A New Free Tool for Creators: Preview Your Vertical Content

Check Your Vertical Content (My New Free Tool)

Over the past few months, we’ve covered the explosive growth of vertical content everywhere. YouTube Shorts hitting 200 billion daily views. Twitch rolling out dual-format streaming. Every platform pushing creators toward that 9:16 aspect ratio like their lives depend on it.

Here’s the problem that’s driving creators crazy: each platform’s interface covers different parts of your content in ways you can’t predict until after you post.

You spend time perfecting your vertical video, making sure everything is positioned just right, only to discover that:

• TikTok’s interface covers your epic reaction to clutching a 1v3.
• Instagram’s profile bubble blocks those captions you spent hours customizing.
• YouTube Shorts’ description overlay hides crucial game elements like your health bar or ammo count.

I ran into this exact issue while scripting my upcoming video about vertical content. After looking around for a simple solution that would let creators preview exactly how their content appears on each platform, I decided to build one myself.

And since you’re part of the Stream Report community, you get to try it first.

Introducing Safe Zone Checker

Safe Zone Checker is a completely free tool that lets you preview any vertical video or image with accurate platform overlays from TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts. You can see exactly how your content will appear to viewers, complete with profile pictures, like buttons, descriptions, and all the UI elements that typically cover your carefully crafted content.

Here’s how it works:

• Simple Upload Process: Drag and drop any video file (or browse to select one) and it starts playing immediately. The tool supports any video or image format your browser can handle.
• Platform Previews: Toggle between TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts overlays to see how each platform’s UI affects your content.
• Local Processing: Everything happens on your device—no uploads to servers, no privacy concerns, no file size limits.
• Bonus Downloads: You can also download the overlay images separately if you want to use them in OBS for live streaming or in your editing software for precise positioning.
• Staying Current: As platforms update their interfaces (which they do constantly), I’ll do my best to keep both the tool and overlay downloads updated to match the current designs.
• Desktop or Mobile: The tool works on both desktop and mobile.

I’ve been testing Safe Zone Checker for a couple of weeks now, and it’s already saved me from several content placement mistakes. It’s particularly useful for gaming content creators who need to ensure important gameplay moments, UI elements, or reactions aren’t hidden by platform interfaces.

You can try Safe Zone Checker here.

This is essentially a soft launch to Stream Report readers before I make any videos about it, so if you run into any bugs or have feedback, just reply to this email. Your input will help make it better before it sees wider traffic, and you’re getting access to something that could genuinely make your vertical content strategy more effective.

Pete’s Content Corner

Delve into my weekly selection of content creation highlights—handpicked videos, podcasts, and tweets that promise to captivate, educate, and entertain.

1. YouTube’s new PushAPI for live content is being privately tested, promising near real-time chat data for third-party services like Streamer.bot. I’m optimistic this could lead to a more Twitch-like chat experience for YouTube in the future.
2. Twitch is rolling out SubFeeds for the Clips Feed, letting users explore more tailored clip content by choosing categories at the top of the feed. It’s a small but smart discoverability improvement that should help your clips reach more relevant audiences.
3. YouTube is testing the ability to A/B test video titles alongside thumbnails in their “Test & compare” feature. Currently rolling out to a small percentage of creators, this expansion makes sense given how much titles impact click-through rates.

I’ll be honest—building tools isn’t usually my thing, but once I get an idea in my head, I love the challenge of turning it into something genuinely useful. If Safe Zone Checker helps even a few of you avoid the frustration of discovering UI placement issues after you’ve already posted, it was worth building. And since you’re the first to try it, your feedback could shape how useful this becomes for the broader creator community.

Thanks, as always, for taking the time to read Stream Report.

Pete ✌️