For many years, content creators around the world have made YouTube video thumbnails with the same formula: a picture of themselves looking shocked with their mouth agape in front of whatever is happening in the background of the image.
It was a popular pose for small creators and massive stars alike, but one of the biggest content creators in the world might have broken the code for a new thumbnail meta.
Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson posted some screenshots of some recent analytics from a new YouTube video, showing that he is getting better viewership and watch time on videos with a thumbnail where he closes his mouth. This pose is a classic trademark of his channel, but now, he might be transitioning into a new phase with more smiles rather than shock.
These supposed numbers stem from YouTube’s new Test and Compare feature for thumbnails, which allows creators to test up to three thumbnails for their videos to see which one performs better among their respective viewer base.
The system shows different thumbnails to viewers at first, and whichever image garners better viewership over a specific amount of time will eventually be activated for all viewers. Among all of the tests that MrBeast did, the thumbnail with him simply smiling with his mouth closed performed better than any of the shocked face pictures.
MrBeast also agreed with a user on Twitter, stating that the shocked face meta was officially over for his channel. “Now that I can actually A/B test thumbnails I don’t have to guess, and I just test and see what people want,” He said. “My mouth would have closed years ago if I had this tool.”
With one of the biggest creators straying away from the shocked face formula, we can expect many other content creators to follow suit and close their mouths on their thumbnails for the foreseeable future.
