Media content on ViTA must meet requirements for platform, content quality, coverage, and thumbnail resolution.
Platform requirements
Media must follow the hosting platform requirements.
Make media free & available on the web
Do not put paywalls, walled gardens, subscriptions, or required logins on your content. Livestreams are an exception and can have paywalls, walled gardens, subscriptions, and logins.
Account for devices
Use smart deep links to account for the different devices users might have.
- Desktop users: Links direct them to the desktop web.
- Mobile users: Links direct them to the mobile web.
- Mobile app users: Links direct them to the app. The user’s experience is as frictionless as the mobile web version and they don’t have to log in.
Create a frictionless experience
Make it easy for users to navigate your content.
- Ensure your site and assets load quickly.
- Use autoplay when possible.
- Do not require additional navigation, like sign-ups, unless it’s for livestreams.
- If the content is on a site, make it the focus of the landing page so users don’t have to scroll to find the video they clicked.
- On Google Search Sports OneBox, use a maximum of 2 clicks for users to view a specific stream or video.
Reduce content delays
Upload your content as close to real time as possible so your users don’t get delays between the action and content availability.
Content quality & coverage requirements
Important: When you tag a video as a media asset, it must follow Google requirements.
Games
For pre-game previews:
- Only tag content for games that you have official distribution rights for.
- Inform users about the specific game covered.
- Include coverage such as footage from recent games, key player interviews, commentary, and analysis.
- Do not use videos as ads for the broadcast.
For in-game highlights and post-game recaps:
- Only tag content for games that you have official distribution rights for.
- Cover all key game events, such as goals, key plays, and other notable actions.
- Do not use clickbait.
- Add a title.
- Add the video duration for in-game highlights.
Summaries
Important: When you add a video asset or a YouTube video with a summary, set the "Video type" to Post-game.
A summary is a daily, weekly or round recap of what happens around the league or tournament.
Each summary should catch the user up on the most important parts of matches from the tournament. Do not cover all the matches or try to put all match recaps into one video. Instead, focus on what’s most important and newsworthy and stay in the time frame of a match-specific recap.
Best of Athlete
You can add videos that aren't tied to a specific date or period. You can add collections of the best single-play clips, viral-worthy on or off the field, court moments, and event-specific news.
When you add a video asset or a YouTube video with a Best of Athlete, you should:
- Set the "Video type" to Post-game.
- Add a title.
Guidelines for titles:
- Titles can have up to 40 characters.
- Avoid repetitive text.
- Do not include attribution since it will be overlaid separately.
- Use informative and catchy headlines.
Currently, Best of Athlete is only available on mobile devices and will show when there are 3 or more highlights from the same athlete. On Google Search, up to 10 videos will be included in the video carousel at any given time.
Consistency
Make your videos consistent in:- Style and content
- Unbiased point of view
- Quality narration
Content availability
Important: Do not add URLs in ViTA until the asset is successfully uploaded to the host domain.
You must tag assets and add URLs in ViTA based on the type of asset.
- Pre-game highlights: Before and up to the event.
- In-game highlights: During the event.
- Post-game highlights: After the event.
- Livestream: Before and during the event.
- Pre-game stories: Before and up to the event.
- In-game and post-game stories: During and after the event.
Thumbnail image requirements
Images and URLs that you use for thumbnails must meet these Google requirements:
- Thumbnails must be accessible globally without geo-restrictions that limit access.
- A name or a logo can be added to thumbnails for rights holders' content attribution.
- For videos or Web Stories on your site, provide thumbnail URLs using URLs based on your site's server.
- URLs must not expire.
- Thumbnails must be on a web server, not on cloud storage platforms.
- Images must accurately represent the content.
- Images must be clear on mobile and desktop.
- Images must be visually interesting, high contrast, close up, and bright.
- Landscape thumbnails:
- Images must have a high resolution of 1980x720 pixels or a minimum of 768x423 pixels.
- Image aspect ratio must be 16:9.
- Portrait thumbnails:
- Images must have a high resolution of 1053x1404 pixels or a minimum of 702x936 pixels.
- Image aspect ratio must be 3:4.
Tip: When you add a portrait thumbnail, your Story is eligible to appear on Discover.