Shares

Only the button counts. Someone copying the URL out of the address bar, screenshotting into a group chat, or sending through an app that strips tracking leaves no trace, so treat the count as a floor. YouTube breaks shares down by destination too, which is often the more useful view, since a video shared into private messaging behaves very differently from one shared onto a public feed. The dependable read is simple: a slice of your audience thought one specific person needed to see this.