How to Add a Google Business Profile Video for Your Hotel

A Google Business Profile video is a short clip on your hotel's Google Search and Maps listing, right next to your rating, photos, and hours, exactly where travelers check before they ever open an OTA or your own site. Google's specs: up to 30 seconds, up to 75 MB, 720p resolution or higher, uploaded through the Business Profile app. Review typically takes 24 to 48 hours before it goes live. It matters because for most searches, your Google Business Profile video is the first moving image a guest sees of your hotel.

Google Business Profile Video Requirements

Here's what Google requires for videos on a Business Profile, per Google's published video guidance. Missing any one of these is the most common reason an upload gets rejected before it even reaches review:

These limits force a choice most hoteliers don't have to make with photos: pick one thing to show, not everything. A 30-second cap and a 75 MB ceiling mean you can't upload a highlight reel of every room type, the spa, the restaurant, and the view in one file, at least not without the quality dropping enough that Google's 720p floor gets tight. If you're also formatting clips for OTAs, keep in mind the specs aren't universal: Expedia listing videos are vertical only and Booking.com doesn't accept gallery video at all. Our guide to adding video to Booking.com and Expedia listings walks through each platform's rules so you can shoot once and export correctly for all of them.

Once approved, the video doesn't just sit in a gallery tab. It can surface in your Knowledge Panel on Search, inside the Maps app when someone taps into your listing, and in local search results for searches like hotels near a landmark. That's a lot of exposure for one 30-second file, seen by anyone comparing your hotel against other listings on the same map view, which is exactly why getting the specs right the first time is worth the extra five minutes it takes to double check a file's length and size before uploading.

How to Upload a Video to Your Google Business Profile

Uploading takes a few minutes once you have a finished clip that already meets the specs above. Here's the process, start to finish:

1. Open the Business Profile app, or search your hotel's name on Google and click Edit profile, then sign in with the account that manages your hotel's listing.
2. Tap Edit profile, then Photos. Google groups video together with photos rather than treating it as its own separate section.
3. Choose the Videos tab inside the upload flow and select your clip from your phone or computer.
4. Confirm the file meets spec (30 seconds, 75 MB, 720p) before you upload; Google doesn't always tell you which limit an upload failed on.
5. Submit and wait for review, usually 24 to 48 hours, then search your hotel's name on Google and check the Maps listing to confirm the video is showing publicly.

One thing hoteliers miss: only the account that manages the Business Profile can upload. If your marketing agency, your GM, and your front desk manager have all tried logging in with different Google accounts over the years, sort out who actually holds ownership access before you troubleshoot anything else. A rejected or stalled upload is more often an access problem than a video problem.

What to Show in 30 Seconds

Thirty seconds isn't enough time for a tour, so don't try to film one. Pick one space and one feeling: the pool at golden hour, the lobby as someone walks in, a room with the curtains open to the view. A Google Business Profile video doesn't need narration or text overlays to work; movement and light do the job. Keep the pace unhurried. A clip that cuts every second feels more like an ad than a place you'd actually want to stay, and travelers who watch video before booking say what builds trust most is transparency and authenticity, not polish.

• A slow glide through the lobby as morning light comes through the windows.
• Steam rising off the pool or hot tub at dawn or dusk, when it reads best on camera.
• A room reveal, curtains opening to show the view, bed made, nothing staged beyond that.
• A signature detail, the rooftop bar, the beach path, the breakfast spread, whatever genuinely sets your property apart from the hotels next to it on the map.

Both of those were built the same way: existing property photos turned into a single moving clip, no reshoot required. If you don't have raw footage lined up, a 30-second clip built from the photos your hotel already has is often the fastest way to get something live this week. The same file that goes on your Business Profile works on Instagram and your own booking page too; see our playbook for using video to lift direct bookings for how to put one clip to work in more than one place.

Photos vs. Videos on Your Google Business Profile

Adding video to your Google Business Profile doesn't mean deprioritizing photos, and you shouldn't choose one over the other. Photos still do the heavy lifting: they're what most browsers see first, they load faster, and Google lets you upload far more of them than the single video slot. But video is what makes a listing stop a scroll. Expedia Group's 2025 Science of Wanderlust study of 7,000 travelers found video influences booking decisions almost three times more than static photos: 71% of travelers said video influenced their choice, compared with 24% for photos alone. That gap holds even for short clips: the same research found short-form video still moves decisions positively for about half of travelers surveyed. On a Google Business Profile specifically, where most hotels only have photos, one good video is often the single piece of content that separates your listing from nearly identical competitors on the same map view.

If Your Google Business Profile Video Isn't Showing

Uploads that don't go live usually fail for one of a few predictable reasons. Work through these before assuming Google lost the file:

• It's still in review. Give it the full 24 to 48 hours before troubleshooting further; reviews can occasionally run longer during high-volume periods.
• It missed a spec. Even a few seconds over 30, a file just past 75 MB, or resolution under 720p can cause a silent rejection with no error message.
• It reads as promotional. Google's guidelines are meant for genuine representations of the business; text overlays with prices, phone numbers, or Book Now graphics are more likely to get flagged than a plain shot of the property.
• The wrong account uploaded it. If someone without verified manager access on the listing added the video, it may sit unpublished until an owner or manager approves it.
• It was removed after the fact. Videos that were live can be taken down later if a viewer reports it or Google's review flags it on a rescan; re-uploading the exact same file rarely fixes this, a different clip or a fresh export is more likely to get approved.

If none of these explain it, the Business Profile help center has a direct support option for verified owners. It's slower than getting a video right the first time, but it does resolve most edge cases eventually. In the meantime, a fresh, correctly spec'd upload almost always beats waiting on a support ticket.