Twitch Will Let Creators Upload External Short-Form Video Next Year

Starting early next year, Twitch will allow creators to upload short-form videos made outside the platform, the company announced during the keynote at TwitchCon 2026 in San Diego. The move is Twitch's biggest attempt yet to fix on-platform discoverability and to create more ad inventory. Executives insist the goal is not to clone TikTok.

"We're not trying to be TwitchTok," said Mike Minton, Twitch's chief product officer. Instead, the platform wants short-form video to help viewers find creators and then funnel them into livestreams, where creators earn most of their income.

Why is Twitch changing its clips strategy?

The new uploads build on Twitch's existing Clips tools, which have let creators and viewers clip livestreams and share them on the platform for more than a decade. But the real viral reach happens elsewhere. Twitch creators' short-form content routinely racks up millions of views on TikTok, X, YouTube Shorts and Instagram.

Minton admitted the platform had "missed an opportunity" to make clips work natively on Twitch.

"It's a smart thing for them to do. You want to follow your favorite Twitch creators but you aren't able to catch them live at that moment, so you're going to TikTok or you're watching old uploads on YouTube," said Eric Bogard, CEO of UnderCurrent Talent.

Cross-platform conversion is notoriously weak for streamers. "Every data point will always show you that getting people to click over different platforms doesn't work really at all," said Tim McArdle, co-founder and chief content officer at creative studio Wildcatter.

What do streamers think?

Reactions among creators split along lines of scale. McArdle, whose company produces heavily on Twitch, called the features potentially game-changing. "They needed to do it, and for a company that produces a lot on Twitch, we're excited about it," he said.

Dan "Onepeg" Marshall, who has over 72,000 followers on the platform, said the move is good for the overall ethos of Twitch. He flagged the new "Category Recap" shelf — a feed of clips and recaps that will appear on category pages, supplementing the existing Clips tab on mobile and desktop — as the most interesting announcement.

"Of all of the things Twitch has tried to pull in the last several years, this is probably one of the better ideas for discoverability if it does more than just show clips of the largest creators in each category," Marshall said.

Two streamers, Vio and Frogan, were blunt in their skepticism. "People don't go to Twitch to find clips or videos. They go to YouTube or TikTok," said Vio. Frogan went further: "They need to let the Clips thing go. No one is going to watch clips on Twitch natively."

Will feeds become algorithmic?

Yes, over time. According to Minton, Twitch feeds will eventually become more personalized, with users' viewing habits determining whether they see more short-form content or more streams.

"Will people consume as much of the clips on Twitch as TikTok? Probably not, but that's OK… the utility of why they're doing it and how it's going to be used is different," McArdle said.

The new editing tools will make it easier to find exciting moments and turn them into clips. That matters for smaller creators who lack the budget to hire an editor or the energy to cut footage after hours of streaming. Vio and Marshall questioned whether AI would power these tools. Vio said Twitch's existing AI tools have been "ass so far."

Minton said his focus is the "torso and long tail of creators" — the mid-tier and niche streamers, not just the头部 channels. Better discoverability means more creators making money.

What about ad money?

For advertisers, the calculus is inventory. Allowing externally made clips, rather than only chopped-up stream footage, adds more surface area to the platform.

"It sounds like they're trying to capture more inventory as leverage from an advertising perspective," said Justin Miclat, chief growth officer at talent and brand management company Click Media.

Minton said increased audiences are what advertisers care about, and that Clips can support activations organized directly between brands and creators. But creators will not earn directly from short-form yet. Ads already run among clips, yet Twitch has no direct monetization for short-form content, Minton confirmed.

"Twitch is mostly live monetization, so the transition from the short form into live is where you're going to make your money," Minton said. "70 percent of it directly from your fans versus ad-supported. I do think over time we will find ways for ads in and around clips that'll make sense that won't diminish the user experience but will increase those earning opportunities for creators."

The bet rests on a simple behavioral contrast. "Live content isn't amazing for discovery… you hop into [a stream], you may not understand what's going on," Minton said. "Whereas short form is amazing… you get a snapshot of a great moment, and you can decide: 'Is this something I want to spend more time on?' Yes, it is. Follow. Boom. Next time you open up the app, that streamer's in the feed."