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J
JNavas2
Participating Frequently
June 9, 2013
Question

How to get best quality 1080p Full HD video on YouTube

  • June 9, 2013
  • 1 reply
  • 50326 views

This is a guide for Premiere Elements 11 that can be adapted to other versions.

YouTube currently streams 1080p video by default in H.264/MPEG-4 AVC at a maximum bitrate of about

4 Mbps, up to 30 fps, with AAC audio at 192 Kbps, so use this format to avoid quality loss from conversion.

The High Definition for YouTube - 1920x1080 preset in PE has the following issues:

  • Settings cannot be tuned.
  • If the upload fails, your effort has been wasted.
  • Video bitrate of 8 Mbps is about 2x YouTube limit, so your video will get converted and lose quality.
  • Audio bitrate of 128 Kbps is less than YouTube maximum of 192 Kbps, again losing quality.

So it's better to better to create output in PE and then upload to YouTube in your Web broswer of choice.

In Publish+Share, select Computer, then AVCHD.

In Presets, select MP4 - H264 1920x1080p 30 (or 24 or 25, depending on your project/source fps).

Then click Advanced.

In the Video tab:

  • Change Profile to High.
  • Check Render at Maximum Depth.
  • Change Bitrate Encoding to VBR, 2 Pass (although 1 Pass is usually almost as good).
  • Change Target Bitrate (Mbps) to 4.
  • Change Maximum Bitrate (Mbps) to 16.

In the Audio tab:

  • Change Bitrate (kbps) to 192.

Click OK, and in Please name this preset, give it a name like "YouTube max quality (MP4 - H264 1920x1080p 30)".

Last, click Save to create your YouTube output. Then upload to YouTube in your Web browser of choice.

Hope that helps!

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

S
Steve Grisetti
Legend
June 9, 2013

Is creating a custom template really necessary though? Can you see a significant difference in your finished YouTube video compared to simply using the Publish & Share/Computer/AVCHD with default YouTube HD preset? I'd be interested in seeing a side-by-side comparison -- just to see if it's worth creating a larger file at a higher bitrade and a longer YouTube transcoding time.

J
JNavas2Author
Participating Frequently
June 9, 2013

Preset Publish & Share: Computer: AVCHD: YouTube HD can be used as a starting point, with these caveats:

  • Transcoding time will be about the same.
  • Video bitrate default of 8 Mbps will result in much larger file, and conversion by YouTube which will reduce quality. Because bitrate is so low, conversion artifacts may be visible, particularly in scenes with high motion. Set video bitrate to 4 Mbps to avoid video conversion by YouTube (and set Maximum to 16 Mbps).
  • Audio bitrate default of 64 Kbps is much too low for good quality -- use at least 128 Kbps, or better yet 192 Kbps -- the overall file size difference isn't large enough to matter.
  • Audio Frequency should be set to match project/source.
  • Video framerates above 30 fps will not work well.
J
JNavas2Author
Participating Frequently
June 10, 2013

Again, every medium has its specific needs. Rather than a super one-size-fits-all solution, it might be best to determine what the video is going to be used for and what medium it's going to be delivered on. There's an optimized format for every purpose.


Indeed, and that's just the point of my posting, an optimized format for YoutTube Full HD!

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