Short-form video remains the hottest attention format, but the competitive landscape is shifting. YouTube Shorts has doubled its ad revenue year over year, thanks to integration with Google’s search and recommendation engines. Instagram Reels, meanwhile, is deeply woven into the Meta ad ecosystem, offering seamless remarketing. For creators, the difference is audience intent: Shorts viewers skew discovery-driven and lean into educational or explainer content, while Reels thrives on lifestyle, humor, and commerce tie-ins. Strategically, cross-posting is essential, but tailoring hooks, captions, and CTAs to platform-native behaviors maximizes ROI. For advertisers, Shorts increasingly functions like top-of-funnel SEO content, while Reels mirrors paid social campaigns. Neither platform is optional anymore; the challenge is systematizing production so each piece of creative flexes to both environments without doubling workload. Efficiency wins in short-form, but nuance in approach drives outsized outcomes.