YouTube is testing AI-generated music remixes for Shorts

Just a heads up, if you buy something through our links, we may get a small share of the sale. It’s one of the ways we keep the lights on here. Click here for more.

YouTube recently launched an AI-powered feature that enables select users to “restyle” licensed music tracks for use in Shorts. 

This feature, part of the “Dream Tracks” experiment introduced in November, allows eligible users to select from a curated list of licensed tracks and customize their background music by entering a prompt. 

This customization might involve changing the genre or mood of the track—such as turning a pop song into a rock version — while keeping the original lyrics and vocals intact.

Each restyled track credits the original artist and indicates to viewers that the track was modified with AI.

A limited number of creators with access can enter a prompt to change various aspects of a song, such as its mood or genre, and the expansion of YouTube’s Dream Track AI feature will generate a modified 30-second soundtrack.

The “Dream Tracks” feature also includes an AI-generated voiceover option. Users can select voices from well-known artists like Charlie Puth, Charli XCX, Demi Lovato, and T-Pain to add distinctive narration to their content. 

This AI-powered customization aims to enhance the creative possibilities for Shorts, giving users more ways to personalize their videos and potentially increasing viewer engagement.

While currently limited to a small group of testers, YouTube’s restyling tool could become a powerful asset as it competes with other short-form platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels.

As highlighted by The Verge, YouTube says:

If you’re a creator in the experiment group, you can select an eligible song > describe how you want to restyle it > then generate a unique 30-second soundtrack to use in your Short.

These restyled soundtracks will have clear attribution to the original song through the Short itself and the Shorts audio pivot page, and will also clearly indicate that the track was restyled with AI.

Although there is no confirmed timeline for a full rollout, many hope that music restyling will be available to all Shorts creators in the future.

Got any thoughts on this new YouTube Shorts feature? Are you going to be using it? Tell us what you think in the comments below, or reach out to us via our Twitter or Facebook.