Metacafe

Review summary

Good points

Bad points

Our verdict

The videos here at Metacafe have a strong emphasis on entertainment, and if you are looking for a laugh or to check out the latest movie or celebrity news, then this is the video sharing site for you. You won’t find the variety of different styles of video on offer – no news, documentaries, or art house videos for example – but what the site does offer, it offers well with an easy-to-use interface and a large amount of videos on display.

Full review

Metacafe is one of the most popular video sharing sites on the Internet with, according to them, more than 40 million unique viewers every month. Will you find what you are looking for on this video sharing website? We’ve looked into Metacafe to see what the site has to offer.

Sign up

Register as a Metacafe member to submit and rate videos, add comments and join discussions. Registering is simple with an email address and name. You'll need to have an account on Metacafe to rate videos and write comments but you can view the content without signing up.

Viewing features

Videos on Metacafe must be less than 100 Megabytes, but there is no limit on the length. Metacafe focuses on the shorter clips so you are much more likely to see 90- to 180-second clips than longer movie segments or videos. You will not find full-length television episodes or movies, or episodes chopped up into smaller parts. The average video last just over 90 seconds. As Metacafe has far more original content than most other video sharing websites, it makes browsing much more fun. You’re unlikely to find duplicate videos like you do on YouTube, especially when each one varies in quality. We've noticed that the home page is updated with the highest ranking videos far more frequently than many other video sharing websites. The viewing quality of videos on the site is generally good and clear.

Metacafe focuses on the entertainment break video – funny, inspiring, and entertaining short videos. You’re less likely to come across a video of a sneezing dog that someone uploaded from their camera phone but more likely to find short videos from a range of entertainment providers. The big channels and the sports providers have their own channels and the site is full of TV clips, trailers and music videos.

Search by what’s popular now, the highest rated videos, the most viewed and the rising stars of the video sharing community. The rating system is driven by the audience, and the videos are generated, selected and reviewed by the community.

Producer features

Not every video is automatically included on Metacafe if you upload it. Metacafe focuses on a certain type of video and there is a community review panel in place made up of over 80,000 volunteers that take a first look at all the videos that are submitted each day.

Safety

There’s a family filter which allows you to turn off or on the capacity to search for videos of an adult nature. All adult videos are listed in the Adult category, so searching elsewhere won’t turn up any unexpected results, although they may still be visible in the “most popular” lists on the homepage. You must be over the age of 13 to use the website, upload videos and make comments. For anyone that encounters abuse or misuse of the comments system on Metacafe, there’s an email address to write to. A set of house rules means disputes can be clarified and resolved by the Metacafe team.

Features

You can create your own channel on Metacafe where you post all your own uploaded videos and link to videos you like. Viewers can subscribe to the channel to receive a notification of new content when it’s provided. You can also send messages to the host of the channel, make comments and learn more about the user by reading their profile.

Ease of use

It’s easy to view the videos on the Metacafe site, just find the one you want then press play. Once you’ve finished watching there are a number of other suggestions for further viewing. There’s a toolbar at the bottom of the screen which you can use to skip to the next video in the sequence.

Help & support

The FAQs section on the Metacafe site is limited but you can search through it to find answers to commonly asked questions. There is a feedback form that you can fill in and send to the Metacafe group if you have technical problems, questions or feedback. You don't need to be a member and we like that fact it doesn't keep referring us back to the FAQs.

Overall

Metacafe is an entertaining look at a world of videos with a large amount of content from amateur and professional providers alike.

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