Methods to improve buffering and pre-buffering of short form videos

A system comprising:

• control circuitry configured to:
• identify a set of recommended content items to be presented on a client device associated with a user, each content item of the set of recommended content items comprising one or more segments;
• determine a first set of segments of the set of recommended content items, the first set of segments to be stored in a buffer of the client device;
• determine a second set of segments of the set of recommended content items;
• determine a subset of the second set of segments by, for each of one or more segments of the second set of segments:
• determining a quality level of the segment;
• determining, based on the quality level, a predicted retention rate for the segment, wherein the predicted retention rate corresponds to a likelihood that the client device will play the segment;
• and
• selecting the segment for the subset of the second set of segments based on a comparison of the predicted retention rate to a retention threshold;
• determine a modified set of segments based on the first set of segments and the subset of the second set of segments;
• and
• determine, for each segment of the modified set of segments, a priority level;
• and
• input/output circuitry configured to:
• prioritize a transmission of one or more segments of the modified set of segments to the client device based on the corresponding priority levels of the one or more segments of the modified set of segments.