Choosing a title for a YouTube Short in two languages

A good bilingual YouTube Shorts title leads with a short hook in the language most of your viewers use, adds the other language right after, and keeps the whole thing short enough to read at a glance. For Duma Meow, my Vietnamese cartoon comedy, every Short gets an SEO title written in both English and Vietnamese.

Here's how to approach it, with the trade-offs to think about.

Why write titles in two languages?

A bilingual title lets one video speak to two audiences. With a Vietnamese cartoon, that might be Vietnamese speakers who want to laugh at the dialogue and English speakers who are curious about the language or just like cat cartoons.

Each language does a different job:

• Vietnamese shows exactly what's said in the clip and signals to Vietnamese speakers that it's for them.
• English explains the joke or the topic for everyone else.

The constraints

YouTube titles can be up to 100 characters, but on Shorts, much less than that is visible in the feed, and it gets cut off on small screens. So the first few words matter most. Treat everything after the first part as a bonus.

There's also the viewer's attention: Shorts are swiped quickly. A title that takes effort to parse loses the moment.

Step 1: Decide which language leads

Lead with the language that does the most work for that specific clip:

• If the Vietnamese line is the joke, lead with it: "Ối giời ơi..." sets the tone instantly.
• If the format is the hook, like a well-known meme or trend, lead with the English name people recognize: "This is fine" or "starter pack."

There's no rule that one language always goes first. Choose per video.

Step 2: Keep the Vietnamese diacritics

Always write Vietnamese with full diacritics: Ham chơi!, not "Ham choi!". Without the marks, words can become ambiguous or change meaning, and it looks careless to Vietnamese readers.

Some viewers search without diacritics because it's faster to type. Instead of dropping the marks from the title, it's reasonable to include the unaccented spelling elsewhere, like the description, where it doesn't hurt readability.

Step 3: Translate the meaning, not the words

Literal translations often kill the joke. "Mày mới là đồ giả!" word-for-word is clunky; "YOU'RE the fake!" carries the punch. "Rồi thì, kiểu là, nói chung là..." becomes "So, like, basically..." because that's what it feels like in English.

If you're translating Vietnamese slang or exclamations, check meaning with a native speaker, because many have several uses.

Step 4: Use a clear separator

Separate the two languages so the eye can split them. A vertical bar, a dash or a slash works:

• Ham chơi! | Vietnamese cat voice test
• Mười điểm. – Ten points (cartoon cats)

Keep the separator consistent across your channel so viewers learn the pattern.

Step 5: Add one keyword, not five

Include a word people might actually search, like "Vietnamese," "cartoon" or "cat," but don't cram in a list. Titles stuffed with keywords look spammy and read badly in both languages.

A simple template

Here's a template that works for many Shorts:

• [Vietnamese line] | [English meaning or hook] + [one keyword]

For example, a clip built around the line "Hết giờ chơi." might become:

• Hết giờ chơi. | Playtime's over (Vietnamese cartoon cats)

Common mistakes

• Titles so long the key part gets cut off.
• Dropping diacritics in the Vietnamese.
• Literal translations that lose the joke.
• Switching formats from video to video.
• Clickbait that doesn't match the clip; viewers swipe away and don't come back.

Don't forget the rest

The title is one piece. The description, captions and the first second of the video matter too. A bilingual title works best when the clip itself delivers right away. For more on how a Short comes together, see how a 15-second cartoon Short gets made. If you're curious about the line in the first example, read what ham chơi means or watch the ham chơi voice test.

Write three title options for your next Short, read each one aloud in under three seconds, and keep the one that still makes sense if only the first five words show.