Video, be it onsite or distributed, has changed how publishers develop content — and vertical video products have revolutionized the way audiences consume that content. With nearly 2 billion content views a month (a 400% increase over the past 12 months) Mashable videos garner the largest portion of the brand's overall audience. Building on that big growth and inspired by incontrovertible data that makes it clear that the future of watchability is mobile, Mashable launched a premium product for vertical, chapterized viewing of video: Mashable Reels, which are produced specifically for the company's mobile site and feature entertainment, culture, and tech programming.
Reels are a dynamic editorial experience, blazing new frontiers of storytelling via original text, video, and animation exclusive to the vertical-view format. In presenting audiences with these fully immersive narratives, Reels represents the perfect marriage of words and images for the digital age. Written by Mashable's editorial staff, with imagery by artists and illustrators on our Studios team, Reels are a vertical video product that embraces mobile-first storytelling without compromising the desktop experience.
Reels were created with user convenience in mind: Clicking into a Reel doesn't launch a new app, take readers offsite, or require a plugin. It's a cutting-edge, premium, immersive in-browser experience. To view a Mashable Reel on any device, simply tap a link to a Reel. The Reel will automatically play, but users can also control their experience. On mobile browsers, swipe up to begin the Reel, then, tap right to move forward through each frame, or left to backtrack. On desktop browsers, the Reel appears as a carousel allowing readers to click individual frames to navigate through a story.
We've selected three of our favorite Reels that do well to illustrate their quality, creative diversity, and innovative storytelling. Our Move to Mars is an examination of the real-life science that will steer humanity toward colonizing the red planet, and it demonstrates Reels' capacity for delving into complicated topics. Reels also allow for our Studios team to stretch their artistic wings—The Strange Video Game Systems Time Forgot is stylized as a throwback catalogue guaranteed to tug at some old-school gamers' and 80s babies' heartstrings (and provoke curiosity in the uninitiated, too). Finally, for a truly multimedia experience, Welcome Aboard, Pilot: A History of Mecha features original illustrations, animations, and 3D motion graphics that guide readers through a fascinating pop culture niche.
Our top Reels had reached close to a million people a few days after the launch of the format.
