Longer TikTok videos are coming to everyone

Back in December, TikTok started allowing some of its best-known creators to upload longer videos to the platform. Instead of adhering to the usual 60-second limit, they could share clips that were as long as three minutes. Starting today and “over the coming weeks,” TikTok says it will roll out that capability to everyone. You’ll get a notification from the app once you can use the feature.

TikTok says it’s making the change to give people more flexibility when it comes to crafting their videos, especially when it comes to content like cooking and beauty tutorials that are tough to pull off over a series of short clips. “With longer videos, creators will have the canvas to create new or expanded types of content on TikTok, with the flexibility of a bit more space,” the company says of the change.

Now that the feature is becoming more widely available, it will be interesting to see how the TikTok community responds to it. When some of the first longer videos hit the platform, the response was one of collective bewilderment. After all, the 60-second format is so central to TikTok’s identity. That’s not to say longer videos will erode the app's popularity, but you always worry when a platform moves away, even if it’s just a small step, from what made it popular in the first place.