A hook is the first one to three seconds of a short-form video: the line, image, or action that makes someone stop scrolling. TikTok's own ad guidance asks advertisers to "introduce your content proposition in the first 3 seconds" and to "prioritize your hook in the first 6 seconds" (TikTok Ads Manager).
How do you use the hook generator?
- Describe the product. Type the product, the audience, the problem, and the result they want.
- Read the hooks. Get two opening lines in each of 8 formats, filled in with your words.
- Get more. Press More hooks for a new set, then copy the ones you like.
- Test them. Film three to five hooks per concept and keep the one that holds viewers.
What are the 8 hook formats?
- Comment reply. Answers a real question, so it feels native and builds on curiosity that already exists.
- Secret reveal. Opens on something "nobody tells you", so viewers stay for the answer.
- Relatable opener. Starts with a feeling the viewer already has.
- Product reveal. Puts the product in hand and in frame from the first second.
- Listicle. Promises a short, countable payoff.
- Myth bust. Challenges advice the viewer has heard before.
- Before and after. Shows the change, then explains it.
- Story and cliffhanger. Opens a question the video answers at the end, the device behind microdramas.
See 30 real opening lines from brands' ads, grouped by these formats, in hook examples for TikTok and Reels ads.
How should you test hooks?
- Write three to five hooks per concept. Keep the rest of the video the same.
- Run each hook as its own ad. Compare how many viewers stay past the first seconds.
- Keep the winner and brief the next round from it. That loop is what we call UGCmaxxing.
These hooks come from templates, not AI. Edit them so they sound like your creator, and check that every claim is true for your product.
