How to Write Hooks for Shorts: 28 Formulas That Stop the Scroll

Nothing else in your video matters if the first three seconds fail. On Shorts, Reels and TikTok, the platform measures how many people swipe away almost immediately — and that swipe-away rate, more than watch time, decides whether your video gets shown to the next thousand people. A brilliant video with a weak hook dies at 200 views. A mediocre video with a great hook can run to a million.

So the hook isn't the intro. The hook is the strategy. Here's how to write one every time.

The one rule underneath all 28 formulas

Every working hook opens a loop the brain wants closed. It creates a small, specific tension — a question, a contradiction, a stake — that only watching resolves. Weak hooks describe. Strong hooks provoke. "Today I'll talk about saving money" describes. "You're losing $340 a year to one setting on your phone" provokes.

28 hook formulas (steal these)

Curiosity & knowledge gaps

1. The overlooked fact: "99% of people use [thing] wrong."
2. The hidden cost: "This free app is quietly charging you."
3. The secret reason: "The real reason [X] happens isn't what you think."
4. The forbidden knowledge: "They don't want you to know this about [X]."
5. The number tease: "There are 3 types of [X]. Most people are #2."
6. The countdown: "5 [things] you'll wish you knew sooner. #1 first."

Contradiction & pattern-break

7. The reversal: "Everything you've been told about [X] is backwards."
8. The unexpected winner: "The best [X] isn't [obvious pick] — it's this."
9. The confession: "I was doing [X] wrong for years."
10. The myth-kill: "[Popular belief] is a myth. Here's the proof."
11. The paradox: "Spending more money here actually saves you money."
12. The taboo: "Nobody talks about this, so I will."

Stakes & self-interest

13. The direct threat: "If you do this, stop immediately."
14. The loss frame: "You're losing [specific thing] right now."
15. The deadline: "You have until [event] to fix this."
16. The 'you' callout: "If you're [specific person], this is for you."
17. The before/after: "This took me from [bad state] to [good state]."
18. The shortcut: "The fastest way to [result], no [common obstacle]."

Story & tension

19. In medias res: "So I just found out that..."
20. The cliffhanger stat: "This number will make you angry."
21. The unfinished sentence: "The moment I saw the bill, I..."
22. The named enemy: "[Company/thing] is lying to you about [X]."
23. The impossible claim: "This costs $0 and beats the $500 version."
24. The time machine: "If I started [X] again, I'd do only this."

Visual & format hooks

25. The on-screen question as caption while the voice does something else.
26. The 'watch till the end' promise — but only if you actually pay it off.
27. The rapid list — 5 cuts in 5 seconds signals density and value.
28. The zoom-in reveal — start tight on the surprising detail, pull back to explain.

The 4 mistakes that kill hooks

• Warming up. "Hey guys, welcome back" is three wasted seconds. Start mid-action.
• Being vague. "Some money tips" loses to "$340 a year." Specific numbers out-pull round claims.
• Burying the hook under a logo animation or intro sting. The hook must be frame one.
• Writing a promise you don't keep. Clickbait that doesn't pay off tanks your average-view-duration, which the algorithm punishes harder than a weak hook.

How to apply this at scale

You don't need 28 hooks per video — you need one great one, chosen fast. The operator move is to keep this list open, generate three hook variants for each topic, read them aloud, and ship the one with the strongest pull. If you're producing daily (see the faceless channel playbook), a hook that reliably survives the 3-second test is worth more than any editing trick.

MASKED//ENGINE writes a hook-first script for every video automatically — the first line is engineered to open a loop, because that's the line that decides the view.