Top website hosting service Squarespace has announced a range of new video tools that it thinks will greatly please creators.

Although embedding video, such as from YouTube, has always been possible on Squarespace, the new additions are focused on hosting and monetizing that video content, such as its relatively new Member Areas service.

Broadly, the new tools let website owners sell access to video content, host video content directly, and upload up to 30 minutes of high-res content. There are also new tagging and merchandising tools.

Squarespace video hosting

The company has also rebuilt its video player from scratch to accommodate the new features, which includes playback, speed, and resolution controls alongside deep integration with the Squarespace platform.

"We launched Member Areas in 2020 to provide creators with a new way to sell content through memberships," said Squarespace. "Since then, we’ve seen an increase in video content being utilised, and to help customers better leverage this medium, our latest releases offer a seamless way to monetise video content such as classes."

Hosting video, and offering extensive tools to manage it, puts Squarespace more directly in competition with the likes of Patreon and YouTube, both of which offer options to monetise content. OnlyFans is also now a direct rival, although it remains unclear what Squarespace's content moderation policy says about adult content.

In recent days, Substack, the newsletter platform, has also added the ability to host video for creators in beta, a feature that will be well-received by those with many subscribers already paying for their services.

Via Engadget