
2025 (647 posts)
79 seconds
76%
2026, to October 20 (729 posts)
78 seconds
87%
Open on the problem
We read the first ten seconds of 186 launch videos: the 93 with the most upvotes and the 93 with the fewest, out of the 279 we have the words for.
The first ten seconds
93 with the most upvotes
93 with the fewest
The problem, a pain or what is broken
40
31
A scene, a skit or a customer talking
18
15
The founder says who they are
19
19
The product, or straight into the demo
10
19
Music and no words
6
9
The top group opened on the problem more often, and went straight to the product about half as often.
"Hi, I'm the founder" came out even, 19 and 19. Saying your name first doesn't hurt, but the first ten seconds do more when they're about the buyer.
The most upvoted post, Brickwise, had 3,092 upvotes and 1,692 YouTube views.
Of the 100 most upvoted posts, only 9 were also among the 100 most watched. 41 of them had under 1,000 views.
The most watched launch video had more than 79 million views and 99 upvotes.
Upvotes come from people reading Launch YC. Views come from anyone, and a founder can pay to show the video as an ad, so a big view count can be bought.
So a launch post reaches the YC crowd. To reach buyers, the video has to travel further: your own posts, the press, and the creators your buyers already watch.
Being in San Francisco isn't the edge
1,055 of the 1,697 posts came from startups the YC directory lists in the San Francisco Bay Area.
They got the same upvotes as everyone else. The typical post got 28 in the Bay Area and 29 everywhere else.
What sets a launch apart is the video and what you do after it.
What we'd do with your launch video
Open on your buyer's problem in the first ten seconds, in the words they use.
Keep it under two minutes, and show the product doing one job.
Treat Launch YC as day one. Send the product to creators your buyers watch weeks before, and give the press a moment to cover. Read press or creators first if you're deciding where to start.
Source: Our own count, yc_launch_videos, every Launch YC post with a video, read 2026-11-01
