Finance YouTube pays up to 50× more per 1,000 views than gaming YouTube. That mathematical reality should drive how much you invest in equipment, what you prioritise, and when upgrades become obvious financial decisions rather than speculative purchases. Yet most creators use the same gear-buying mental model regardless of niche — overspending in low-CPM categories and under-investing where the returns genuinely justify premium kit.
This guide breaks down YouTube CPMs by niche and maps them to sensible equipment spending priorities. For the broader creator equipment context, see my Ultimate Creator Equipment Guide 2026.
The UK CPM Reality (2026)
CPM (cost per mille — cost per 1,000 ad impressions) varies enormously by niche. UK-focused 2026 ranges based on my audits across 500+ channels:
Niche
Typical CPM Range
Revenue per 100k views
Finance / investing / personal finance
£20–£50
£2,000–£5,000
B2B software / SaaS reviews
£15–£35
£1,500–£3,500
Business / entrepreneurship
£12–£25
£1,200–£2,500
Tech reviews (consumer)
£8–£18
£800–£1,800
Education / how-to / tutorials
£5–£12
£500–£1,200
Beauty / fashion / lifestyle
£6–£14
£600–£1,400
Health / fitness / wellness
£5–£11
£500–£1,100
Food / cooking
£3–£8
£300–£800
Travel vlogs
£3–£7
£300–£700
Entertainment / comedy
£2–£5
£200–£500
Gaming
£1–£4
£100–£400
Music / reactions
£1–£3
£100–£300
Important caveats: These are AdSense CPMs only. Affiliate revenue, course sales, sponsorships and merchandise can multiply creator income 3–10× on top of these baselines in most niches. But the AdSense CPM is what you can rely on from raw view volume alone, and it’s the right starting point for equipment budgeting.
Why CPM Should Drive Equipment Decisions
The break-even math is different in every niche. An SM7B microphone costs £400. In finance YouTube at £30 CPM, that’s earned back after 13,000 additional views (plausible within a single video). In gaming at £2 CPM, it’s 200,000 additional views — more than many gaming videos will ever get.
This means:
High-CPM niches can afford broadcast-grade gear early because individual videos can pay for kit upgrades
Low-CPM niches need to prove audience first because the break-even is distant
Kit spending should scale with expected video revenue, not total channel revenue — a £5,000 kit that will show up in 200+ videos over its lifespan needs only a small CPM benefit to justify itself
Equipment Priorities by CPM Tier
Tier 1: High-CPM (£15+ per 1,000 views)
Finance, B2B software reviews, business/entrepreneurship, commercial real estate, insurance.
Equipment priority: Authority-signalling kit. Broadcast-grade audio (Shure SM7B), full-frame camera (Sony A7C II), professional three-point lighting, intentional set design.
Justifiable investment: £5,000–£15,000 equipment budget for channels with 50k+ subscribers. Viewers scrutinise production quality; amateur-looking creators lose credibility permanently.
Key spend: audio. In these niches, audio carries 40% of perceived authority. A £400 SM7B routinely delivers 15–25% retention improvements in the first 30 seconds — at £30+ CPM, that’s thousands of pounds of recovered revenue per video.
What to skip: RGB/creative lighting, gimbals for seated work, cinema cameras before 500k subscribers.
Tech reviews, education, career/job advice, real estate investing, marketing/agency.
Equipment priority: Production polish with multi-camera setups. Consumer audiences here care about visual competence without needing broadcast-grade gear.
Justifiable investment: £3,000–£7,000 for established channels.
Key spend: multi-angle setup + macro capability. Tech reviews need product detail shots; educational content needs demonstration angles. Second camera body and macro lens often deliver more impact than upgrading the main body.
What to skip: Cinema cameras, motorised sliders, shotgun mics unless doing documentary-style work.
Beauty, fashion, lifestyle, health/fitness, DIY, home improvement.
Equipment priority: Lighting above everything else. Beauty especially needs colour-accurate, flattering lighting that a great camera alone cannot deliver.
Justifiable investment: £1,500–£4,000 for established channels.
Key spend: lighting kit. In beauty specifically, 40–50% of equipment budget should go to lighting (not the usual 25%). Softboxes, bi-colour panels, accent lighting for colour work — this is where visible production quality comes from.
What to skip: Full-frame cameras (APS-C is plenty), broadcast-grade audio (wireless lavalier is enough), gimbals for seated content.
Food/cooking, travel vlogs, parenting, hobbies/crafts, general how-to.
Equipment priority: Portability and reliability. Complicated kits don’t get used; simple kits get used consistently.
Justifiable investment: £1,000–£3,000 for established channels.
Key spend: wireless lavalier + capable compact camera. For travel, a Sony ZV-E10 + Rode Wireless Me + drone is the practical tier. See my travel vlog equipment guide.
What to skip: Large lighting kits (you’ll use natural light), multiple camera bodies, studio set design.
Equipment priority: PC performance (for gaming) over creator equipment. Volume + personality + clip-ability drive growth; gear only needs to be “good enough to not hurt retention.”
Justifiable investment: £500–£1,500 in creator-specific kit. Your gaming PC budget is separate and can legitimately be £1,500–£3,500, but that’s functional kit, not production kit.
Key spend: clean audio + decent webcam. USB mic + Elgato Facecam + one or two Key Light Airs covers 95% of what these niches need.
What to skip: DSLR-as-webcam setups, broadcast mics, three-point lighting, cinema cameras. Every upgrade to expensive gear in these niches is harder to justify because viewer CPM is low.
This means a niche’s “real CPM-equivalent” can be 2–10× its AdSense CPM. Finance especially punches far above its already-high AdSense CPM — the affiliate opportunities are exceptional.
CPM-Calibrated Audio Investment
Since audio is the single biggest production upgrade, here’s the specific calibration by CPM tier:
£20+ CPM: Shure SM7B + Cloudlifter + Focusrite setup (£720+) — mandatory at this tier
£5–£10 CPM: Rode Wireless Go II (£269) or MV7+ — audiences tolerate less but quality still matters
£2–£5 CPM: HyperX QuadCast S (£130) or Rode Wireless Me (£145) — “good enough” tier
£1–£2 CPM: FIFINE K669B (£45) or similar — audiences don’t scrutinise audio
Spending finance-tier audio budget on gaming content is over-investment. Spending gaming-tier audio on finance content is under-investment. Match the kit to the CPM.
CPM-Calibrated Camera Investment
Similar calibration by CPM tier:
£20+ CPM: Sony A7C II (£2,099) or FX30 (£1,899) — full-frame or cinema-grade
£10–£20 CPM: Sony A7C II or A6700 (£1,300) — capable pro-grade body
£5–£10 CPM: Sony ZV-E10 (£700) — starter mirrorless, plenty
£2–£5 CPM: Logitech MX Brio (£210) or phone-first shooting
£1–£2 CPM: Elgato Facecam (£170) or existing webcam
The Niche-Switching Consideration
If your channel is drifting between niches or planning to pivot, equipment decisions get complicated. General principles:
Buy for your target niche, not current niche. If you’re pivoting from gaming to finance content, the SM7B makes sense immediately — don’t wait for finance-level revenue to justify it.
Versatile kit survives niche changes better than specialised kit. A Sony A7C II + 35mm f/1.8 + Shure MV7+ works in every niche; a cinema camera + shotgun mic + broadcast-tier set design is harder to repurpose.
CPM arbitrage is real. If you’re bored of gaming content at £2 CPM, a genuine pivot to tech reviews at £12 CPM is worth gear investment even before the pivot proves out.
The UK-Specific CPM Nuances
Some considerations specific to UK creator markets:
US audience targeting: UK creators who deliberately target US audiences (finance, tech, some business niches) often see US-level CPMs (£30–£60 in finance). Accent matters less than content focus; US-themed content with US-oriented keywords does lift CPM significantly.
UK-only audiences cap out lower: Niches like UK-specific finance (HMRC, UK tax, UK pensions) have smaller audience sizes but can have very high per-viewer value through local sponsorship deals.
Brexit has slightly compressed EU CPMs for UK channels — worth factoring if you’re positioning for European markets specifically.
When to Ignore CPM-Based Budgeting
Some legitimate scenarios for overspending relative to CPM:
You’re using YouTube as a top-of-funnel for higher-margin business. Course creators, consultants, agency owners — your per-view value is much higher than AdSense CPM suggests. Budget accordingly.
You’re deliberately building a premium brand. If positioning as the premium creator in your niche is part of your strategy, production polish is a strategic investment, not just a gear decision.
Audio accessibility is essential to your content. Long-form podcasters, course creators, audiobook-adjacent creators need great audio regardless of CPM tier.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are UK CPMs really lower than US CPMs?
Typically yes, by about 30–50% for most niches. This is why UK creators targeting US audiences often see significant CPM lifts. Positioning content for US viewers (thumbnail/title language, reference points, currency mentions) can meaningfully change channel economics.
Should I pick my niche based on CPM?
Only partially. CPM matters, but so does your genuine expertise, interest, and audience size potential. Finance has great CPMs but is extremely competitive; gaming has low CPMs but massive audience volume. The best niche is where your expertise + passion + market opportunity intersect — CPM is a factor, not the deciding factor.
Can I change niche just for higher CPM?
You can, but content quality in a niche you don’t understand drops faster than CPM rises. Most successful niche pivots happen when creators develop genuine expertise in the new niche before pivoting. Faking finance knowledge to chase high CPMs is visible and credibility-damaging.
Does CPM change within a niche?
Significantly. Within gaming, for example, “retro/indie gaming” CPMs are often higher than “popular AAA gaming” because the audiences skew older and more affluent. Within finance, “UK personal finance” often out-CPMs generic “investing advice” because of higher commercial intent. Niche-within-niche specialisation matters.
What affects CPM most within a niche?
Audience demographics (age, income, location), video topic (commercial intent), season (Q4 always pays more), ad inventory (long videos with multiple mid-roll ads), and viewer engagement (retention length). You can influence some of these; others are locked by niche choice.
Should affiliate revenue change my gear budget?
Yes, significantly. If your “real” per-view revenue is £50 per 1,000 views (AdSense + affiliate combined), budget as if you’re in a £50 CPM niche. Finance creators with strong affiliate deals routinely see £50–£100 effective CPM equivalents, which justifies substantially more equipment investment.
Is it worth investing in multi-language content for CPM reasons?
Generally no, unless you’re specifically targeting high-CPM markets (US, UK, Canada, Australia). Dubbing English content to German or French adds cost but rarely matches the CPM of focused English-language content. Focus on audience depth in high-CPM languages first.
What to Do Next
Identify your niche’s CPM tier from the table above
CPM isn’t just a vanity metric — it’s the single clearest signal of how much your content monetises, which should directly determine how much equipment investment makes sense. Finance creators who spend gaming-level equipment budgets are leaving money on the table. Gaming creators who spend finance-level equipment budgets are burning cash that won’t come back. Match your kit to your niche’s economics, and every upgrade becomes a justifiable investment rather than speculative spending.
Yes, YouTubers can still get paid for old videos for months or even years after uploading them.
That is the short answer. The useful answer is understanding why old videos keep earning, when they stop, which revenue streams last the longest, and what separates a dead upload from an evergreen asset that keeps paying over time.
This guide breaks that down properly, including ad revenue, YouTube Premium, memberships, affiliate links, evergreen search traffic, and the biggest reasons old videos stop making money.
Why trust this guide?
I am not writing this as an outsider. I am a YouTube Certified Expert. I have coached 500+ clients, built and grown multiple channels, earned six YouTube Silver Play Buttons, built a personal audience of 100k+, and spent years working across YouTube strategy, SEO, retention, metadata, channel systems, and monetisation.
This matters because old-video monetisation is one of the most misunderstood parts of YouTube. Many creators act like a video only matters in the first 48 hours. In reality, some videos die fast, while others quietly become long-term assets.
If you want help applying any of this to your own channel, you can book a discovery call.
Quick answer: do YouTubers still get paid for old videos?
Yes. If an old video still gets views and remains monetised, it can keep earning money through ads, YouTube Premium, and other revenue streams long after it was first published.
A video does not stop earning just because it is old. It stops earning when the traffic, monetisation, or relevance dries up.
YouTube’s own revenue analytics documentation explains that creators can earn from ads, YouTube Premium revenue, channel memberships, Super Chat, and Super Stickers as part of their wider revenue picture. That is important because it shows older videos can continue earning as long as they still attract views and remain eligible for those monetisation systems.
Why old videos still earn
YouTube does not pay by upload date. It pays by ongoing audience activity and monetisation opportunity.
If an older video still gets watched, still qualifies for ads, or still contributes to other revenue sources, then it can still keep earning.
Reason old videos still earn
Why it matters
The video still gets views
No views means no monetisation opportunity
The video still has ads turned on and remains advertiser-friendly
Ads can continue serving on old content
YouTube Premium members still watch it
Premium watch time can still generate revenue share
The video still drives affiliate clicks, memberships, or leads
Old videos can keep generating off-platform value
The topic remains relevant in search or suggested traffic
Evergreen demand keeps the video alive
💡 A quick worked example. Say a tutorial you posted two years ago still pulls 8,000 views a month in a niche with a $6 RPM. That’s roughly $48 a month — about $576 a year — from one old video you’re no longer touching. Stack twenty evergreen videos like that and your back catalogue quietly earns while you sleep. That compounding is the whole point of building a library, not just chasing the next upload. For the full picture of how creators get paid, see do you get paid for YouTube, and to breathe new life into your archive, monetise old YouTube videos with Gyre.
This is why some YouTube channels make money from uploads that are years old. The platform keeps surfacing useful content when viewers still want it.
How old videos make money
Ads are the obvious answer, but they are not the only answer.
Old videos can still earn through:
ad revenue
YouTube Premium revenue
channel memberships
Super Thanks on supported content
affiliate links in descriptions or comments
product sales, services, or coaching enquiries
sponsorship-driven long-tail views in some cases
YouTube’s ad revenue guidance explains that RPM includes multiple revenue sources beyond ads alone, including YouTube Premium revenue, channel memberships, Super Chat, and Super Stickers. That is one reason old videos can stay valuable even when ad performance alone is not spectacular.
They tend to stop or slow down when one or more of these things happen:
the topic becomes outdated or irrelevant
search demand disappears
the video loses recommendation momentum
ads are turned off or the video becomes ineligible for monetisation
links, products, or offers in the video become outdated
the content gets buried by better, newer competitors
Important: old videos can keep paying for years, but that does not mean every old upload becomes passive income. Most videos decline. Some stay useful. A few become real evergreen assets.
Evergreen videos vs dead uploads
This is where the difference really shows.
Video type
What usually happens over time
Evergreen tutorial
Can earn steadily for months or years if the topic stays relevant
Search-led how-to
Can keep attracting long-tail views and monetisation
Time-sensitive news
Usually spikes fast, then dies off quickly
Trend reaction or drama
Often short shelf life unless it becomes reference content
Product review with lasting buyer intent
Can keep earning if the product remains relevant and linked offers still convert
This is one reason YouTube can feel wildly inconsistent. Some videos are fireworks. Others are rental properties.
Best types of old videos for long-term income
If your goal is to make money from old videos, you want more evergreen content in the mix.
The strongest long-tail performers often include:
tutorials
how-to guides
software walkthroughs
product reviews with sustained search demand
educational explainers
problem-solving videos
FAQ-style content
This is why search-friendly and problem-solving content can be so powerful. It keeps meeting viewer intent long after the upload date has been forgotten.
You cannot force every old video to stay relevant, but you can give your catalogue a much better chance.
Best ways to extend the earning life of old videos:
Make more evergreen topics, not just fast-expiring trends.
Keep titles and thumbnails strong enough to compete over time.
Update descriptions, links, and pinned comments when offers change.
Link old videos into newer related uploads to revive traffic.
Build revenue streams beyond ads, such as affiliates, memberships, and products.
Review analytics to spot old videos that still deserve support.
This is where channel systems matter. Older videos often earn best when the whole channel helps keep them alive through playlists, internal linking, topic clusters, and relevant follow-up content.
Fresh official facts worth knowing
This topic becomes much more useful when it is grounded in current YouTube documentation rather than assumptions.
Fact
Why it matters
What it means in practice
YouTube says RPM includes ads, YouTube Premium revenue, memberships, Super Chat and Super Stickers
Shows old videos can stay valuable across more than one revenue source
Old videos are not limited to ad earnings alone
YouTube says not all views have ads, and monetised playbacks are tracked separately from total views
Explains why some old videos keep getting views without earning much ad revenue
Traffic alone is not enough; monetisation quality still matters
YouTube says Premium gives creators another way to get paid for the content they create
Reinforces that old videos can still earn when Premium members watch them
Old ad-free views from Premium users can still matter
YouTube Partner Programme monetisation depends on continued eligibility and policy compliance
Explains why old videos do not earn forever automatically
Old videos still need to remain monetisable and policy-safe
Video pick: Why most YouTubers do not make money
This matters here because old videos can keep earning, but only if the channel is built around useful, monetisable content in the first place.
Tools that really help you build a catalogue that keeps earning
The old tools section needed a full rebuild. Tools should support a strategy, not pretend to replace one. These are the ones I would actually recommend first because they are relevant, trustworthy, and already supported by useful content on this site.
Tool
Best for
Why it earns a place here
Best next step
YouTube Studio
Finding evergreen videos, revenue sources, and long-tail winners
This is where you spot which old videos are still earning and deserve more support
What I would do if I wanted more old videos to keep paying
Make more evergreen, problem-solving videos.
Build each video to rank, recommend, and stay useful.
Check old videos regularly for outdated links and weak CTAs.
Diversify beyond ad revenue alone.
Treat your video library like an asset, not just a posting history.
Final thoughts
If you came here for the fast answer, here it is again: yes, YouTubers can still get paid for old videos if those videos keep getting views and remain monetised.
Old videos do not stop earning because they are old. They stop earning because traffic fades, monetisation disappears, or the content stops being relevant.
The smart creator move is not to hope every upload goes viral once. It is to build a library where some videos keep compounding over time.
Yes, YouTubers can control some parts of which ads appear on their content, but they cannot hand-pick every ad shown on their videos.
That is the short version. The useful version is knowing exactly what creators can control, what YouTube controls automatically, and where people get confused between ad formats, ad categories, sensitive-topic blocks, and advertiser selection.
This guide breaks that down properly, so you know what is possible in YouTube Studio, what is not, and what creators should focus on if they want better monetisation without chasing myths.
Why trust this guide?
I am not writing this as an outsider. I am a YouTube Certified Expert. I have coached 500+ clients, built and grown multiple channels, earned six YouTube Silver Play Buttons, built a personal audience of 100k+, and spent years working across YouTube strategy, SEO, retention, metadata, channel systems, and monetisation.
Questions like this matter because monetisation myths waste a lot of creator energy. If you think you can manually choose perfect ads for every video, you will focus on the wrong lever. If you think you have no control at all, you miss tools YouTube does actually give you.
If you want the wider monetisation picture as well, read What Percentage of YouTubers Make Money?. If you want help applying any of this to your own channel, you can book a discovery call.
Quick answer: can YouTubers control which ads are shown?
Partly. YouTubers can control some ad settings, such as ad formats, mid-roll placement, and blocking certain ad categories or advertiser URLs, but YouTube still chooses which ads are actually served through its ad systems.
So the honest answer is yes, but only up to a point.
YouTube’s own Help pages make this pretty clear. When you monetise a channel, ads on your video are automatically chosen based on context such as your video metadata and whether the content is advertiser-friendly. At the same time, creators can still manage certain controls inside YouTube Studio.
What creators can control
This is the part people often overlook. Creators do have some meaningful levers.
Control area
Can creators influence it?
How much control?
Ad formats
Yes
Creators can choose which ad formats to allow on monetised videos
Mid-roll placement
Yes
Creators can manage and edit mid-roll positions on longer videos
Sensitive ad categories
Yes
Creators can block or allow certain sensitive categories
General ad categories
Yes, to a degree
Creators can block some general categories
Specific advertiser URLs
Yes, to a degree
Creators can block certain advertiser URLs in available controls
Exact ad selection for each viewer
No
YouTube serves ads automatically
YouTube Help confirms creators can block certain ads from appearing on or next to their content using blocking controls in YouTube Studio. It also says creators can choose ad formats and manage mid-roll ad breaks on monetised videos.
What YouTube controls automatically
This is the line that matters most: YouTube still decides what specific ad gets served to a specific viewer.
Creators are not sitting there hand-picking Nike for one viewer, Adobe for another, and Grammarly for someone else. Ads are served through YouTube’s ad systems, auctions, Google Ad Manager, and other YouTube-sold sources. YouTube says ads on monetised videos are automatically chosen based on context like your video metadata and whether the content is advertiser-friendly.
Creators are not sitting there hand-picking Nike for one viewer, Adobe for another, and Grammarly for someone else. Ads are served through YouTube’s ad systems, auctions, Google Ad Manager, and other YouTube-sold sources. YouTube says ads on monetised videos are automatically chosen based on context like your video metadata and whether the content is advertiser-friendly. https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/7438625
Plain English version: you can shape the playing field, but you cannot personally hand-pick every ad that appears.
That is why the cleanest answer is “partial control, not total control”.
Ad categories and sensitive-topic blocks
One of the clearest forms of ad control creators do have is category-level blocking.
If there are certain types of ads you do not want appearing next to your content for personal, business, or brand reasons, YouTube allows creators to block some categories, including sensitive ones, inside YouTube Studio.
Type of control
What it does
Why it matters
Sensitive categories
Lets creators block ads from selected sensitive categories
Useful for brand alignment and channel comfort
General categories
Lets creators block some broader ad categories
Helps reduce mismatched advertiser themes
Updates in Studio
Changes may take time to reflect
Useful to know if you do not see an instant change
This is especially useful if you have a family-friendly brand, strong personal values, or a niche where certain categories would feel wildly off-brand.
Can you block specific advertisers?
To a degree, yes.
Historically, creators and publishers have had access to advertiser URL blocking controls in the broader Google ads ecosystem, and YouTube support material has referenced these controls for YouTube-hosted monetisation as well. The practical takeaway is that creators can have some limited advertiser-level blocking options, but this is still not the same thing as curating every ad partner one by one.
So again, the right mental model is not “I can choose exactly who advertises on my videos”. It is “I can exclude some things I do not want”.
Can YouTubers choose ad formats?
Yes. This is one of the most direct forms of control creators have.
YouTube’s upload and monetisation guidance says that creators in the YouTube Partner Programme can choose advertising formats for their monetised videos. YouTube also supports multiple formats such as skippable in-stream, non-skippable, bumper, and other watch-page ad inventory.
Question
Best answer
Can creators choose whether monetisation is on?
Yes
Can creators choose some ad formats?
Yes
Can creators choose the exact brand shown to each viewer?
No
Can creators block some ad categories?
Yes
Can YouTubers control where mid-roll ads appear?
Yes, and this is often more strategically important than people realise.
YouTube Help says creators can manage and edit mid-roll ad slots on longer videos in YouTube Studio. There are multiple ways to place mid-roll ad breaks, including automatic and manual approaches.
Why this matters: mid-roll control can affect viewer experience, retention, and revenue far more than obsessing over which exact advertiser appears.
If you place mid-rolls badly, you can damage watch time and annoy viewers. If you place them sensibly, you can improve monetisation without trashing the viewing experience.
Fresh official facts worth knowing
This topic gets much clearer when you anchor it to official documentation instead of creator myths.
Fact
Why it matters
Source
YouTube says ads on monetised videos are automatically chosen based on context like metadata and advertiser-friendliness
Confirms creators do not hand-pick every ad
YouTube Help
YouTube says creators can block certain ads using blocking controls in Studio
Confirms creators do have some real control
YouTube Help
YouTube says creators can choose advertising formats and manage mid-rolls
This is useful here because ad control questions make more sense when you understand the bigger revenue picture rather than one isolated ad event.
Tools that really help you manage monetisation more intelligently
The old tools section needed a full rebuild. Tools should support a strategy, not pretend to replace one. These are the ones I would actually recommend first because they are relevant, trustworthy, and already supported by useful content on this site.
Tool
Best for
Why it earns a place here
Best next step
YouTube Studio
Monetisation settings, ad formats, mid-rolls, and analytics
This is where nearly all meaningful creator-side ad control actually happens
Use YouTube Studio to set sensible ad formats and category blocks.
Review mid-roll placement on longer videos.
Focus on advertiser-friendly, high-retention content.
Build a wider monetisation mix beyond ads.
Stop trying to micromanage the exact ad auction outcome.
Final thoughts
If you came here for the fast answer, here it is again: yes, YouTubers can control some parts of which ads are shown, but not every specific ad.
Creators can influence formats, category blocks, some exclusions, and mid-roll placement. But YouTube still serves ads automatically through its ad systems based on context, suitability, and demand.
The smart move is not to chase total control. The smart move is to use the controls you do have, protect viewer experience, and build a channel that monetises well across the bigger system.
Can YouTubers control which ads are shown on their videos?
Partly. Creators can control some settings like ad formats, mid-rolls, and some blocked categories, but YouTube still chooses the actual ads served to viewers.
Can YouTubers block certain ads?
Yes. YouTube provides blocking controls for certain ad categories and sensitive categories in Studio.
Can YouTubers choose the exact brand shown in ads?
No, not on a viewer-by-viewer basis. YouTube serves ads automatically through its own systems.
Can YouTubers choose ad formats?
Yes. Creators in the YouTube Partner Programme can manage monetisation and choose certain ad formats for eligible videos.
Can YouTubers control mid-roll ads?
Yes. Creators can manage and edit mid-roll ad breaks on longer videos in YouTube Studio.
Can creators block political or sensitive ads?
In many cases, yes. YouTube provides sensitive category blocking controls for creators in Studio.
Do blocked category changes happen instantly?
Not always. YouTube says changes can take time to reflect, sometimes up to around 24 hours.
What matters more than trying to control every ad?
Content quality, retention, advertiser-friendly topics, sensible mid-roll placement, and a wider monetisation mix matter more in practice.
Yes, YouTubers get paid when YouTube Premium members watch their videos. Premium viewers don’t see ads, but YouTube shares part of every Premium subscription with the creators those members watch. YouTube now publishes the split, and says that on average a Premium signup earns creators more than the same person watching ads. Here’s how the money is worked out, what changes in 2027 and how to see it in your own analytics.
Last updated: 24 October 2026 · By Alan Spicer, YouTube Certified Expert
The short version: Premium replaces ad revenue on that view with subscription revenue. It doesn’t replace it with nothing.
The more useful questions are how the money is shared, whether Premium views are worth more than ad views, and how Premium fits into a wider YouTube income plan. That’s what this guide covers.
Why listen to me? I’m Alan Spicer, a YouTube Certified Expert since 2017 (including Content Ownership & Monetisation). I’ve coached 500+ creators, run 500+ channel audits and earned six YouTube Silver Play Buttons. When I audit a channel, RPM is the first number I check, and Premium revenue is part of that number.
⚡ QUICK ANSWER: Do YouTubers get paid if you have YouTube Premium?
Yes. When a YouTube Premium member watches your video, you earn a share of their subscription instead of ad money. YouTube pools Premium revenue and shares it by member watch time and views, and says that on average creators earn more from a Premium signup than from that person watching ads.
How does YouTube Premium pay creators?
YouTube Premium pays creators by sharing subscription revenue according to how much members watch their content. YouTube’s help page says Premium membership fees are distributed to creators based on member watch time, the majority goes to partners, and payments arrive at the start of each month alongside ad revenue (YouTube Help).
A viewer pays for YouTube Premium. They get ad-free, background and offline viewing across YouTube.
They watch your videos. Their views and watch time are recorded, including background play and downloads.
YouTube builds a revenue pool. A share of net subscription revenue goes into a creator pool: 30% for Premium and 60% for Premium Lite.
The pool is split by watch behaviour. The pool is shared out by member watch time and views across all eligible creators.
You receive your share. Your share is paid at 55% for long-form and 45% for Shorts, in the same monthly payment as ad revenue.
Viewer type
What they see
How the creator earns
Free viewer
Ads may show
Ad revenue, plus memberships, Super Thanks and other features if turned on
YouTube Premium member
No ads
Share of the Premium revenue pool, plus the same other features
YouTube Premium Lite member
No ads on most content
Share of the Premium Lite revenue pool, plus the same other features
Premium doesn’t cancel creator earnings. It changes where the money comes from.
VIDEO
My video on exactly this question, if you’d rather watch than read.
How much of YouTube Premium goes to creators in 2027?
YouTube puts 30% of net Premium subscription revenue and 60% of net Premium Lite revenue into dedicated creator pools, then pays creators 55% of their share for long-form and 45% for Shorts. YouTube published these figures on 10 August 2026 as part of its 2027 Partner Programme update.
Item
Figure
What it means
Premium creator pool
30% of net subscription revenue
Net of costs including music partner payments
Premium Lite creator pool
60% of net subscription revenue
Lite has no music benefits, so more goes to creators
How each pool is split
By member watch time and views
More Premium viewing of your content means a bigger share
Yes, for that view. A Premium member doesn’t see ads, so their view earns you Premium revenue instead of ad revenue. Every free viewer on the same video still earns you ad revenue as normal.
In plain English: ads are replaced by subscription revenue, not by nothing. That’s why the right answer to the main question is “yes, through a different revenue stream”.
Viewers who block ads without paying for Premium are a different case, because neither ads nor Premium money reaches the creator. I cover that in do YouTubers get paid if you use AdBlock.
Are Premium views worth more than ad-supported views?
On average, yes. YouTube says partners, on average, earn more from a Premium signup than from that same user watching ads, based on 2026 performance (YouTube Official Blog). That’s a change from the old advice that Premium views were roughly equal to ad views.
It isn’t guaranteed for every view. A Premium member who watches hundreds of hours across many channels spreads their share thinly, and in a high-CPM niche like finance, ad views can pay very well. The value depends on how much Premium members watch you, where they are, and what ads would have paid in your niche. My CPM by niche guide shows how big that ad gap can be.
Question
Answer
Do Premium viewers help creators earn?
Yes
Do Premium views count as ad views?
No, they use Premium revenue sharing instead
Is a Premium signup worth more than an ad viewer on average?
What still counts when someone watches with Premium?
Almost everything still counts when someone watches with Premium. A Premium view counts as a view, adds watch time and retention data, and feeds recommendations exactly like a free view.
Public view count and watch time
Audience retention and recommendation signals
Progress towards YouTube Partner Programme thresholds
Your share of Premium revenue
Memberships, Super Thanks, products and other income
YouTube also confirms that background play counts towards your watch time, and that downloaded videos are recorded and added the next time the member goes online (YouTube Help). Since 24 August 2026, YouTube counts a view as soon as playback starts, while earnings are based on engaged views and engaged watch hours (YouTube Help). Downloads are a separate case from ripping videos with third-party tools, which earns creators nothing (see do YouTubers get paid if you download their video).
Why this matters for strategy: you don’t need to make “Premium-friendly” content. You need content people watch to the end. Premium revenue follows watch behaviour, so audience retention is the lever.
Who can earn from YouTube Premium views?
Creators in the YouTube Partner Programme who have accepted the right monetisation modules can earn from Premium views. For long-form videos that means the Watch Page Monetisation Module with watch page ads turned on, and for Shorts the Shorts Feed Monetisation Module (YouTube Help).
Requirement
What you need
Join YPP with revenue sharing
1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 qualified watch hours in 12 months or 10 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days (YouTube Help)
From 1 February 2027 (new applicants)
1,000 subscribers plus 8,000 qualified watch hours in 365 days or 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days (YouTube Official Blog)
Long-form Premium revenue
Watch Page Monetisation Module accepted and watch page ads on
Shorts Premium revenue
Shorts Feed Monetisation Module accepted
Content
Must follow YouTube’s channel monetisation policies
You see YouTube Premium earnings in YouTube Studio under Analytics, then Revenue, where YouTube Premium appears as its own revenue source. You can also review Premium watch time and views by video.
Premium revenue is included in your RPM. YouTube defines RPM as total revenue per 1,000 views after YouTube’s share, covering ads, channel memberships, YouTube Premium, Super Chat and Super Stickers (YouTube Help). CPM covers only ad and Premium revenue on monetised views, before YouTube’s share. If you want to lift the number, my guide to increasing your YouTube RPM has nine practical steps, and what YouTube RPM is explains the basics.
How does Premium fit into a wider YouTube income strategy?
YouTube Premium is one part of your income mix, not something to build a strategy around directly. The best way to earn more from Premium is the same as earning more from ads: better topics, stronger thumbnails and intros, and more watch time.
The tools that help you build a monetisable channel are the ones that improve what people click and how long they watch, because that drives both ad and Premium revenue.
Yes. YouTube Premium Lite has its own revenue pool, set at 60% of net Lite subscription revenue, shared by member watch time and views. I cover it in detail in YouTube Premium Lite for creators.
Do Premium views count towards monetisation?
Yes. Premium views from public videos count towards watch hours and views like any other, so they help you reach YPP thresholds. See what qualified watch hours and views are.
Is it better to watch with Premium or ads to support a creator?
Either works, but YouTube’s own figures say Premium signups earn creators more on average. Adding a membership, Super Thanks or using their affiliate links supports them most directly.
What I would do to earn more from YouTube
Stop thinking only in terms of ads.
Make content that holds attention for longer.
Use analytics to understand viewer behaviour, not vanity numbers.
Build a revenue mix with more than one stream.
Treat Premium as part of the system, not the whole plan.
Frequently asked questions
Do YouTubers get paid if I have YouTube Premium?
Yes. Premium members don’t see ads, but creators in the YouTube Partner Programme earn a share of Premium subscription revenue based on how much members watch their content. The money arrives in the same monthly payment as ad revenue.
Do Premium views count as ad views?
No. A Premium view doesn’t serve an ad, so it isn’t an ad view. It still counts as a normal view for your public view count, watch time and analytics, and it earns you money through Premium revenue sharing rather than ad revenue.
Are YouTube Premium views worth more?
On average, yes. YouTube says partners earned more on average from a Premium signup than from that user watching ads, based on 2026 performance. Individual results still vary with your audience’s location, how much they watch and how much ads would have paid in your niche.
Do YouTubers lose money if I watch with Premium?
No. Premium swaps the ad revenue from your watch for a share of your subscription. Because YouTube says creators earn more on average from Premium signups than from ad viewers, watching with Premium usually supports the creator at least as well as watching ads.
Can small YouTubers earn from Premium?
Yes, once they qualify for ad and Premium revenue sharing. That needs 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 qualified watch hours in 12 months or 10 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days, rising to 8,000 hours or 20 million Shorts views for new applicants from 1 February 2027.
Does YouTube Premium affect memberships or Super Thanks?
No. Premium only changes the ad experience. Channel memberships, Super Chat, Super Stickers and Super Thanks are separate revenue streams, so a Premium member can still support a creator through any of them.
Does background play or downloaded Premium viewing count for creators?
Yes. YouTube says background play counts towards your watch time, and downloaded videos are recorded and added to your watch time the next time the member goes online. Both feed into how Premium revenue is shared.
How do I see my YouTube Premium earnings?
Open YouTube Studio, go to Analytics, then the Revenue tab. YouTube Premium appears as its own line in your revenue sources, and you can view Premium watch time and views by video. Your RPM also includes Premium revenue alongside ads, memberships and Super Chat.
Final thoughts
Yes, YouTubers get paid if you have YouTube Premium. They don’t earn from ads on your view; they earn from a share of your subscription, split by watch time, and YouTube’s own 2026 figures say that share is worth more on average than an ad viewer.
Premium is still only one stream. The bigger goal is content people want to watch, because watch behaviour drives almost everything else. If you want help building that kind of channel, read how I work with creators or book a free discovery call.
About the author
Alan Spicer is a YouTube Certified Expert (since 2017) and independent YouTube consultant with 20 years of self-employment. He has coached 500+ creators, run 500+ channel audits, worked on the vidIQ customer success team from 2020 to 2021, and helped channels such as Coin Bureau Trading grow from 15k to 100k+ subscribers in eight months. He has six YouTube Silver Play Buttons and a combined audience of 100K+.
Most YouTube channels never make meaningful money. The rule-of-thumb is around 0.25%, but that number needs real context. This guide covers the complete picture: how much YouTube pays per 1,000 views by niche, real 2026 income tiers, CPM and RPM data, country-by-country earnings, YouTube Shorts pay rates, the Q4 CPM spike, Connected TV earnings uplift, the March 2026 YouTube Shopping expansion, the 2027 YouTube Partner Programme changes, and a free three-mode earnings calculator.
Last updated: 24 October 2026 · By Alan Spicer, YouTube Certified Expert
Most YouTube channels never make meaningful money. That sounds blunt, but it is the truth. The upside is that this number is often misunderstood. YouTube contains millions of abandoned, inactive, experimental, and half-started channels that were never built as businesses.
If you are asking what percentage of YouTubers make money, the question underneath it is more useful: how realistic is it to build a channel that earns anything at all, and what separates the channels that do from the ones that never get there?
This guide answers that properly, and goes further. You will find the specific CPM and RPM numbers by niche, country-by-country earnings data, the Q4 seasonality effect on earnings, what YouTube’s Connected TV shift means for creator income, the March 2026 YouTube Shopping expansion, what the new 8,000-hour rule from 1 February 2027 changes, a free earnings calculator, and a clear timeline for how long it takes to make money.
Around 0.25% of YouTube channels earn meaningful money from YouTube itself. More than 3 million creators are in the YouTube Partner Programme, roughly 2.6% of an estimated 115 million channels, and most of them earn under $200 a month from ads. Full-time income is rarer still, at well under 1%.
A practical rule-of-thumb: around 0.25% of all YouTube channels earn meaningful money through YouTube’s built-in monetisation systems.
That figure needs context. Most articles quote it without explaining it, which is exactly why this page exists.
The more accurate version: most YouTube channels make nothing; a minority make some money; only a small fraction generate high income. YouTube says more than 3 million creators are in the YouTube Partner Programme (YouTube Official Blog, August 2026). Against an estimated 115 million channels, that’s about 2.6%, and most of those earn under $200/month: technically monetised, practically not a business.
How much does YouTube pay per 1,000 views in 2026?
⚡ QUICK ANSWER
How much does YouTube pay per 1,000 views?
In 2026, YouTube pays creators between $2 and $12 per 1,000 views for long-form content on average. Finance and tech channels can earn $10–$25+ RPM, while gaming and entertainment channels typically earn under $3 RPM. YouTube Shorts pay far less, approximately $0.03–$0.08 per 1,000 views. These are creator take-home figures after YouTube’s 45% revenue share.
This is the question that sits underneath the ‘what percentage make money’ question, because the answer changes everything. A channel with 100,000 monthly views in the finance niche earns $1,000–$2,500/month. The same channel in entertainment earns $150–$300. Same view count, completely different business.
Content Format
Typical RPM (Creator Take-Home)
After YouTube’s 45% Cut
Key Variable
Long-form 8+ min (finance niche)
$10–$25
Yes, advertisers pay $18–$45 CPM
Mid-roll ads + high-value audience
Long-form 8+ min (tech/software)
$7–$14
Yes
Buyer-intent viewers
Long-form 8+ min (average niche)
$2–$8
Yes
Niche and audience geography
Long-form under 8 min
$1.50–$6
Yes
No mid-roll ads, fewer ad slots
YouTube Shorts
$0.03–$0.08
Yes, pooled revenue model
Volume play; use for growth not income
Live streams (ads only)
$1–$5
Yes
Super Chat adds significantly on top
RPM = Revenue Per Mille. What you receive per 1,000 total views after YouTube’s 45% cut. Source: TubeAnalytics 2026 creator dataset (50,000+ channels).
Why RPM Matters More Than Views
When I audit a channel, RPM is the first number I check, not subscribers, not views. A channel with 200,000 monthly views and a $2 RPM earns $400/month. A channel with 50,000 views and a $12 RPM earns $600/month. The channel with fewer views earns more. That’s the niche effect in practice.
What do the real 2026 numbers show?
115M+
Total YouTube channels worldwide
3M+
Creators in the YouTube Partner Programme (YouTube, Aug 2026)
~2.6%
Of all channels are in YPP and can earn ad revenue
<1%
Channels earning full-time income
Metric
Number
Source / Notes
Total YouTube channels
115M+
ytshark.com 2026, includes abandoned, inactive, experimental channels
3M ÷ 115M. Being in YPP is not the same as meaningful income
YPP creators earning under $200/month
Majority
Estimate: at a $2 to $4 RPM, a channel needs 50,000 to 100,000 monthly views to pass $200
Channels earning full-time income ($4,000+/mo)
Well under 1% of active channels
TubeAnalytics 2026 creator earnings analysis
Channels earning $50,000+/month
Under 0.1%
Top-tier; typically 1M+ subs with diversified revenue
YouTube paid creators total (past 4 years)
$100B+
Neal Mohan, January 2026: paid to creators, artists and media companies. Highly concentrated at the top
Average CPM all niches (2026)
$6.15
Up 27.6% from $4.82 in 2025. TubeAnalytics 50K-channel dataset
Non-ad revenue share for $10K+/month creators
41%
Up from 31% in 2025. IMH Creator Economy Report 2026
Sources: YouTube Official Blog (Neal Mohan’s January 2026 letter; YPP update, August 2026); ytshark.com; TubeAnalytics; Influencer Marketing Hub. Third-party figures are estimates.
Why ‘0.25%’ and ‘2.6%’ are both right
These numbers measure different things. About 2.6% of all channels are in YPP, so they can earn ad revenue. 0.25% earn meaningful money, enough to constitute actual income. Most YPP creators earn under $200/month from AdSense. Both figures are accurate. Neither tells the full story alone.
What counts as making money on YouTube?
Most articles fail here: they count any income as proof of ‘making money’. A channel earning enough to buy a sandwich once a month is not a business. Here is a cleaner breakdown:
Level
What It Usually Means
Monthly Estimate
What It Feels Like
Incidental income
Low, irregular earnings from ads
$1–$50
A nice surprise, not something you can plan around
Meaningful side income
Regular monthly earnings with clear upside
$100–$500
Covers tools, gear, software, starts being real
Part-time creator income
Consistent revenue worth reinvesting
$500–$2,000
Starts behaving like a small business
Full-time creator income
Diversified revenue at salary-level reliability
$4,000+
Usually built on more than AdSense alone
Creator business
Multiple revenue streams, team, systems
$10,000+
YouTube is top of funnel, not the whole business
Key point: when creators say they “make money on YouTube” they usually mean all revenue connected to their YouTube audience, including affiliate links, brand deals, digital products, coaching, and email funnels, not just AdSense. That is why topic, niche, and audience geography matter so much. See the top languages on YouTube for how language choice affects your income ceiling.
How does YouTube monetisation work in 2026 and 2027?
YouTube monetisation works in two tiers: a 500-subscriber tier that opens up fan funding and YouTube Shopping, and a 1,000-subscriber tier that switches on ad revenue. The ad-revenue threshold doubles for new applicants on 1 February 2027.
YPP Tier
Subscribers Needed
Activity Threshold
What You Get
Early access (fan funding)
500 subscribers
3 public uploads in 90 days + 3,000 watch hours in 12 months OR 3M Shorts views in 90 days
Super Thanks, Super Chat, Super Stickers, channel memberships, no ad revenue yet
Full ad revenue access
1,000 subscribers
Assessed before 1 Feb 2027: 4,000 public watch hours in 12 months OR 10 million Shorts views in 90 days. From 1 Feb 2027: 8,000 qualified watch hours in 365 days OR 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days
Ad revenue, YouTube Premium revenue share, full YPP monetisation suite
The 2027 rule change: what it means for this number
How the 2027 monetisation rules work and the fastest way to qualify, from my channel.
Being ‘In YPP’ and ‘Earning Useful Money’ Are Not the Same Thing
A channel can be enrolled in YPP, technically monetised, and still earn $12/month. Meeting the threshold gets you in; it does not guarantee revenue. The threshold is the starting line, not the finish line.
Very few YouTubers make meaningful money. Around 0.25% of channels earn a real income from YouTube, and most of the 3 million+ creators in YPP earn modest amounts.
What we can say with confidence:
Most channels never reach monetisation thresholds or turn access into useful income
More than 3 million creators (about 2.6% of all channels) are in YPP and can earn ad revenue (YouTube, Aug 2026)
Most YPP creators earn under $200/month, barely covers the cost of making the content
Full-time creator income ($4,000+/month) represents well under 1% of active channels
Views are heavily concentrated: in Pew Research Center’s study of channels with 250,000+ subscribers, the top 10% of videos took 79% of all views
Creators earning $10K+/month now derive 41% of revenue from non-ad sources, up from 31% in 2025 (IMH 2026)
$85M/year (MrBeast) versus $12/month (first YPP video), both are “monetised YouTubers”
Plain English: use 0.25% as the fast answer for meaningful direct YouTube monetisation. Most channels earn nothing. A smaller group earn a bit. A much smaller group builds a dependable side income. A tiny fraction builds a serious creator business. YouTube has paid over $100 billion to creators, artists and media companies in the past four years (Neal Mohan, January 2026), but that money is not distributed evenly. Not even close.
How much do YouTubers earn at each subscriber level?
YouTubers typically earn $20 to $200 a month from ads at 1,000 to 10,000 subscribers, and $2,000 to $8,400 a month at 100,000 to 500,000 subscribers, but niche and audience location move those numbers a lot. For the subscriber side of the question, see how many subscribers you need to make money.
Tier
Subscriber Range
Typical Monthly Ad Revenue
What That Means
% of Active Channels
Pre-monetised
0–999 subs
$0
No direct YouTube income yet, focus on audience fit and content quality
~97%
Early YPP
1,000–10,000 subs
$20–$200/month
The first cheque. Real but rarely meaningful without other revenue streams
~1.6%
Supplemental income
10,000–100,000 subs
$200–$2,000/month
Enough to reinvest or cover part-time income in high-CPM niches
~0.8%
Full-time creator
100,000–500,000 subs
$2,000–$8,400/month
Sustainable if paired with affiliates, sponsorships, or products
Ad revenue estimates: TubeAnalytics 2026 creator earnings analysis. Actual earnings vary significantly by niche, audience location, and content format.
Subscriber Count Does Not Determine Revenue
A finance channel with 50,000 subscribers can out-earn a gaming channel with 500,000. Niche, audience geography, video length, and monetisation strategy matter far more than raw subscriber count.
High-value customers, a bank account is worth thousands to a financial advertiser
Insurance & legal
$12–$38
$7–$21
Extremely high customer lifetime value
B2B software / SaaS
$15–$40
$8–$22
B2B customers have large budgets; companies pay premium to reach decision-makers
Technology & software reviews
$8–$25
$4–$14
Buyer-intent audience researching specific purchases
Digital marketing
$10–$20
$5–$11
Marketing tools and agencies compete aggressively for this audience
Real estate & mortgage
$8–$20
$4–$11
Transaction values are enormous
Health & medical
$8–$18
$4–$10
Healthcare and wellness advertisers pay premium for qualified audience
Education & tutorials
$6–$15
$3–$8
Edtech platforms target motivated learners
Food & cooking
$4–$12
$2–$7
Strong general advertiser base but lower purchase intent
Fitness & lifestyle
$3–$10
$1.50–$5
Broad audience but lower advertiser competition
Gaming (general)
$2–$8
$1–$4
Younger, lower-income demographic, valuable at scale only
Entertainment & comedy
$2–$6
$1–$3
Massive reach potential but weak advertiser targeting signal
Music
$0.50–$3
$0.30–$1.50
Copyright complexity limits monetisation
Kids content (COPPA)
$0.50–$3
$0.30–$1.50
Behavioural targeting disabled by law, significantly limits ad value
Source: TubeAnalytics 2026; FluxNote CPM Guide 2026; OutlierKit RPM data March 2026. Q4 CPMs run 20–50% higher. US audience assumed.
Same Views, Different Niche
Channel A (Finance)
Channel B (Gaming)
Difference
Monthly views
200,000
200,000
Identical
CPM
$25
$4
6.25x
Creator RPM (after 45% cut)
~$12/1,000
~$2/1,000
6x
Monthly AdSense revenue
~$2,400
~$400
$2,000 more from same traffic
Does YouTube pay more for views on TV screens?
⚡ QUICK ANSWER
Does YouTube pay more for Connected TV views?
Yes, significantly. YouTube CTV (Connected TV / TV screen) placements average $20–$25 CPM, a 30–60% premium over mobile and desktop. Over 45% of YouTube watch time now happens on TV screens, and CTV now drives roughly 75% of YouTube’s total ad spend. Creators with longer, lean-back content who attract TV-screen viewers earn measurably more per view without changing a single thing about their content.
Connected TV is one of the most significant and least-discussed factors in YouTube earnings in 2026. When your video gets watched on a living room TV versus a phone, the advertiser typically pays more, because TV viewers have longer attention spans, higher purchasing power, and are harder to reach through other channels.
Device / Platform
Typical CPM Range
Share of YouTube Watch Time
Notes
Connected TV (TV screens)
$20–$25
45%+ and growing
30–60% premium over other devices; advertisers pay top rates for lean-back attention
Desktop / Laptop
$8–$15
~25%
Strong intent signals from search-driven traffic
Mobile
$4–$10
~30%
Largest volume but lower CPM; ad-skip rates higher
If you create long-form educational, financial, tutorial, or documentary-style content, the type people watch comfortably on a big screen, you likely get more CTV views than you realise. Channels earning $100K+ from TV screens grew 45% year-over-year in 2025. Uploading in 4K triggers a ‘premium’ signal in the ad auction and can increase CTV CPM further.
When are YouTube earnings highest and lowest?
⚡ QUICK ANSWER
When is YouTube CPM highest?
YouTube CPM is highest in Q4: October through December, when advertiser budgets peak for holiday campaigns. CPMs spike 30–60% above annual average during Q4, with Black Friday week seeing increases of 80–120%. The highest single day is typically in late November. January brings the sharpest drop: CPMs fall 30–50% as advertisers reset annual budgets. Monday consistently delivers the highest CPM across the week.
Period
CPM vs Annual Average
What to Do
Why It Happens
Q4 (Oct–Dec)
+30–60% above average; Black Friday week +80–120%
Publish your highest-quality, highest-effort content. Maximise upload consistency.
Holiday ad budgets. Brands aggressively bid to reach shoppers. Q4 is when the ad market is most competitive.
Back-to-school advertising and pre-Q4 campaign testing.
Q2 (Apr–Jun)
Near annual average
Strong baseline. Good period for evergreen content builds.
Steady advertiser spending after Q1 reset.
Q1 (Jan–Mar)
-30–50% vs December
Don’t panic, this is structural. Focus on content volume and evergreen SEO.
Annual budget resets. Advertisers have spent most of their holiday budget.
Monday
Highest day of week (~$3.53 avg)
Schedule important uploads for Mon–Wed for best CPM.
Advertisers reset weekly budgets; Monday bids are highest.
Weekend
Lower than weekdays
Weekend uploads still valuable for search traffic.
Advertiser demand drops as campaign managers aren’t optimising.
The practical takeaway: your January RPM is not your actual RPM. Creators who panic-quit in Q1 because earnings dropped are misreading a structural annual cycle. The correct comparison is Q1 this year vs Q1 last year, not Q1 vs the previous December.
Calendar Your Best Content for Q4
If you have a video idea that could go big, an in-depth guide, a highly searched topic, or a competitive keyword, the best time to publish it is September or October. It builds momentum heading into the highest-CPM months of the year.
How much do YouTube earnings vary by country?
The same video, with the same number of views, can earn 5–10x more if the viewers are in the United States compared to India or Brazil. This is one of the most important and least-discussed variables in YouTube earnings. Targeting a specific market? See how to make money on YouTube in the UK and in Australia.
Country / Region
Average YouTube CPM (2026)
RPM Range (Creators)
Notes
United States
$8–$25 (varies by niche)
$4–$14
Highest-value YouTube market. Finance US = $20–$50 CPM
United Kingdom
$6–$18
$3–$10
Second-highest English-language market
Canada
$5–$16
$2.50–$9
Very similar to UK; strong advertiser market
Australia
$5–$14
$2.50–$8
High-value English-speaking market
Germany
$4–$12
$2–$7
Highest non-English CPM; strong B2B and finance advertisers
Netherlands / Nordics
$4–$10 (avg ~$8.62)
$2–$5.50
Small but premium audience
France / Spain
$2–$8
$1–$4.50
Spanish global reach drives views but Latin American audience reduces average CPM
Brazil
$0.50–$3
$0.25–$1.50
Huge audience, lower advertiser spend per viewer
India
$0.50–$2
$0.25–$1.25
World’s second-largest YouTube audience; very low CPM, requires massive scale
Southeast Asia
$0.30–$1.50
$0.15–$0.80
Growing audiences; CPM improving but significantly below Tier 1 markets
YouTube Shorts pay approximately $0.03–$0.08 per 1,000 views from the Shorts ad revenue pool, compared to $2–$14+ RPM for long-form videos. Shorts revenue now accounts for 18% of total creator earnings on the platform (up from 11% in 2025), but per-view rates remain significantly lower than long-form. The strategic value of Shorts is audience growth and channel discovery, not direct monetisation.
Format
Typical RPM / Per 1,000 Views
Monetisation Model
Best Strategic Use
Long-form video (8+ min)
$2–$14+ depending on niche
Direct ad placement, pre-roll, mid-roll, post-roll + Premium revenue share
Primary revenue driver
Long-form video (3–7 min)
$1.50–$8+
Pre-roll and post-roll only, no mid-roll
Acceptable but leaves mid-roll money on the table
YouTube Shorts
$0.03–$0.08
Pooled ad revenue fund, rate is shared across all eligible Shorts
Top-of-funnel growth and new subscriber acquisition
Live streams
Variable, can be high
Ads during stream + Super Chat + Super Stickers + memberships
Live engagement and fan funding; gaming channels earn 34% of revenue here
Creators who post both Shorts and long-form see 23% higher total revenue than those focusing on either format alone (TubeAnalytics 2026). Use Shorts to grow. Use long-form to earn.
Two official facts help explain the low per-view rate. Shorts now average 200 billion daily views (Neal Mohan, January 2026), so the shared revenue pool is split across a huge volume of plays. And since 24 August 2026, YouTube counts a view the moment any video starts to play, but YPP earnings are still based on engaged views and engaged watch hours (YouTube Help), so your public Shorts view count will run well ahead of the views you’re paid on. Compare the two formats in Shorts vs long-form monetisation, and if you’re chasing the Shorts route into YPP, read how to get 20 million Shorts views in 90 days.
VIDEO
Revenue goes well beyond AdSense, especially important for Shorts-focused creators
Why do so few YouTubers make money?
So few YouTubers make money because starting is free, most quit before growth compounds, and many never pick a niche or monetisation model that can pay. Here are the five reasons I see most in channel audits.
1. The barrier to starting is effectively zero
Anyone can start a YouTube channel in 10 minutes for free. That accessibility is good, but it floods the platform with channels that never had a serious monetisation plan. If starting cost £100, far fewer would start without thinking it through.
2. Most creators quit before compounding starts
The first 10–30 videos are usually the hardest and least rewarding. The algorithm doesn’t know you yet. Numbers are small. Most creators stop here. The channels that break through pushed through this window and kept publishing.
3. People chase views before building a monetisation model
Views without intent do not pay. A million views on a music lyric video earns far less than 50,000 views on a personal finance video from an engaged US audience. The strongest channels ask early: “if this channel works, how does it make money?” Most never ask. See How to Make Money on YouTube Without AdSense for the full multi-stream answer.
4. Packaging is the most common first bottleneck
Weak titles and thumbnails kill channels faster than poor camera quality ever will. This is the single most consistent finding across 500+ channel audits. My thumbnail guide and CTR rescue guide cover the fixes. A channel with mediocre production but strong packaging, clear thumbnails, curiosity-driven titles, well-structured intros, will outperform a beautifully shot channel with generic presentation every time.
5. Wrong niche for the CPM available
A gaming channel needs 10x more views than a finance channel to earn the same income. Many creators pick niches based on passion without understanding the CPM ceiling (see how to pick a profitable niche). Both channels can be worth building, but the finance creator reaches financial sustainability at 1/10th the audience size.
Problem
Effect on Channel
Effect on Earnings
Weak thumbnails and titles
Low CTR, fewer people start watching
Lower reach, lower watch time, lower revenue
Poor intros
Retention drops in first 30 seconds
Algorithm cuts distribution; fewer ads served
No niche clarity
Audience confusion
Harder to build trust or a relevant offer
No monetisation plan
Traffic goes nowhere useful
Views produce weak results even when volume is OK
Wrong niche for CPM
Revenue ceiling too low
Viable channel that can never make serious money from ads alone
Inconsistency
Algorithm has nothing to work with
Channel never reaches the scale needed for compounding
WORK WITH ALAN SPICER
Have a YouTube channel that isn’t making money? Let’s work out why.
On a free discovery call we’ll look at your niche, RPM, packaging and monetisation model, and find the bottleneck that’s holding your income back.
You’re in YPP but earning under $200 a month
You want to qualify before the 1 February 2027 rule change
YouTubers make money beyond AdSense through affiliate links, YouTube Shopping, sponsorships, their own products, memberships and client work. My guide to making money on social media covers each method in depth.
Tag products in videos, Shorts and live streams and earn commission on sales
All YPP creators with 500+ subs, announced 25 March 2026
Expanded from the 10,000-subscriber requirement to the 500-subscriber tier. Over 500,000 creators were already in YouTube Shopping in January 2026. See YouTube Shopping for creators
Brand sponsorships
Paid integration within videos
10K+ subs in a defined niche with engaged audience
+45% YoY, gaming channels earn 34% of revenue here
Consulting / coaching
Direct client work generated by YouTube
Expertise channels, finance, marketing, business
Highest margin, one client can exceed months of AdSense
Email list
Off-platform audience ownership
Any channel, requires deliberate capture strategy
Email subscribers are worth more long-term than YouTube subscribers. Start with a free lead magnet
MARCH 2026 YouTube Shopping expanded to 500-subscriber channels
On 25 March 2026, YouTube expanded its Shopping affiliate programme to all YPP creators with at least 500 subscribers who meet the eligibility guidelines, removing the previous 10,000-subscriber barrier. Creators can now tag products from participating brands in videos, Shorts, and live streams and earn commissions on resulting sales. Source: YouTube Official Blog, 25 March 2026. YouTube says more than 500,000 creators were already in YouTube Shopping by January 2026 (Neal Mohan’s 2026 letter).
Why smaller channels can still win: Creators earning $10K+/month now derive 41% of revenue from non-ad sources, up from 31% in 2025 (IMH 2026). A channel with 5,000 engaged subscribers in a high-intent niche with an affiliate strategy and a consulting offer can out-earn a 500,000-subscriber entertainment channel. Channel size and channel income are not the same thing.
Two channels with the same views can earn wildly different amounts
How Long Does It Take to Make Money on YouTube?
⚡ QUICK ANSWER
How long does it take to make money on YouTube?
Most dedicated creators take 6–12 months to reach 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours. From 1 February 2027, new applicants need 8,000 qualified watch hours, so plan for longer. Some fast-track in 3 months using Shorts and SEO-led content. After approval, first payment arrives 2–3 months later once earnings reach the $100 minimum threshold. On average, creators earn their first dollar around 6–8 months after launch, but this varies enormously by upload consistency, niche, and content quality.
Milestone
Typical Timeline
Fast-Track Path
Main Variable
500 subscribers (fan funding tier)
2–4 months
1–2 months with Shorts strategy
Upload consistency and niche search volume
1,000 subscribers + 4,000 hours (full YPP, assessed before 1 Feb 2027)
6–12 months
3–6 months with SEO-led content
Niche demand, thumbnail CTR, retention
1,000 subscribers + 8,000 qualified hours (full YPP from 1 Feb 2027)
12–18 months for most new channels
6–9 months with SEO-led content and live streams
Watch time per video, upload volume, retention
YPP application reviewed
1–30 days after applying
Faster for clearly policy-compliant channels
Content quality and policy compliance
First payment ($100 minimum threshold)
2–3 months after YPP approval
Sooner in high-CPM niches with higher views
Views + RPM determines how fast you hit $100
$500/month from AdSense
12–24 months
6–12 months in high-CPM niche
Niche, view volume, RPM
$4,000+/month (full-time income)
2–5 years (AdSense alone)
12–18 months with diversified revenue
Multi-stream monetisation essential
The Honest Reality About Timeline
These timelines assume consistent uploading (1–2 videos/week), a searchable niche, and improving content quality over time. Creators who upload once a month or switch niche frequently take much longer or never get there. The biggest determinant is not talent, it’s consistency combined with an increasingly sharp understanding of what your specific audience wants to watch.
Estimate monthly ad revenue based on your actual channel variables, not a generic average.
100,000 views/month
Estimated Monthly AdSense Revenue
$350
RPM used: $3.50 · After YouTube’s 45% cut
AdSense estimate only, does not include sponsorships, affiliates, or memberships
100,000
Monthly
$350
Yearly
$4,200
Adjusted RPM
$3.50
AdSense estimate only. Seasonality and geography adjustments applied.
Enter your monthly income target and niche, see exactly what view volume you need to hit it from AdSense alone.
$
To earn $1,000/month from AdSense at $3.50 RPM:
Monthly Views Needed
286K
Daily Views Needed
9.5K
Est. Subscribers Needed
~57K
Videos/Week @ 10K avg
~7
At $3.50 RPM you need roughly 5–10x more views than a finance channel for the same income. Niche selection matters.
* AdSense estimates only. Most creators hit income targets faster by adding affiliate links, sponsorships, or consulting alongside AdSense. Subscriber estimates assume 5% of subs watch each video.
RPM data sourced from TubeAnalytics 2026 creator dataset (50K+ channels). Estimates are indicative, your actual earnings will vary. Want a personalised analysis?
Which YouTube money statistics matter in 2026?
The YouTube money statistics that matter most in 2026 are the official ones: over $100 billion paid out in four years, 3 million+ creators in YPP, and a doubled watch-hour threshold from February 2027. Third-party figures are labelled as estimates.
How can you beat the odds and make money on YouTube?
You beat the odds on YouTube by picking a niche with buying intent, winning the click, making videos long enough for mid-rolls and adding income beyond ads early. These are the eight steps I give clients.
Pick a niche with clear audience intent. Not just what you enjoy, what a specific person is actively trying to solve or learn. High intent = higher CPM = more earning power.
Build around searchable, clickable problems. Evergreen searchable content compounds over time. A well-ranked tutorial from 2024 still earns in 2026.
Design the title and thumbnail before you film. If you can’t write a strong title for the video idea, the idea isn’t ready.
Make videos 8+ minutes long. Mid-roll ads can double or triple revenue per video. This is one of the highest-impact technical decisions for earnings.
Study retention and CTR in YouTube Studio weekly. The data tells you what’s working (start with audience retention). Ignoring it is the most common mistake at every channel size.
Add a monetisation path before YPP. Affiliate links, a service offer, or email capture can generate income before you hit 1,000 subscribers.
Treat the channel like a system, not a pile of uploads. Consistent publishing, regular analytics review, iterating on what works. The channels that win are boring on the inside and gripping on screen.
Use Shorts for growth, long-form for revenue. Shorts average $0.03–$0.08 per 1,000 views. Long-form earns $2–$14+. The play is feeding long-form with Shorts, not replacing it.
If you need help identifying the specific bottleneck for your channel, that is exactly what a YouTube Consultant does. You can also book a free discovery call to work through your specific situation.
VIDEO
Which tools help you make money on YouTube?
The tools that help you make money on YouTube are the ones that fix a specific bottleneck: YouTube Studio for decisions, then research, workflow and streaming tools as you grow.
Tool
Best For
Why It Earns a Place Here
Start Here
YouTube Studio
Analytics and decision-making
Your first and most important tool. CTR, retention, RPM, traffic sources, and monetisation signals live here.
Free, in your YouTube account
vidIQ
Topic research and keyword-driven growth
Topic discovery, keyword support, and planning decisions when used with judgement.
No. Most YouTube channels either never reach monetisation thresholds or never turn that access into meaningful income. Of the 3 million+ creators in YPP (about 2.6% of all channels), most earn under $200/month from AdSense.
How much does YouTube pay per 1,000 views?
Between $2 and $12 per 1,000 views for long-form content on average in 2026. Finance channels can earn $10–$25+ RPM; gaming and entertainment channels typically earn under $3 RPM. YouTube Shorts pay $0.03–$0.08 per 1,000 views. These are creator take-home figures after YouTube’s 45% cut.
What is the difference between CPM and RPM on YouTube?
CPM (Cost Per Mille) is what advertisers pay YouTube per 1,000 ad impressions. RPM (Revenue Per Mille) is what you receive per 1,000 total views after YouTube takes its 45% cut. RPM is always lower than CPM and is the number that matters for income planning.
Can a small YouTube channel make money?
Yes, but often not primarily from AdSense. Small channels earn through affiliate links, consulting, lead generation, digital products, memberships, and YouTube Shopping. A 5,000-subscriber finance channel with a strong affiliate strategy can out-earn a 200,000-subscriber gaming channel.
How many subscribers do you need to make money on YouTube?
Fan funding features start at 500 subscribers. Full ad revenue requires 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 watch hours or 10 million Shorts views, rising to 8,000 qualified watch hours or 20 million qualified Shorts views for new applicants from 1 February 2027. YouTube Shopping affiliate is now available from 500 subscribers. Off-platform income, affiliates, services, digital products, has no subscriber minimum.
How long does it take to make money on YouTube?
Most dedicated creators reach full YPP access within 6–12 months of consistent uploading under the current 4,000-hour rule, and the 8,000-hour rule from February 2027 will stretch that for new channels. Fast-track creators using SEO and Shorts can get there in 3–6 months. First payment arrives 2–3 months after approval once earnings hit the $100 minimum threshold.
Do YouTube Shorts pay well?
Not per view. Shorts pay approximately $0.03–$0.08 per 1,000 views versus $2–$14+ RPM for long-form. Shorts revenue has grown to 18% of total creator earnings in 2026, but the model is high volume, low per-view rate. The strategic play is using Shorts for audience growth that feeds long-form revenue.
What YouTube niche pays the most in 2026?
Finance and credit card content commands the highest CPM at $15–$50 per thousand impressions. After YouTube’s 45% cut, finance creators typically see $8–$27 RPM. Insurance, legal services, and B2B software also rank in the top tier. Gaming and entertainment sit at $1–$4 CPM.
Does YouTube pay differently by country?
Yes, significantly. US viewers generate 5–10x more ad revenue per view than viewers from India or Brazil. A video with 100,000 views from a US audience can earn $1,500–$2,500 while the same video with a South Asian audience might earn $100–$300.
When is YouTube CPM highest?
Q4: October through December, is when CPMs peak, running 30–60% above annual average with Black Friday week at 80–120% above average. Q1 (January–March) is the lowest period, dropping 30–50% from December as advertisers reset annual budgets. Monday consistently delivers the highest CPM day of the week.
What is Connected TV on YouTube?
Connected TV (CTV) refers to YouTube watched on television screens via smart TVs, streaming devices, and gaming consoles. CTV placements average $20–$25 CPM, a 30–60% premium over mobile. Over 45% of YouTube watch time now happens on TV screens, making CTV an increasingly important earnings factor for creators with lean-back content.
Is YouTube still worth starting in 2026?
Yes, if you treat it as a long-term system. The monetisation infrastructure has never been stronger. More revenue options, better analytics, YouTube Shopping now available at 500 subscribers. The channels that win in 2026 are better packaged, more useful, and more strategic about monetisation than their competitors.
WATCH ON YOUTUBE
99.75% of YouTubers Don’t Make Money. Here’s Why
Alan Spicer breaks down the real reasons the percentage is so low and what to do about it.
Pick a niche with obvious audience intent, a specific person with a specific problem I can help solve.
Map 20–30 videos around beginner questions, comparisons, pain points, mistakes, and myths, all searchable.
Design titles and thumbnails before filming. If I can’t write a strong title for the idea, I don’t film it.
Make every video 8–10 minutes+ to qualify for mid-roll ads from day one of YPP.
Publish consistently long enough to gather real signal, at least 30 videos before drawing conclusions.
Study YouTube Studio weekly: what did people click? Where did they leave? Build from the data.
Add one monetisation path early, affiliate links, a service offer, or an email capture. Don’t wait for YPP.
Post 3–5 Shorts per week to grow audience, then funnel to long-form where the real revenue is.
Frequently asked questions
What percentage of YouTubers are monetised?
About 2.6% of all YouTube channels are in the YouTube Partner Programme, based on YouTube’s figure of more than 3 million creators and an estimated 115 million channels. If you mean ‘earning meaningful money’, the practical estimate is around 0.25% of all channels. YouTube does not publish a precise live count for this.
What percentage of YouTubers make a full-time income?
Well under 1% of active channels. Full-time creator income ($4,000+/month) is much rarer than basic monetisation because it requires higher view volumes, better monetisation strategy, and usually multiple revenue streams.
Can you make money on YouTube before 1,000 subscribers?
Yes. The early access YPP tier starts at 500 subscribers in eligible regions, giving access to fan funding and YouTube Shopping affiliate. Off-platform income, affiliate links, consulting, digital products, has no minimum subscriber requirement.
How much money does 1,000 subscribers make on YouTube?
There is no fixed amount. Subscriber count does not determine revenue. Niche CPM, audience location, video length, watch time, and monetisation strategy matter far more. A 1,000-subscriber finance channel may earn $200/month. A 1,000-subscriber entertainment channel may earn $8/month.
How much does YouTube take from creators?
YouTube takes 45% of ad revenue from long-form video ads, leaving creators with 55%. For channel memberships and Super Chat, YouTube takes 30%. For YouTube Shopping affiliate commissions, YouTube does not take a cut, creators receive the full commission from the brand.
Why does my YouTube CPM drop in January?
January CPM drops are structural and predictable, advertisers reset annual budgets after spending heavily in Q4. Drops of 30–50% from December are normal. This is not a permanent change. The correct benchmark is Q1 this year versus Q1 last year, not versus the previous December.
What type of YouTube channel makes the most money?
Finance, insurance, legal services, and B2B software command the highest CPM rates. A smaller channel in a high-CPM niche will typically out-earn a larger channel in a low-CPM entertainment niche. Execution still matters within any niche.
Is YouTube monetisation only AdSense?
No, and relying only on AdSense is one of the most common mistakes creators make. The strongest YouTube businesses combine ads with affiliate income, YouTube Shopping, sponsorships, digital products, memberships, live stream revenue, and owned audience assets like email lists.
How does Connected TV affect my YouTube earnings?
Significantly, if your content attracts TV-screen viewers. CTV placements average $20–$25 CPM, a 30–60% premium over mobile. Over 45% of YouTube watch time now happens on TV screens. Creators with longer lean-back content in finance, education, and documentary formats see the biggest CTV earnings uplift.
What is the YouTube Shopping affiliate program?
YouTube Shopping allows eligible YPP creators to tag products from participating brands in their videos, Shorts, and live streams. When a viewer clicks and purchases, the creator earns a commission. Since 25 March 2026, the programme is available to all YPP creators with at least 500 subscribers who meet the eligibility rules. Commission rates are set by individual brands.
Final thoughts
If you came here for one number: around 0.25% of YouTube channels earn meaningful money through direct YouTube monetisation. That is still directionally right.
But the better answer is bigger. Most YouTube channels make nothing. A minority make some money. A smaller group earns useful side income. A tiny fraction builds a serious creator business. The gap between those groups is not talent or luck, it is niche selection, packaging quality, consistency, video length strategy, and a monetisation model that goes beyond waiting for AdSense.
You do not need millions of subscribers to make YouTube worth it. You need a channel built on demand, trust, strong packaging, decent retention, 8-minute+ videos that qualify for mid-roll ads, and a monetisation model that fits the audience. Add YouTube Shopping affiliate from 500 subscribers, build an email list from day one, and treat AdSense as one of several income streams rather than the entire business.
Alan Spicer is a YouTube Certified Expert (since 2017) and independent YouTube consultant with 20 years of self-employment behind him. He has coached 500+ creators, run 500+ channel audits, worked on the vidIQ customer success team from 2020 to 2021, and helped grow channels such as Coin Bureau Trading (15k to 100k+ subscribers in eight months) and Woof & Joy (300k+ in under ten months). He holds six YouTube Silver Play Buttons and has a 100K+ combined audience.
Sources: Neal Mohan’s 2026 letter (YouTube Official Blog, 21 January 2026: $100B+ paid in four years, 200 billion daily Shorts views, 500,000+ creators in YouTube Shopping); YouTube Partner Program updates for 2027 (10 August 2026: 3 million+ creators in YPP, new thresholds from 1 February 2027); YouTube Shopping expansion to 500 subscribers (25 March 2026); 2025 U.S. YouTube Impact Report (Oxford Economics); YouTube Help: how engagement metrics are counted; Pew Research Center, 2019. Third-party estimates: ytshark.com channel statistics 2026; TubeAnalytics State of YouTube Monetization 2026; Influencer Marketing Hub Creator Economy Report 2025/2026; Goldman Sachs Creator Economy Research March 2025; FluxNote, OutlierKit, MilX and Lenos CPM/RPM data 2026; Exploding Topics. CPM and RPM figures are averages, and individual channels vary significantly by content quality, audience geography and seasonality. Last reviewed: 24 October 2026. This post provides general information and does not constitute financial advice. Affiliate disclosure: some links on this page are affiliate links (marked rel=”sponsored”). If you sign up through them I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Programme terms change, so check current terms on each provider’s site.
If you watch the whole ad on YouTube, a creator may earn more in some situations, especially with certain skippable ad formats. But it is not a simple universal rule that “full ad watched = more money every time”.
The more useful answer depends on the ad type, whether the ad impression qualifies for payment, whether the viewer interacts, where the viewer is located, and how that view fits into the creator’s wider RPM and monetisation mix. This guide breaks that down properly.
Why trust this guide?
I am not writing this as an outsider. I am a YouTube Certified Expert. I have coached 500+ clients, built and grown multiple channels, earned six YouTube Silver Play Buttons, built a personal audience of 100k+, and spent years working across YouTube strategy, SEO, retention, metadata, channel systems, and monetisation.
Ad revenue questions get messy because people mix up impressions, CPM, RPM, ad formats, and viewer behaviour. The point of this guide is to untangle that in plain English.
Quick answer: do YouTubers get paid more if I watch the whole ad?
Sometimes. Watching the whole ad can increase what a creator earns in some cases, especially with skippable video ads, but it does not automatically mean more money every single time.
The answer depends on the ad format, whether the ad impression qualifies for payment, and how YouTube is monetising that specific view.
That is the short answer Google can quote and the reader can use straight away.
The more precise version is this: creators can earn from ad impressions in different ways, and the value of a single ad view is shaped by more than just “did the viewer watch the whole thing?”. Some ads are skippable, some are not, some may pay after a certain watch threshold or interaction, and some revenue is better understood through overall RPM than through one ad event in isolation.
Why it depends on ad type
The first thing to understand is that not all YouTube ads work the same way.
Ad type
Does “watch the whole ad” matter?
Why
Skippable in-stream ad
Often yes
These can depend on how long the viewer watches or whether they interact
Non-skippable in-stream ad
Not in the same way
The ad was already served fully, so completion is built into the format
Bumper ad
Not really
These are very short and non-skippable by design
Premium watch
No ad to watch
Premium uses subscription revenue instead of normal ad serving
YouTube’s ad format documentation confirms that creators can have skippable, non-skippable, bumper, pre-roll, post-roll, and mid-roll formats depending on the video and monetisation settings. Source: YouTube Help.
Skippable ads explained
This is where most of the confusion comes from.
For skippable ads, the advertiser may not pay in the same way if the viewer skips very early. A longer watch or an interaction can matter more than a near-instant skip. This is why people often say that watching the whole ad helps the creator more.
Plain English version:
If you skip quickly, the creator may earn less or nothing from that ad impression.
If you watch longer, the creator is more likely to benefit.
If you watch the whole ad, that can sometimes be even better, but it still depends on the ad and bidding model.
This is the part that makes the original question directionally right, but still too simplistic. Watching the whole ad can help, but it is not a guaranteed flat-rate bonus that applies the same way to every ad.
Non-skippable ads explained
Non-skippable ads work differently because the viewer cannot skip them in the first place. That means the creator is not relying on the viewer choosing to stay past a skip threshold in the same way.
In that case, the question is less about “did you watch the whole ad?” and more about the fact that the ad was served at all.
Simple rule: completion matters more for skippable ads than for non-skippable ads.
Does clicking the ad help creators earn more?
Sometimes, yes.
Some ad models can be influenced by interaction as well as watch behaviour. So if a viewer clicks, that can signal more value to the advertiser and can contribute to the economics of that ad impression.
That said, creators should not be telling viewers to click ads just to help them. It is not a sensible growth strategy, and it is not how serious channels build reliable income anyway.
Why watching the whole ad is not the whole story
This is where creator earnings become more realistic and less myth-based.
Even if a viewer watches the whole ad, that is still only one tiny event inside a much bigger system. A creator’s earnings are shaped by:
how many views they get
how many of those views are monetised
how many ad impressions are served
which countries the viewers are in
which niche the content is in
whether the audience is advertiser-friendly
whether the channel also earns from Premium, memberships, affiliates, or sponsors
YouTube’s revenue analytics documentation explains that a view does not always include an ad, and that monetised playbacks and ad impressions are different from total views. It also explains that RPM includes more than just ads, such as YouTube Premium and fan funding. Source: YouTube Help.
Question
Best answer
Does watching the whole ad always mean more money?
No
Can watching more of a skippable ad help?
Yes
Do non-skippable ads work the same way?
No
Is ad completion the main thing creators should optimise for?
No, the bigger picture matters more
How this affects CPM and RPM
If you want to understand why two channels with similar views can earn very different amounts, you need to understand CPM and RPM.
Simple definitions:
CPM is what advertisers pay per 1,000 ad impressions before YouTube’s revenue share.
RPM is what the creator earns per 1,000 views after YouTube’s share and can include ads, Premium, memberships, and other revenue.
This matters because a single viewer watching a full ad might help at the margin, but the creator’s real business outcome is measured across the whole revenue system. YouTube’s own RPM help page confirms that RPM includes ad revenue, YouTube Premium, channel memberships, and more. YouTube Help.
If you are a creator, the right takeaway is not to obsess over whether one viewer watched one ad to the end. The better move is to build a channel that earns well across multiple layers.
What actually moves the needle more: stronger topics, better thumbnails, better retention, more monetised playbacks, better audience fit, cleaner ad-friendly content, and a broader revenue mix.
This is relevant because the whole-ad question makes more sense once you understand the difference between ad value and overall creator earnings.
Tools that genuinely help you build a better monetised channel
The old tools section needed a full rebuild. Tools should support a strategy, not pretend to replace one. These are the ones I would actually recommend first because they are relevant, trustworthy, and already supported by useful content on this site.
Tool
Best for
Why it earns a place here
Best next step
YouTube Studio
Watching RPM, monetized playbacks, and retention
This is where you see the bigger picture rather than obsessing over one ad event
Focus on stronger content that holds attention longer.
Increase monetised playbacks and total watch time.
Understand RPM instead of only thinking about ad clicks.
Build more than one revenue stream.
Final thoughts
If you came here for the fast answer, here it is again: sometimes, yes — watching the whole ad can help a creator earn more, but not always.
That is especially true for skippable ads, where watch length and interaction can matter more than they do with non-skippable formats.
The bigger truth is that creators make money from a wider system, not from one simple rule. Ad type, monetized playbacks, CPM, RPM, audience fit, retention, and other revenue streams all matter.
Do YouTubers get paid more if I watch the whole ad?
Sometimes. Watching the whole ad can increase what a creator earns in some cases, especially with skippable ads, but it is not a universal rule that applies the same way every time.
Do skippable ads pay more if I do not skip?
They can. A longer watch or an interaction can make that ad impression more valuable than an instant skip.
Do non-skippable ads work the same way?
Not exactly. With non-skippable ads, the ad has already been served fully, so viewer completion works differently from skippable formats.
Does clicking the ad help the YouTuber?
Sometimes, yes, but creators should not build their strategy around encouraging ad clicks. The bigger revenue picture matters more.
Does every YouTube view include an ad?
No. YouTube’s own analytics documentation says not all views have ads, which is one reason total views and earnings do not match neatly.
Is watching the whole ad the best way to support a creator?
It can help, but better support usually comes from watching more of the video, engaging, subscribing, using affiliate links, joining memberships, or buying creator products and services.
Does YouTube Premium change this?
Yes. Premium members do not watch normal ads, but creators can still earn through Premium revenue sharing instead.
What should creators focus on instead of obsessing over ad completion?
Creators should focus on stronger topics, better thumbnails, better retention, more monetized playbacks, and a wider monetisation mix.
1 million YouTube views can make anything from very little to a significant amount, depending on niche, audience location, monetized playbacks, video length, and the creator’s wider revenue system.
That is the short answer. The useful answer is understanding why there is no single fixed payout for 1 million views, what RPM actually tells you, and how ads, Premium, memberships, affiliates, and buyer intent can completely change the result.
This guide breaks that down properly, including realistic scenarios, why two channels with the same views can earn wildly different amounts, and what creators should optimise if they want those million views to be worth more.
Why trust this guide?
I am not writing this as an outsider. I am a YouTube Certified Expert. I have coached 500+ clients, built and grown multiple channels, earned six YouTube Silver Play Buttons, built a personal audience of 100k+, and spent years working across YouTube strategy, SEO, retention, metadata, channel systems, and monetisation.
This matters because the “1 million views” question is one of the most searched and one of the most badly answered. Most articles throw out a number with no context. Real creator earnings do not work like that.
If you want help applying any of this to your own channel, you can book a discovery call.
Quick answer: how much money does 1 million YouTube views make?
There is no fixed number. A practical answer is that 1 million YouTube views might make a few hundred pounds or dollars, a few thousand, or much more if the channel has strong RPM and additional monetisation beyond ads.
The better question is not “What is the one number?” It is “What RPM, audience, niche, and business model sit behind those views?”
YouTube’s own revenue analytics guidance explains why this varies so much. RPM is the creator-focused metric that includes total revenue reported in YouTube Analytics, including ads, YouTube Premium, channel memberships, Super Chat, and Super Stickers, divided by total views. It also says not all views monetise and not all views have ads. That alone tells you why 1 million views does not equal one universal payout.
Why there is no fixed payout for 1 million views
YouTube does not pay a flat rate per view.
What a creator earns depends on things like:
how many of those views were actually monetised
what advertisers were willing to pay in that niche
which countries the viewers came from
whether viewers were watching long-form content or Shorts
whether the creator also earned from YouTube Premium, memberships, or other revenue
whether the video had strong buyer intent or weak entertainment intent
Factor
Why it changes the money
Niche
Finance, business, software, and high-intent topics often monetise better than broad entertainment
Audience location
Advertiser demand varies heavily by country
Video format
Long-form, Shorts, livestreams, and Premium watch behaviour do not monetise the same way
Ad suitability
Some topics attract more advertiser demand than others
Extra monetisation
Affiliates, memberships, and products can make the same 1 million views worth far more
Why RPM is the better metric than guessing
If you want to answer the million-views question properly, RPM is the best starting point.
Simple definitions:
RPM = what the creator actually earns per 1,000 views after revenue share, including more than just ads.
CPM = what advertisers pay per 1,000 monetized playbacks before YouTube’s share.
YouTube’s analytics help makes this clear: RPM is creator-focused and includes multiple revenue sources, while playback-based ad metrics are narrower. That means RPM gives a more realistic “what did I actually make?” answer.
These are not guarantees. They are examples based on how RPM works.
Example RPM
Approximate revenue for 1 million views
What this usually suggests
£0.50 / $0.50
About £500 / $500
Weak monetisation, low advertiser demand, low monetised playback rate, or poor fit
£2 / $2
About £2,000 / $2,000
Decent baseline long-form monetisation for some general channels
£5 / $5
About £5,000 / $5,000
Stronger niche, better monetisation quality, or additional revenue sources
£10 / $10
About £10,000 / $10,000
High-intent niche, strong audience value, or excellent monetisation setup
This is the cleanest way to answer the headline question without lying. The value of 1 million views depends on the RPM behind them.
Why two channels with 1 million views can earn completely different amounts
Two channels can hit the same view count and still see wildly different outcomes.
Channel type
Why the earnings may differ
Broad entertainment
May attract large view counts but weaker advertiser value per view
Finance or software education
Can attract higher advertiser demand and higher-value audiences
Music or covers
May face revenue-sharing, rights issues, or weaker RPM depending on setup
Product review channel
Can add affiliate income on top of YouTube revenue
This is also why a smaller channel in a stronger niche can sometimes out-earn a much bigger one.
Why 1 million views can be worth far more than ad revenue
The smartest creators do not think of 1 million views as just ad money.
They think of those views as audience attention that can be monetised in layers.
One million views can also generate: affiliate sales, memberships, sponsorship interest, lead generation, course sales, product sales, consultation bookings, and stronger brand authority.
This is why the same million views can be worth £2,000 to one creator and £20,000+ in total business value to another. The ad revenue is only one layer.
If your goal is to increase the value of your views, these are the levers that matter most:
Choose topics with stronger advertiser and buyer intent.
Attract audiences in countries and niches with stronger commercial value.
Build videos that qualify for more monetised playbacks and stronger watch time.
Add affiliate bridges, products, services, or memberships.
Treat YouTube as a business system, not just a view counter.
This is the difference between chasing vanity metrics and building a creator business.
Fresh official facts worth knowing
This topic gets much stronger when you anchor it to YouTube’s own definitions instead of random internet payout guesses.
Fact
Why it matters
What it means in practice
YouTube says RPM includes ads, YouTube Premium, memberships, Super Chat and Super Stickers
Shows million-view value is broader than ad revenue alone
1 million views can be worth more than a simple ad estimate
YouTube says not all views have ads and not all views monetise equally
Explains why view count alone does not predict income
1 million views does not equal one fixed payout
YouTube says Premium gives creators another way to get paid when members watch their content
Shows ad-free viewers can still contribute revenue
Million-view earnings can include Premium watch value too
YouTube’s earnings reports are subject to adjustments including invalid traffic and content claims
Shows estimated revenue is not always final
Creators should be careful about treating early estimates as guaranteed payouts
Video pick: RPM vs CPM on YouTube
This is the most useful companion here because the million-views question makes far more sense once you understand RPM and CPM properly.
Tools that genuinely help you make your views worth more
The old tools section needed a full rebuild. Tools should support a strategy, not pretend to replace one. These are the ones I would actually recommend first because they are relevant, trustworthy, and already supported by useful content on this site.
Tool
Best for
Why it earns a place here
Best next step
YouTube Studio
Tracking RPM, top earners, and monetisation quality
This is where you see what your views are actually worth rather than guessing from internet averages
What I would do if I wanted my next 1 million views to be worth more
Stop asking for one universal payout number.
Track RPM and top-earning topics instead.
Build content with stronger commercial intent.
Add monetisation layers beyond ads.
Treat views as business attention, not just vanity metrics.
Final thoughts
If you came here for the fast answer, here it is again: 1 million YouTube views can make very different amounts depending on RPM, monetized playbacks, audience location, niche, and whether the creator monetises beyond ads.
That is why you will see people quote wildly different numbers online and all sound confident. The real answer is not one magic payout. The real answer is the monetisation system behind the views.
There is no fixed number. A useful estimate depends on RPM, niche, monetized playbacks, audience location, and how much revenue comes from more than just ads.
Can 1 million YouTube views make £1,000?
Yes, depending on the RPM. At £1 RPM, 1 million views would equal about £1,000, but some channels earn much less or much more.
Can 1 million YouTube views make £10,000?
Yes, in higher-value niches or when the creator has a strong monetisation mix. At £10 RPM, 1 million views would equal about £10,000.
Why do some creators earn more per million views than others?
Audience location, niche, advertiser demand, monetized playbacks, and additional revenue streams can change the value of the same number of views dramatically.
Does RPM matter more than CPM for this question?
Usually yes. RPM is closer to what the creator actually earns across total views.
Do 1 million Shorts views pay the same as 1 million long-form views?
No. Shorts monetisation works differently, so you should not assume the same payout logic applies.
Can affiliates and products make 1 million views worth more?
Absolutely. In many cases, the biggest money from 1 million views comes from monetisation beyond watch-page ads.
What is the best way to increase the value of YouTube views?
Focus on stronger commercial topics, better audience fit, higher RPM, and multiple revenue streams beyond ads alone.
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In the constantly evolving landscape of digital advertising, marketers and brands are always on the lookout for effective ways to reach their target audience. YouTube, as one of the largest online video platforms, offers a variety of advertising options.
One of these is YouTube Select (formerly known as Google Preferred), a premium service that allows advertisers to target ads to top-performing channels and content.
In this article, we will explore YouTube Select, compare it with normal adverts, and provide insights on how to use and become part of this premium service.
What is YouTube Select?
YouTube Select is an advertising program that enables brands to place their ads on the top 5% of YouTube channels based on popularity, engagement, and content quality.
These channels are grouped into 12 categories, allowing advertisers to focus on specific target audiences. YouTube Select lineups are human-verified, ensuring brand safety and alignment with advertiser values.
Benefits of YouTube Select
Access to premium content: Advertisers can place their ads on highly popular and engaging content, which increases the likelihood of reaching their target audience.
Improved targeting: With 12 distinct categories, advertisers can select the lineup that best matches their target audience’s interests.
Brand safety: YouTube Select’s human verification process ensures that ads are placed alongside content that aligns with brand values and guidelines.
Exclusive opportunities: YouTube Select offers sponsorships and programs, such as YouTubeOriginals, which provide additional avenues for brand promotion and visibility.
Top 5% of channels based on popularity, engagement, and quality
All YouTube channels (subject to YouTube’s ad guidelines)
Targeting
12 distinct categories for precise targeting
Broad targeting based on demographics, interests, and behaviours
Brand Safety
Human-verified content for brand alignment
Algorithm-based content filtering
Ad Formats
Various formats including sponsorships and programs
Standard formats like TrueView, Bumper ads, etc.
Cost
Typically higher due to premium content access
Lower, based on auction and targeting parameters
How to Use YouTube Select
To start using YouTube Select, follow these steps:
Sign up for a Google Ads account, if you don’t already have one.
Create a new campaign and choose the “Video” campaign type.
In the “Placements” section, select “YouTube videos” or “YouTube channels.”
Search for the YouTube Select lineup you want to target, and add it to your placements.
Set your targeting preferences, budget, and other campaign settings.
Create or upload your video ad, and submit it for review.
Once your ad is approved, your campaign will go live, and your ads will be served on the selected YouTube Select channels.
How to Be Included in YouTube Select
To have your channel considered for inclusion in YouTube Select, focus on the following aspects:
Content quality: Produce engaging, high-quality content that resonates with your target audience. This will help increase your channel’s popularity and overall performance.
Consistency: Maintain a consistent posting schedule, ensuring that your viewers have a reason to keep coming back to your channel.
Audience engagement: Encourage comments, likes, and shares by engaging with your audience and creating content that invites interaction.
Advertiser-friendly content: Ensure your content complies with YouTube’s ad guidelines and does not contain any controversial or inappropriate material.
Channel optimization: Optimize your channel by using relevant keywords, tags, and descriptions to increase visibility and discoverability.
Although there is no direct application process for YouTube Select, focusing on the above aspects will increase your chances of being noticed by YouTube and included in their premium lineups.
Useful Tips – Get The Most From YouTube Select
Research your target audience: Understand your audience’s preferences, interests, and online habits to create content that resonates with them and increases engagement.
Collaborate with other creators: Partner with other YouTube creators to expand your reach and tap into new audiences. Collaborations can help both channels grow and increase the likelihood of being included in YouTube Select.
Leverage analytics: Regularly review your YouTube analytics to identify trends, patterns, and areas for improvement. Use this data to optimize your content strategy and enhance your channel’s performance.
Invest in video production: High-quality videos are more likely to engage viewers and keep them watching. Invest in good equipment, editing software, and production techniques to create visually appealing content.
Promote your channel: Utilize social media, email marketing, and other promotional tactics to increase visibility and drive traffic to your YouTube channel. This will help grow your audience and improve your channel’s performance.
Stay updated on platform changes: Keep up-to-date with YouTube’s policies, guidelines, and feature updates to ensure your channel remains compliant and takes advantage of new opportunities.
YouTube Select vs. Normal Adverts: Harnessing the Power of Preferred Advertising
YouTube Select offers a powerful advertising solution for brands looking to reach a highly engaged audience through premium content.
By comparing YouTube Select with normal adverts, advertisers can make an informed decision about the best advertising approach for their specific needs.
By following the steps outlined in this article, brands can harness the power of YouTube Select, while content creators can improve their chances of being included in this premium service. With the right strategy, both advertisers and creators
Deep Dive Q&A: YouTube Select, YouTube Advertising, and Influencer Marketing
Q1: What is the primary difference between YouTube Select and normal YouTube advertising?
A: YouTube Select targets ads on the top 5% of YouTube channels based on popularity, engagement, and content quality. These channels are grouped into 12 categories, allowing advertisers to focus on specific target audiences. In contrast, normal YouTube advertising is available across all channels (subject to YouTube’s ad guidelines), offering a broader range of targeting options based on demographics, interests, and behaviors.
Q2: Can small businesses benefit from using YouTube Select?
A: Yes, small businesses can benefit from using YouTube Select if they have a well-defined target audience and wish to access premium content to maximize ad exposure. However, the cost of YouTube Select may be higher than normal YouTube advertising, so small businesses should weigh the benefits against their marketing budget.
A: Content creators can optimize their channel by focusing on content quality, consistency, audience engagement, advertiser-friendly content, and channel optimization through relevant keywords, tags, and descriptions.
Q4: What are the most popular ad formats on YouTube?
A: Some popular YouTube ad formats include TrueView In-Stream ads, TrueView Discovery ads, Bumper ads, and Non-Skippable In-Stream ads. YouTube Select also offers exclusive sponsorship and program opportunities, such as YouTube Originals, for enhanced brand promotion and visibility.
Q5: How can advertisers measure the success of their YouTube campaigns?
A: Advertisers can measure the success of their YouTube campaigns by tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) such as views, watch time, impressions, click-through rate (CTR), view-through rate (VTR), cost per view (CPV), and conversions. YouTube provides a comprehensive analytics dashboard to monitor these metrics, allowing advertisers to optimize their campaigns accordingly.
Q6: How does influencer marketing tie into YouTube advertising?
A: Influencer marketing is an advertising strategy that involves partnering with influential individuals, often YouTube creators, to promote a product or service. Brands can leverage influencers’ existing audience and credibility to reach new customers, making it an effective complement to other YouTube advertising methods.
Q7: What factors should brands consider when choosing a YouTube influencer?
A: Brands should consider the influencer’s relevance to their target audience, the size and engagement level of their audience, content quality, and past performance of similar collaborations. It’s essential to select an influencer whose values align with the brand’s image and goals.
Q8: What are some tips for a successful influencer marketing campaign on YouTube?
A: Some tips for a successful influencer marketing campaign on YouTube include setting clear goals and expectations, providing creative freedom to the influencer, establishing a fair compensation structure, tracking and measuring the campaign’s performance, and maintaining open communication throughout the collaboration.
Q9: How can I ensure my YouTube ads comply with the platform’s guidelines?
A: To ensure your ads comply with YouTube’s guidelines, familiarize yourself with the platform’s ad policies, which cover content, targeting, and data usage. Avoid any content that violates these policies, and when in doubt, seek clarification from YouTube or consult their Help Center.
Q10: What are some best practices for creating engaging YouTube ads?
A: Some best practices for creating engaging YouTube ads include:
Grabbing the viewer’s attention within the first few seconds
Keeping the ad concise and to-the-point
Telling a compelling story that resonates with your target audience
Using high-quality visuals and audio
Including a clear call-to-action (CTA)
Testing different ad variations to optimize performance
Q11: How can I target my ads more effectively on YouTube?
A: To target your ads more effectively on YouTube, you can use a combination of demographic targeting (age, gender, parental status), interest targeting (affinities, custom affinity audiences, life events), and placement targeting (specific channels, videos, or YouTube Select lineups). Regularly reviewing your campaign’s performance and adjusting your targeting parameters can help you reach your desired audience more effectively.
A: Brands can manage their YouTube advertising budget effectively by:
Setting clear goals and objectives for their campaigns
Allocating funds based on priority and potential return on investment (ROI)
Regularly monitoring and optimizing campaign performance
Testing different ad formats, targeting options, and bidding strategies to find the most cost-effective approach
Utilizing YouTube’s daily budget and bid cap options to control spending
Q13: What role do keywords play in YouTube advertising?
A: Keywords play a crucial role in YouTube advertising by helping advertisers target their ads based on the user’s search queries and the content they consume. Proper keyword research and selection can improve the relevancy and effectiveness of your ads, ensuring they reach the right audience.
A: To promote your YouTube channel organically, focus on:
Producing high-quality, engaging content that resonates with your audience
Optimizing your channel and video metadata with relevant keywords, tags, and descriptions
Encouraging viewer interaction through comments, likes, and shares
Collaborating with other creators to expand your reach
Sharing your content across social media platforms and other marketing channels
Q15: Can I use remarketing to improve my YouTube advertising campaigns?
A: Yes, you can use remarketing to target viewers who have previously interacted with your channel, videos, or ads. This allows you to re-engage users who have shown interest in your content, products, or services, increasing the likelihood of conversions. By creating remarketing lists in Google Ads, you can tailor your campaigns to specific segments of your audience, making your advertising efforts more relevant and effective.
Two YouTube channels with identical views can earn wildly different money — and CPM is the reason.
A finance channel can out-earn a gaming channel five to ten times over on the same view count. This is the 2026 niche-by-niche CPM breakdown — real ranges, worked earnings examples, seasonality, and how to push your own rates higher.
Why trust this? I’m Alan Spicer — a YouTube Certified Expert with two decades on the platform, six Silver Play Buttons and 500+ creators coached. I’ve seen the earnings behind the view counts across dozens of niches, so this is grounded reality, not guesswork.
⚡ QUICK ANSWER: What pays the most on YouTube?
Niche decides your CPM more than anything else. In 2026, personal finance ($15-45), insurance ($12-38), legal ($10-40) and business/SaaS ($12-35) pay the most per 1,000 ad impressions, while gaming ($1-8), entertainment and beauty pay least and rely on volume plus affiliates. The all-niche average is roughly $4-8 CPM. Remember your take-home RPM is always lower than CPM.
CPM vs RPM: The 30-Second Explainer
Before the numbers, get these two straight — they’re constantly confused:
CPM (cost per mille) is what advertisers pay per 1,000 ad impressions. It’s an advertiser-side number. Full detail in what is YouTube CPM.
RPM (revenue per mille) is what you actually take home per 1,000 video views — after YouTube’s 45% cut and after accounting for the views that never show an ad. More in what is YouTube RPM.
The headline: RPM is always lower than CPM. A $20 CPM might translate to an $8-10 RPM once the cut and ad-free views are factored in. When people quote big “CPM” numbers, your real earnings are the RPM — so read every figure below with that in mind.
YouTube CPM by Niche 2026: The Master Table
Here’s the big one — estimated 2026 CPM ranges by niche for a US audience, with a rough take-home RPM guide. Rates outside the US typically run 40-70% lower.
Niche
CPM range (US)
Rough RPM
Tier
Personal Finance & Investing
$15–$45
$8–$20
🟢 Top
Insurance
$12–$38
$7–$18
🟢 Top
Legal & Tax
$10–$40
$6–$18
🟢 Top
Business & Entrepreneurship
$14–$35
$7–$16
🟢 Top
Software / SaaS
$12–$30
$6–$14
🟢 Top
Make Money Online
$10–$30
$5–$14
🟢 Top
Real Estate
$12–$30
$6–$14
🟢 Top
Digital Marketing
$8–$25
$4–$12
🟠 High
Technology & Reviews
$8–$25
$4–$12
🟠 High
Health & Fitness
$6–$15
$3–$8
🟠 Mid
Education
$5–$12
$3–$7
🟠 Mid
Travel
$4–$10
$2–$6
🟠 Mid
Food & Cooking
$3–$8
$2–$5
🔴 Lower
Beauty & Fashion
$3–$8
$2–$5
🔴 Lower
Lifestyle & Vlogging
$2–$6
$1–$4
🔴 Lower
Entertainment & Comedy
$2–$6
$1–$4
🔴 Lower
Gaming
$1–$8
$1–$4
🔴 Lower
Music & Relaxation
$1–$5
$1–$3
🔴 Lower
Ranges are 2026 benchmarks for US audiences from aggregated industry reports; your exact figures depend on audience location, watch time, format and season. Compare with my CPM by niche 2026 and highest-paid niches breakdowns.
The Highest-Paying Niches (and Why)
The top tier is dominated by one thing: advertisers with deep pockets and high customer value. When a single new customer is worth thousands, brands happily pay a premium for the ad slot.
Personal finance & investing ($15-45): brokerages, credit cards and robo-advisors bid aggressively; tax season and market events push rates even higher.
Insurance ($12-38): a policy is a long-term, high-value customer, so insurers pay up.
Legal & tax ($10-40): law firms and services compete hard, and there are relatively few quality creators — high rates, low competition.
Business, SaaS & marketing ($8-35): B2B software has huge customer lifetime value, and affiliate commissions on tools ($50-500 per referral) can dwarf the ad income.
Real estate ($12-30): mortgage lenders and property platforms reach an audience making large financial decisions.
A crucial insight: sub-topics matter as much as the niche. A tech channel doing general “unboxing” might see $5-8, but shift to “software comparison and review” and it can jump to $12-20 — same channel, buyer-intent content.
Mid-Range Niches
The middle tier — tech, health & fitness, education, digital marketing — pairs decent CPMs with big, engaged audiences, which is often the sweet spot for a sustainable channel. Tech in particular is a story of two halves: general consumer content sits mid-range, while high-intent reviews and comparisons climb into the top tier. Health and education attract steady advertiser interest and lend themselves brilliantly to courses and your own products, which is where the real money often lives regardless of CPM.
Lower-CPM Niches (Don’t Write Them Off)
Gaming, entertainment, beauty, food, lifestyle and music sit at the bottom for CPM — but that’s only half the story:
Volume is the game. These niches attract enormous audiences, so low CPM × huge views can still be serious money at scale.
Affiliates rescue the maths. Beauty and travel creators routinely out-earn their CPM through affiliate links (Amazon, LTK, booking platforms). A $3 CPM beauty channel can add far more per view in affiliate income.
Passion sustains you. A niche you love at a lower CPM beats a high-CPM niche you quit. Gaming and vlogging can absolutely pay — just plan to diversify beyond ads with sponsorships, merch and memberships.
Worked Earnings Examples: Same Views, Different Money
Here’s what 100,000 monetised views looks like across the tiers, using mid-range RPMs from the table above:
Finance (RPM ~$14) → ~$1,400 from 100k views.
Tech (RPM ~$8) → ~$800.
Health & fitness (RPM ~$5) → ~$500.
Beauty (RPM ~$3) → ~$300 in ads — but often another $300-600 in affiliate income on top.
Gaming (RPM ~$2.50) → ~$250, leaning on volume, sponsorships and memberships.
Advertiser demand & customer value. The more a niche’s customers are worth, the more advertisers bid — finance and legal at the top, entertainment at the bottom.
Audience geography. US, UK, Canada and Australia audiences command the highest rates; the same content to other regions can earn 40-70% less.
Sub-topic intent. Buyer-intent content (“best CRM software”) vastly out-earns passive content (“funny fails”) even within the same channel.
Seasonality. The calendar moves rates more than most creators realise — see below.
CPM Through the Year
Your CPM isn’t fixed — it breathes with advertiser budgets:
Q4 (Nov-Dec): the annual peak. Black Friday and holiday campaigns push CPMs to their highest — some creators see them double or triple December vs their yearly average.
January: the cliff. The first few weeks see the sharpest drop of the year as budgets reset — often 50%+ down from December.
Feb-Apr: recovery, plus a tax-season spike for finance and legal content.
Apr-Sept: steady, with back-to-school lifting education and tech.
Plan big uploads and launches for the high-CPM months, and don’t panic when January looks grim — it always does.
How to Increase Your CPM & RPM
You can’t change advertiser rates, but you can steer toward them:
Here’s the mistake that costs creators the most: picking a niche on CPM alone. Two reasons not to:
Ad revenue is fragile. It swings with seasonality, algorithm changes and advertiser moods. Channels that rely only on ads are exposed.
Other streams often dwarf ads. A finance or SaaS creator can add $5-15 of RPM-equivalent from affiliates and brand deals — sometimes doubling total revenue without changing the content.
So use CPM to inform your niche, not decide it. Pick something you can sustain (my niche selection guide helps), then build the full stack: ads, affiliates, sponsorships, memberships and your own products. That’s how the numbers in this article become a real income — see the complete picture in do you get paid for YouTube.
People Also Ask
What is the average CPM on YouTube in 2026?
Across all niches, roughly $4-8 per 1,000 ad impressions — though that average is dragged down by high-volume gaming and entertainment. Most creators in mid-tier niches see $5-15.
How much is 1,000 views worth on YouTube?
It depends on niche and RPM, not CPM. At a typical RPM, 1,000 views might earn anywhere from about $1 (gaming) to $14+ (finance) in ad revenue — which is why niche matters so much more than raw views.
Do faceless channels earn high CPMs?
They can — a faceless finance or tech channel earns the same high CPM as an on-camera one. See starting a faceless channel to target high-CPM niches without appearing on camera.
Do YouTube Shorts have a CPM?
Not in the same way — Shorts use a pooled revenue model, and RPMs are far lower (roughly $0.05-0.20 per 1,000 views). More in can YouTube Shorts be monetised.
YouTube CPM: FAQ
What is a good CPM on YouTube in 2026?
It depends entirely on your niche. For gaming or entertainment, $4-6 is solid; for finance or tech, anything below $10 would be considered low. As a general benchmark, a CPM above $8 for a US audience puts you in a healthy range, and above $15 is excellent — a level mostly seen in finance, legal and tech.
Which YouTube niche has the highest CPM?
Personal finance and investing consistently tops the charts, with CPMs around $15-45 per 1,000 ad impressions in 2026. Insurance, legal, business and SaaS follow close behind. These pay the most because banks, brokerages and law firms will pay a premium to reach audiences with high spending power and buyer intent.
What is the difference between CPM and RPM?
CPM (cost per mille) is what advertisers pay per 1,000 ad impressions. RPM (revenue per mille) is what you actually take home per 1,000 video views, after YouTube’s 45% cut and once you account for views that show no ads. RPM is always lower than CPM, and it’s the number that reflects your real earnings.
Why is my CPM so low?
The most common reasons are your niche (entertainment and gaming naturally pay less), your audience’s location (non-US audiences typically earn 40-70% less), the time of year (January sees the sharpest drop), and content that doesn’t attract high-value advertisers. Shifting toward buyer-intent sub-topics and US-heavy audiences lifts CPM.
Does CPM change during the year?
Yes, significantly. CPMs peak in Q4 (November-December) as advertisers spend holiday budgets, then fall sharply in the first weeks of January when budgets reset — often by 50% or more. Rates recover through spring, and finance and legal content spikes again during tax season from February to April.
Should I pick a niche just because it has a high CPM?
No. CPM is only one part of the picture. A high-CPM niche you have no interest in will fail from burnout, and lower-CPM niches like beauty and travel often out-earn their CPM through affiliate links and sponsorships. Choose a niche you can sustain, then diversify your income beyond ads.
Final Thoughts
YouTube CPM isn’t one number — it’s a spectrum, and where you sit on it is decided mostly by your niche, your audience and the calendar. Finance, insurance and legal creators earn many times more per view than gaming or vlogging channels, but the lower-CPM niches make it back through sheer volume and clever affiliate income. Use the table above as your benchmark, chase the buyer-intent angles within your niche, plan around the seasons — and never forget that ad revenue is just one floor of the building. Stack affiliates, sponsorships and your own products on top, and even a modest CPM turns into a real living.
A note on this guide: CPM and RPM ranges are 2026 benchmarks for US audiences, aggregated from public industry reports and creator-reported data (including analysis from vidIQ and Influencer Marketing Hub). Rates vary by audience location, watch time, format and season, and change over time — treat them as directional, not guaranteed. Some links here are affiliate links (rel=”sponsored”) and never change the price you pay.
If you’re a content creator on YouTube, you might be wondering how to increase your CPM (cost per mille) and RPM (revenue per mille).
These metrics are important for determining how much money you can make from your YouTube videos.
What are CPM and RPM on YouTube? – CPM (cost per mille) refers to the amount of money you earn per 1,000 ad impressions on your videos. RPM (revenue per mille) refers to the estimated amount of money you earn per 1,000 views on your videos, taking into account all sources of revenue, including ads, YouTube Premium, and channel memberships.
In this blog post, we’ll discuss some tips and strategies for increasing your CPM and RPM on YouTube.
Optimize Your Video Titles and Descriptions
The title and description of your video play a big role in determining whether people click on your video or not. Make sure your video titles and descriptions are informative, interesting, and accurately reflect the content of your video. This can help increase your click-through rate (CTR), which can lead to higher CPM and RPM.
Use descriptive and concise titles: Your title should accurately reflect the content of your video and be easy to understand. Try to keep your titles under 60 characters to ensure they aren’t cut off in search results.
Incorporate relevant keywords: Use keywords that are relevant to your video content in your title and description. This can help your video rank higher in search results.
Write compelling descriptions: Use the description to give viewers more information about the video, including a summary of the content and any relevant details. Use relevant keywords throughout the description, but avoid keyword stuffing.
Add links and calls to action: Use your description to include links to related content, your website, and social media pages. You can also use the description to ask viewers to like, comment, and subscribe to your channel.
Use tags: Add relevant tags to your video to help it appear in search results and suggested videos.
Consider the audience: Make sure your titles and descriptions are targeted to your intended audience. Use language and tone that will resonate with them and encourage engagement.
By following these tips, you can optimize your YouTube titles and descriptions and increase the visibility and engagement of your videos.
Focus on High-Value Niches
Certain niches on YouTube tend to have higher CPM and RPM than others. For example, tech, finance, and beauty are all niches that typically have high CPM and RPM.
If you’re looking to increase your earnings on YouTube, consider focusing on a high-value niche that you’re interested in.
YouTube rewards content creators who can keep viewers engaged for longer periods of time. This is because YouTube makes more money from longer videos, so they’re more likely to promote videos that keep viewers on the platform for longer.
Try to create videos that are at least 8 minutes long, as this can help increase your CPM and RPM.
Once you have a longer video you can add more adverts. These adverts are called Mid Rolls.
Try to use high-value keywords that are relevant to your video and have high search volume. This can help increase your video’s visibility and ultimately lead to higher CPM and RPM.
High-value keywords are search terms or phrases that have significant search volume and high commercial intent. These keywords are typically used by people who are actively searching for a product or service, and are more likely to convert into paying customers.
For example, if you have a website that sells running shoes, a high-value keyword could be “best running shoes” or “buy running shoes online.” These keywords are likely to have a high search volume and indicate that the searcher is looking to make a purchase.
High-value keywords can vary depending on the industry and type of business. Some keywords may be more competitive and have higher cost-per-click (CPC) in advertising, but they can also lead to higher returns if you can effectively target and convert those searchers into customers.
To find high-value keywords, you can use keyword research tools like Google AdWords Keyword Planner, SEMrush, or Ahrefs. These tools can help you identify search volume, competition, and other metrics to determine which keywords are worth targeting.
Focus on Audience Retention
Audience retention is a metric that measures how long viewers stay on your video. This metric is important because it’s a signal to YouTube that your video is engaging and valuable to viewers.
Try to create videos that keep viewers engaged and watching until the end. This can help increase your CPM and RPM over time.
Build a Loyal Audience
Having a loyal audience can help increase your CPM and RPM because loyal viewers are more likely to watch your videos and engage with your content.
Try to build a community around your channel by responding to comments, hosting live streams, and creating content that your audience is interested in. This can help increase engagement and build a loyal following.
Collaborate with Other YouTubers
Collaborating with other YouTubers can help increase your exposure and bring in new viewers to your channel.
This can help increase your CPM and RPM by expanding your audience and increasing engagement on your videos. Try to collaborate with YouTubers in your niche who have a similar audience to your own.
In conclusion, increasing your CPM and RPM on YouTube requires a combination of strategies, including optimizing your video titles and descriptions, focusing on high-value niches, creating longer videos, using high-value keywords, focusing on audience retention, building a loyal audience, and collaborating with other YouTubers.
By implementing these strategies and consistently creating high-quality content, you can increase your earnings on YouTube over time.
Q: What is the difference between CPM and RPM on YouTube?
A: CPM (cost per mille) refers to the amount of money you earn per 1,000 ad impressions on your videos. RPM (revenue per mille) refers to the estimated amount of money you earn per 1,000 views on your videos, taking into account all sources of revenue, including ads, YouTube Premium, and channel memberships.
Q: How can I find high-value keywords for my video tags?
A: There are several tools you can use to find high-value keywords for your video tags, such as the YouTube Keyword Tool, Google Trends, and SEMrush. Look for keywords that are relevant to your video and have high search volume, and try to include them in your tags, title, and description.
A: YouTube rewards longer videos that keep viewers engaged for longer periods of time. Try to create videos that are at least 10 minutes long, as this can help increase your CPM and RPM. However, it’s important to focus on creating quality content that keeps viewers engaged, rather than simply trying to make your videos longer.
A: There are several strategies you can use to increase audience retention on your videos, such as creating a compelling hook at the beginning of your video, using engaging visuals and sound effects, providing value to your viewers, and breaking up your content into shorter segments. You can also use YouTube analytics to identify the parts of your video where viewers tend to drop off, and make adjustments to keep them engaged.
Q: How can I collaborate with other YouTubers to increase my CPM and RPM?
A: Collaborating with other YouTubers can help increase your exposure and bring in new viewers to your channel, which can help increase your CPM and RPM. Try to collaborate with YouTubers in your niche who have a similar audience to your own, and create content that appeals to both of your audiences. You can also cross-promote each other’s channels and videos, and collaborate on sponsored content or product launches.
Q: How long does it take to see an increase in my CPM and RPM on YouTube?
A: Increasing your CPM and RPM on YouTube is a gradual process that takes time and consistent effort. It may take several months or even years to see a significant increase in your earnings, depending on the quality of your content, the size of your audience, and the strategies you use to monetize your channel. It’s important to focus on creating high-quality content that provides value to your viewers, and to continually experiment with new strategies to increase your earnings over time.
YouTube Shorts is a new short-form video feature on YouTube that allows users to create and share short-form videos, up to 60 seconds long. Shorts can be created using the YouTube app and can include elements such as music, text, and effects.
YouTube Shorts is designed to be a competitor to TikTok and other short-form video platforms. The feature was launched in September 2020 and is currently only available in select countries.
YouTube Shorts is aimed at creators and viewers who enjoy and engage with short-form video content, and it provides a new way for creators to reach and engage with their audiences on YouTube.
How To Make Money with YouTube Shorts
Making money on YouTube Shorts is possible through monetization, where you earn money from advertisements shown on your videos. Here are a few ways you can do this:
Monetization through AdSense: This is where you link your YouTube channel with Google AdSense and earn money from advertisements shown on your videos. The earnings depend on various factors such as views, clicks, and engagement on your videos, and the amount of money you can earn varies.
Affiliate marketing: You can promote products and services on your videos and earn a commission for each sale made through your unique affiliate link. The commission percentage varies depending on the affiliate program you join.
Sponsored content: Brands may pay you to create content promoting their products or services. The amount you earn depends on the brand and the nature of the agreement.
It is challenging to estimate the income from YouTube Shorts as it depends on various factors such as views, engagement, and monetization methods.
Note that it takes time and effort to build a large and engaged audience, so don’t expect to make a lot of money overnight.
Here are some frequently asked questions about YouTube Shorts:
What are YouTube Shorts?
YouTube Shorts is a new short-form video feature on YouTube that allows users to create and share videos up to 60 seconds in length.
How do I create a YouTube Short?
To create a YouTube Short, you’ll need to use the YouTube app on your smartphone. From the app, you can access the Shorts camera, where you can record and edit your video.
Can I monetize my YouTube Shorts?
Yes, you can monetize your YouTube Shorts through ads and other monetization methods. However, the rules and requirements for monetization may change over time.
What are the requirements for uploading a YouTube Short?
To upload a YouTube Short, you’ll need to have a YouTube account, and your channel must meet YouTube’s Partner Program policies. Additionally, there may be restrictions on the content you can include in your Shorts.
Can I use music in my YouTube Shorts?
Yes, you can use music in your YouTube Shorts. However, you must have the rights to use the music, and YouTube may remove videos that violate copyright laws.
Can I edit my YouTube Shorts after I’ve uploaded them?
Yes, you can edit your YouTube Shorts after uploading them. From the YouTube app, you can access your video and make changes such as trimming, adding music, or changing the caption.
Can I see the performance of my YouTube Shorts?
Yes, you can see the performance of your YouTube Shorts, including views, engagement, and audience retention. From the YouTube Studio, you can access analytics for your Shorts and other videos on your channel.
It wasn’t that long ago that making YouTube videos were created just for fun. But now, it’s one of the highest-paying jobs on the planet. Content creators are making a living out of ad revenue, sponsorships, and using their influence to branch out to other business ventures. The competition is high, but here are the 20 of the richest YouTubers dominating the video-sharing platform right now.
Top 20 Wealthiest YouTubers of 2022:
1. Jeffree Star – $200 Million
The makeup artist and former musician is on the top of the list as he is a master of promoting his own brand, Jeffree Star Cosmetics, using his YouTube channel. He makes beauty content and shares his opinion on confidence, self-image, and fame.
Jeffree made money before YouTube by doing various makeup and modeling gigs. He also joined Myspace and gained a large following. He later started a YouTube channel to endorse his music. But when it didn’t work, he launched his own business.
With 16.1 million subscribers, he is far from being the most-subscribed YouTuber, but it’s enough to make him the wealthiest. His company alone makes him over $100 million yearly. Combine that with his other income sources, and Jeffree gets a $200 million estimated net worth.
2. PewDiePie – $40 Million
Felix Kjellberg, also known as PewDiePie, is dubbed by many as the king of YouTube. He has been on YouTube for a long time, popularizing commentary and reaction videos relating to video games and other pop culture topics.
PewDiePie was always passionate about gaming in his youth, so he recorded himself playing his favorite games. It wasn’t easy at first as YouTube didn’t have the monetization feature yet. He supported his lifestyle by selling artwork, working in the harbor, and running a hot dog stand.
He had the biggest YouTube channel for a long time until T-Series dethroned him after their rivalry. Still, he remains the most popular individual user on the site with 111 million subscribers and a net worth of approximately $40 million.
3. Markiplier – $35 Million
Markiplier is a YouTuber who makes comedic sketches and gameplay videos. Like PewDiePie, Mark has a long history on YouTube. He is a pioneer of the sketch style of playing every character involved.
He has created multiple YouTube channels throughout the years because of different reasons. The first time was when his Adsense account was banned. So, he made MarkiplierGAME. He is also a part of the now-deleted Unus Annus channel.
Now, his self-titled main channel has a subscriber count of 32.3 million. Mark has also found success in other ventures, such as podcasting and voice acting. He has a net worth of around $35 million as a result of his endeavors.
4. DanTDM – $35 Million
Originally referred to as TheDiamondMInecraft, DanTDM is another content creator who got most of his fame and fortune by playing video games. He primarily plays Minecraft, but he also tries other games, like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Pokemon.
In the category of dedicated Minecraft YouTube channel, he set a Guinness World Record for the most views. Dan also broke the record for the most goals scored by a Rocket League squad of two or three players in a single game.
Dan has acquired a total of 26 million subscribers. With this following, he wrote the book titled Trayaurus and the Enchanted Crystal in 2016. He did a book tour and starred in a YouTube Red series the following year. He has a net worth of nearly $35 million.
5. Ryan’s World – $32 Million
Ryan’s World is one of the most recognized YouTube accounts for children. In this channel, a child named Ryan Kaji reviews toy products, performs DIY science experiments, and completes numerous tasks.
It was previously known as Ryan ToysReview, but it was later renamed to its current moniker as Ryan tried new things. The 10-year-old’s mother had given up her full-time career to work with her son for this channel.
They currently have nine total channels, but they garnered 32 million subscribers on their main account. There’s a Spanish and Japanese version of Ryan’s World. They also sell merch, which is mainly toys and clothing. This gives Ryan a $32 million net worth at a young age.
6. Dude Perfect – $30 Million
Cody Jones, Tyler Toney, Garrett Hilbert, and twins Cory and Coby Cotton make up Dude Perfect. They gained popularity by making trick shot videos. Now, they are also doing other wild challenges and fun video series.
The five members were all roommates in college at Texas A&M University. They started by recording trick shots at Tyler’s ranch. When their videos became viral, ESPN called them and asked to feature them.
Dude Perfect has amassed 57.3 million subscribers. Players from several professional sports leagues have collaborated with them. They also created a mobile game with the same name as their channel. Now, the group has a total of $30 million in net worth.
7. MrBeast – $25 Million
This may come as a surprise to some, but MrBeast is not the wealthiest YouTuber alive. He just likes to make philanthropy and challenge videos in which he gives away thousands, and sometimes millions, of dollars to random people and organizations.
Jimmy began posting on YouTube as MrBeast6000 when he was 13 years old. He started getting mainstream attention in 2017 when he made unique vlogs and rigorous challenges.
MrBeast is now close to getting the Red Diamond Play Button as he racked up 91.8 million subscribers. This fame also helped him launch other ventures such as Finger on the App, MrBeast Burger, Feastables. That’s why it’s not surprising that he has over $25 million in net worth.
8. VanossGaming – $25 Million
Evan Fong, popularly known as VanossGaming, is a Canadian online figure, creative director, gaming commentator, and disc jockey. He showcases most of his talents on his YouTube channel.
He created his YouTube channel around the same time he went to college to study economics. When he began to devote more time to content creation, his parents became concerned. But everything worked out in the end for Fong.
He is regarded as a key character in the expanding video game commentary subculture. This is how he got 25.6 million people to subscribe to his channel. He also makes money as a DJ called Rynx. It eventually gave him an estimated net worth of $25 million.
9. Ninja – $25 Million
Ninja, whose real name is Richard Tyler Blevins, is a professional gamer known for streaming Halo 3, Fortnite, PUBG, and more. Team Liquid, Cloud9, Renegades, and Luminosity Gaming were among the teams he played for.
He never went to a university and started streaming in 2011. He was slowly getting viewers at first. His mainstream media debut came in March 2018, when he streamed Fortnite with Travis Scott, Drake, and JuJu Smith-Schuster.
At the time of writing, Ninja’s subscriber count is hidden, but it’s known that he reached 23.9 million in the past. Apart from YouTube, he has many fans on Twitch, even becoming the most-followed channel on the platform in late 2021. He now has a net worth close to $25 million.
10. Rhett and Link – $24 Million
Rhett James McLaughlin and Charles Lincoln “Link” Neal III are a comedic pair that dubs themselves as the “Internetainers”. They have made several comedy projects together, but perhaps their most successful one is the web series Good Mythical Morning.
The duo met in first grade at a North Carolina elementary school. They went on to share a dorm room at North Carolina State University. They both worked in their respective fields for a period while also creating skits.
Their Rhett and Link channel has 4.99 million subscribers, while Good Mythical Morning has 17.5 million. They run five channels in total. They are also the current owners of another comedy group called Smosh. With this, the two have a combined net worth of $24 million.
11. James Charles – $22 Million
As a creator who thrives in the beauty genre, James Charles Dickinson is known for his makeup tutorials. He has stated that cosmetics is a creative expression and an art form for him.
He got into beauty by assisting a colleague with her makeup for a school dance. He eventually taught himself how to do it alone and began doing it professionally for others. James started his channel while working as a small makeup artist in New York.
James has about 24.2 million subscribers currently. After a tweet displaying his makeup made headlines, he was named CoverGirl’s first male brand ambassador. He’s over $22 million after releasing his own makeup line.
12. Jake Paul – $22 Million
Jake Paul is a vlogger who has turned his focus to celebrity boxing. His YouTube channel is known for its pranks, controversy, and music. He is a part of Team 10, who dropped the song, It’s Everyday Bro, which received mixed reactions from listeners.
He first became known on Vine and then for his role as Dirk Mann on the Disney Channel show Bizaardvark, which he played for two seasons. Paul has been the target of numerous controversies during his career as a result of his actions.
Even with the disputes, Paul has gained 20.4 million subscribers. As of his professional boxing career, he has a 5-0 record. Content creation and boxing made him one of the most prosperous YouTubers today, worth $22 million.
13. KSI – $21 Million
JJ Olatunji, alias KSI, is known for posting hilarious reactions and gaming commentary videos on his YouTube channel. He is also involved in celebrity boxing, and he releases his own music. He is also a member of the British influence group Sidemen.
In 2008, he began publishing gaming videos on YouTube, and most of them were about FIFA. He drew a large number of viewers and quickly increased his material coverage.
The JJ Olatunji channel, where he uploads his vlogs, has 14.8 million subscribers while his music account, KSI, has 23.7. JJ was the first rival of Jake Paul in their amateur boxing career. It ended with a draw, and both turned pro later on. This contributed to KSI’s current net worth of $21 million.
14. Preston Arsement – $20 Million
With multiple gaming channels, Preston Arsement is one of the leading content creators in his category. He mainly plays Minecraft, and he’s a part of The Pack, a Minecraft community he started with his friends. He also makes videos from the Minecraft server he runs.
Like many gaming creators, Preston has been a video game lover since childhood. He eventually decided to skip college and create the TBNRfrags channel with two of his friends, TBNRKenWorth and ChocoTheChocobo.
TBNRfrags has reached 7.53 million subscribers. But later on in Preston’s career, he decided to make a channel of his own. It now has 19.3 million subscribers. Arsement’s online pursuits have earned him a net worth of over $20 million.
15. Like Nastya – $20 Million
Like Nastya is the second children’s channel to make it on this list. The channel stars a little Russian girl named Anastasia Radzinskaya, who often does toy unboxing, reviews, and travel vlogs.
At birth, Anastasia was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. Her parents both worked and owned businesses that they eventually sold. They devoted all of their time to caring for their daughter, eventually making a YouTube channel dedicated to her.
Fortunately, the girl is doing well now, and their efforts have earned them 89.2 million subscribers. They translated their videos into different languages. It helped Anastasia gain a net worth of approximately $20 million at eight years old.
16. David Dobrik – $20 Million
As a long-running social media personality, it’s not a shock to many that David Dobrik is one of the most affluent content creators on the planet. His YouTube channel featured individuals with whom he had previously collaborated on other platforms.
David started out on Vine. Before Vine was shut down, he had over a million followers. Because of this, he was able to shift to YouTube faster than most other influencers.
The Slovakian personality continues to grow with his 18.3 million subscribers. He made a second channel, David Dobrik Too. He uploads challenge videos and blooper clips there. David also has a podcast with Jason Nash. All of this amounts to a net worth of around $20 million.
17. Lilly Singh – $20 Million
Formerly called Superwoman, Lilly Singh is an accomplished comedian and actress. Her YouTube channel is full of skits and crossovers with well-known celebrities.
Singh had planned to obtain a degree as her parents had wanted but instead chose to make YouTube videos. She decided that if her YouTube career did not take off, she would return to grad school. But her YouTube channel exceeded her expectations.
She now has 14.7 million subscribers and has been involved in projects outside of YouTube to improve her wealth. She got the chance to make music, host a talk show, and tour the world. Though she still studied for a degree, she also has a net worth close to $20 million.
18. Logan Paul – $19 Million
Logan is the big brother of Jake Paul. The siblings have a similar career and content, consisting of pranks, challenges, and vlogs. Both of them have been involved in several controversies and have dived into the world of professional boxing.
At ten years old, Logan was already making videos. In 2015, he was the most famous Vine creator. He moved on to act in some television programs and even write a screenplay.
He now has 23.4 million subscribers. Aside from his typical content, he’s a frequent guest at boxing, mixed martial arts, wrestling events. He also hosts a podcast titled Impaulsive that adds a lot to Paul’s $19 million net worth.
19. Blippi – $16 Million
Blippi, also referred to as Stevin John, is a popular children’s entertainer who can be seen on a handful of streaming platforms. He depicts a lively and curious character in his informative videos so that kids can relate to him.
Stevin didn’t start out as Blippi. In fact, he was far from child-friendly in his early days of playing characters. He portrayed Steezy Grossman, a child born as feces.
Switching to a different look is perhaps the best decision he’s made now that he has 15.1 million subscribers on YouTube. He also makes foreign language videos and releases them to various platforms. That’s why Blippi is worth $16 million.
20. Roman Atwood – $14.5 Million
Roman Bernard Atwood was known initially for his prank videos. However, he ultimately transitioned to another content style. He made vlogs, in which he chronicles his daily activities.
While still in high school, Roman Atwood began filming and making videos. He even made The Nerd Herd DVD series. In Columbus, Ohio, he’s also worked on a number of films and commercial gigs.
His original prank channel earned 10.3 million subscribers until he stopped posting there in 2016. Now, he is active on his second channel. Overtook the first one with 15.5 million subscribers, giving Roman Atwood a 14.5 million net worth.
People today understand more than ever the importance of diversifying when it comes to your source of income. After decades of financial crisis’ and global pandemics, younger generations are acutely aware of how risky it is to put all your eggs in one employment basket.
This has always been the case for YouTubers, of course. Since the beginning of YouTubers making money from their content, it has always been the advice for smart YouTubers not to rely solely on YouTube to pay their bills. Adpocalypses, changes to personal situations, and much more can make YouTube earnings evaporate in no time.
Of course, telling you that it’s important to spread your wings a bit financially is all well and good, but we want to go that extra step and give you a few ideas on where you can spread your wings!
A side hustle is defined as any job or occupation that is not your main job or occupation. In a traditional sense, an example of this might be someone working in a factory through the week and then doing a few shifts tending bar on the weekend. In this case, the bar work would be a side hustle.
Of course, things are a little more fluid these days, with the lines between side hustles and a “main job” being a little blurrier, but there is an emotional component that is strong these days than it once was. It is not uncommon for people who make their money online to have something that they consider a side hustle actually be their primary source of income!
Still, whether you classify something as a side hustle based on the money it makes you or how important that activity is to you, the basic premise remains the same; it’s a way of earning money that you consider secondary to another way of earning money.
How Much Money Can You Make With a Side Hustle?
The amount of money you can make with a side hustle will, of course, vary tremendously depending on several factors, such as what the side hustle is, how good you are at it, how much time you put into it, and more.
As mentioned above, how much money it makes does not necessarily affect its status as a side hustle. If you consider YouTube your “primary” hustle, you may well find one of your side hustles overtaking as your largest source of income. Our advice would be to not think too much about things like the exact amounts. As long as you’re making enough (whatever “enough” means to you), it doesn’t matter which hustle is making the most money.
Don’t Think of it as a Side Hustle!
While you should get too hung up on the specific amount being made by any form of hustle, it’s important not to think of things as secondary, or unimportant. If your job involves making money on the Internet, you should consider all of it your job, whether it’s making the most or not.
If you start thinking of legitimate income sources as unimportant, you run the risk of letting them slip until they stop being legitimate income sources. You may think of yourself as a YouTuber, but if you have half a dozen side hustles, they will quickly amount to a significant portion of your income, so you probably literally can’t afford to neglect them.
Top 10 Side Hustles for YouTubers
That’s enough about what side hustles are, it’s time to get to our top ten side hustles for YouTubers. Of course, if you simply searched for side hustles and found this post, you aren’t a YouTuber, don’t stop reading. We’ve picked these ten side hustles because they work well with YouTubing, but they are perfectly viable side hustles for other walks of life, too.
In fact, if you see your main hustle on here (blog writer, or podcaster, for example), just swap that one out for “YouTuber” and keep on reading!
Oh, and a little side note about the YouTube Partner Programme, we haven’t included that in this list because we assume that if you’re looking to add side hustles to your resume, you’re already making money from YouTube.
#1 Affiliate Marketer
Affiliate marketing is perhaps one of the most well-established means of making money on the side for YouTubers. This is the process of promoting something in the course of your usual content and making a little money on the actions taken by your viewers.
The most well-known example of this is, of course, Amazon’s affiliate program. When enrolled as an Amazon affiliate, you will be able to get a personal affiliate link from any Amazon product. Viewers who happen to buy that product will not pay any extra—indeed, they wouldn’t even know it was an affiliate link if you didn’t tell them (more on that in a second)—but you will make a small commission on anything they buy through your links.
There are many forms of affiliate marketing available, as well as services designed specifically to facilitate linking companies with people like you. It should be noted, however, that you should always give some sort of indication to your viewers that a link you have put in the description or a product you are promoting in your video is something you are promoting as an affiliate. It’s not hard to find out, and viewers will be turned off by this kind of dishonesty. It could also get you in trouble with YouTube.
#2 Merchandise Seller
Whether you have some kind of merchandise that exists independent of your YouTube channel, or you start releasing merchandise that ties directly in with your YouTube channel, having that channel can be a great way to promote it.
Naturally, if your merchandise is tied to the channel (for example, t-shirts with the channel logo on them), you’re going to want to promote it from that channel. Alternatively, if you want to start (or already have) a small clothing line, you sell artwork, or you sell pretty much anything on a site like Etsy, you can leverage the popularity of your YouTube channel to give that side hustle a bit of a kickstart.
#3 Course Instructor
Many YouTubers have some area of expertise, even if their channel is not about imparting that expertise. These days, the administrative side of creating and hosting an online course to teach other people things is relatively painless. There’s still a lot of work in putting the course together, of course, but there’s a lot of work in running a YouTube channel, as well, and you’re not letting that stop you… are you?
Of course, if your channel is centred around educating, such as a DIY channel, or tutorials on coding, it will be much easier to translate that audience into an online course. But even channels that are not about teaching viewers something can take advantage of this side hustle, as long as the course is teaching a skill that is on display when you make your videos.
#4 Channel Manager
If you have a particular flair for handling YouTube channels, you might consider turning your attention to becoming a channel manager. Essentially, you would take on the management of other people’s channels, and handle almost everything except for the content itself.
Many people don’t have the time or desire to effectively manage their channel themselves, but proper channel management can make an enormous difference. As you will no doubt be aware of this is a side hustle you are considering.
The main thing to beware of here is letting this side hustle take over. A good channel manager will typically have several clients. And, while managing a channel doesn’t take nearly as much time as making content for it, it all adds up if you keep adding clients to your roster.
#5 Blogger
Bloggers may resent seeing their profession listed as a side hustle on a YouTube blog—especially since blogging was a viable source of income before YouTube—but don’t be mad; YouTube can just as rightly be called a side hustle for bloggers. And the good news is this makes sense whichever way round you look at it.
Essentially, you have something to share with an audience, and you are currently doing it in video form. By translating that content to written form, you can reach a whole new audience. Or you can make it supplemental, giving your YouTube audience something else to consume.
#6 Podcaster
In a very similar vein to being a blogger, you can get more of your message out in audio-only form through podcasts. And, again, if you are a podcast, you can easily look at this suggestion in reverse, with YouTube being the side hustle.
This suggestion works best for channels that already have a podcast-like feel, such as panel show channels, or interview channels. If you regularly put out hour-long videos that are mostly talking, you’re going to miss out on a lot of viewers purely because of the time requirements. Not everyone has that much free time to sit and watch YouTube.
Those same people might have an hour’s worth of commuting to do every day, or regularly go for a job and like to listen to something while they do. They might just want something to put on while they do a bit of cleaning around the home. If your content is already podcast-like, putting it out as a podcast will involve negligible work. And, if it succeeds, it could drive more traffic to your YouTube channel.
Of course, you can still make a podcast if your channel isn’t the kind of channel described above. As long as you have something interesting to talk about, you can find an audience.
#7 Produce Video Content
This one is a little trickier. As we mentioned above in the channel manager section, creating content for a channel is the most time-consuming part, so the idea of producing video content for others might not seem like the best plan.
While you could certainly produce video content for other YouTube channels, we’re suggesting something more specialist, such as making animations idents, or infographic clips. If you have a skill for this kind of thing, there will undoubtedly be plenty of people and companies that are happy to pay for your services.
#8 Stock Trader
This one doesn’t really tie in to you being a YouTuber unless your YouTube channel revolves around you being a stock trader, or talking about stock trading in some form. If this isn’t you, you can still get into stock trading (or currency trading), to earn a little (or a lot) extra on the side, just be sure you know what you’re doing. We categorically do not recommend anyone dabbling in the stock market without knowing what they’re doing beforehand.
#9 Become a Consultant
You don’t have to make content to take advantage of your expertise. Consultancy work is a great way for you to exploit your own knowledge while helping others. One example of this could be helping other YouTubers grow their channel (assuming you have proven yourself able to do this in the first place of course!), but it could just as easily be any other area of expertise you have.
#10 Champion a Cause
This one is kind of cheating. You won’t necessarily make any money from championing a good cause, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. Whether it’s planting trees or donating to charities, you have the power to make an impact.
Final Thoughts
YouTube is undoubtedly a great platform for launching other projects, whether they are passion projects, side hustles, or even new careers. The list above is a relatively small selection of the possibilities for adding new hustles to your game, so don’t worry if none of the above work for you.
Of course, if all else fails, your side hustle could always be other YouTube channels.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube
I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.
I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.
That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.
5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
Anyone whose familiar with the topic of YouTube as a money-making opportunity will be familiar with the concept of niches.
If you’re not, all you really need to know for this post is that some niches are worth more to advertisers than others, and the more valuable a niche, the more revenue it has the potential to generate for YouTubers.
Choosing the right niche (or niches) is key to not only ensuring that your channel is financially successful, but also to ensuring that you can maintain the kind of momentum necessary to stick at it long enough to be successful. With that in mind, we’ve picked out seven of the highest paid niches on YouTube.
It’s best to pick a niche you are interested in, but that doesn’t mean you can’t lean towards a more valuable niche that you’re interested.
And now, in no particular order…
Affiliate Marketing
It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that one of the best paying niches on YouTube is about another way of earning money.
Affiliate marketing—earning income through referrals—typically commands a CPM (cost per thousand views) of around $12 to $22, and is probably the highest paying niche available.
Because affiliate marketing is such a viable way to succeed, there is a lot of interest in affiliate marketing products and, as a result, a lot of interest in advertising said products And, because YouTube ads work on a bidding system, the more interest there is in advertising something, the more money those advertisements will generate.
Personal Finance
Our next pick, and something that you might see as establishing a bit of a trend on this list, is personal finance.
Being financially successful is about more than finding ways to make lots of money, you also need to manage your money well, and more of us are coming to learn that.
That’s where personal finance products come in. These might be anything from debt management consultations to services and software for tracking your finances. Videos making content in this niche can expect to see a CPM of between $4 and $12.
Business Advice
In much the same vain as the personal finance pick, business advice is also a very lucrative niche, often commanding CPMs in excess of $10. This one makes a lot of sense, as more and more opportunities for small businesses become accessible to regular people, more of us are looking to start a business of our own.
It could be a craft brewery, a 3D print on demand business, an Etsy store, or any number of other ways to start a business without hundreds of thousands in capital. But those people still need advice on running a business, which is why this niche is so competitive.
Drop Shipping
Very much continuing the theme of our last pick, drop shipping is a business model whereby a business owner markets and sells products that another company stocks and ships, that company being a drop shipping company.
This works to both companies advantage, as the smaller company does not need to worry about purchasing and storing lots of expensive stock, and the larger company does not need to worry about things like customer service.
There isn’t a great deal to be said about print on demand that wasn’t said in our drop shipping pick because the basic business model is very similar, and so are the CPM figures.
Many drop shipping services will offer a print on demand component on some of their products, allowing companies to offer those products with their own branding.
Trading and Investing
It’s probably obvious to you now that all of the highest paid niches on YouTube are ones that revolve around finances in some form or another, so you shouldn’t be surprised to see investing and trading on here.
Videos on the hows and whys of investing, as well as tips for those brave YouTubers who are willing to put that information out there, do very well in their own right, but content in this niche that trading platforms, signal services, and the multitude of investing and trading related services and products can advertise on routinely see CPMs as high as $18.
Content Creation
Our last pick might not be the most lucrative in terms of CPM—typically around $5 to $10, if you were wondering—but it is probably the most relevant to anyone reading this post.
Content creation is big business these days, whether it is creating content on video platforms like YouTube, or making podcasts, writing blog posts, or any number of other ways to make things and put them out into the world.
Crucially, there is a seemingly endless supply of products, tools, and services to help people in their content creation endeavours, which means there is plenty to advertise about.
Final Thoughts
While the niches shown here are hot right now, this is very much a volatile marketplace, and there are so many factors that can affect it.
If you can find a niche you are comfortable working in and interesting in making content for, you are in the ideal position as a YouTuber, because you will enjoy what you do.
We understand that many YouTubers don’t necessarily have that luxury, however, and it is sometimes necessary to hunt for the niche that makes the most financial sense. As with most areas of online revenue generation, the best advice you can take here is to not put all of your eggs in one basket.
If you focus everything on one niche, and that niche takes a dive for some unforeseeable reason, you will find yourself in a sticky spot.
If you can diversify your content and tackle multiple niches in different areas, you stand a much better chance of withstanding any dramatic changes to any single niche’s popularity.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube
I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.
I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.
That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.
5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
One of the great things about YouTube, both as a source of revenue and as a creative outlet, is that there are so many ways to be successful.
There are wildly successful YouTubers in just about every niche and making just about every kind of content there is. From gaming videos that are pure gameplay—no commentary—to in-depth guides on how to make an amazing home cooked meal. If you want to get a feel for what it is like to camp out in the wilderness with nothing but a knife, there’s content for that.
Want to see someone attempt to build a real-life Iron Man suit? There’s a video out there for you.
This wealth of variety is a two-way street, of course. Not only does it mean that you can find just about any kind of content you want, it also means you can make just about any kind of content you want, and reviewing products is one such type of content that can be both creatively fulfilling and financially successful.
What Are YouTube Product Reviews?
Product reviews on YouTube can cover everything from a “Top 10 Moustache Trimmers” list video to an in-depth review of a cryptocurrency marketplace.
The format can vary significantly, also.
When you think of YouTube reviews, you tend to think of videos where the YouTuber lays out the details of the product, perhaps talks about the kind of use cases you would want it for, and maybe even compares it to similar products. In reality, review videos can be ridiculously over the top or unconventional.
They can even be subtle in the sense that it is not immediately obvious that the video is a review, but nevertheless gives the viewer all the information that a review would give.
Many YouTubers have found themselves becoming unintentional product reviewers as an organic result of their channel’s subject matter. For example, there is a strong niche around camping on YouTube, and many camping YouTubers have found themselves spending whole videos talking about the gear they use after being asked repeatedly by their viewers to do so. The same can be said for musician YouTubers and their gear, and any number of other niches where product reviews were never the main purpose of the channel.
There is a limit to this, of course. For example, the “Will it Blend?” format of days gone by, where various products were thrown into a blender to see if they would blend, doesn’t really tell the viewer much about the product’s capabilities beyond being blended (though it was an effective marketing campaign for the blender itself).
As a general rule, a product review video should tell the viewer any important information they might want to know about the product—such as specifications—give the viewers some basis of comparison so that those less informed about the type of product are not left behind, and, usually, give some kind of subjective opinion. If we were to apply these basics to a video of a new mobile phone, you might include the following key sections;
The technical specifications of the phone
How those specifications stack up next to a similarly-priced phone
Your recommendations—who is the phone good for? Is it worth the money?
As we mentioned above, the actual presentation in which you get this information across is entirely up to you, and there is a lot of scope for creativity there.
How to Make Money on YouTube Reviewing Products
So, to the crux of the post; how to make money on YouTube reviewing products. Like the content of the videos themselves, there are many ways to monetise your product reviews.
We’re going to cover the main ones, but before we do, let’s go over some ground rules that apply to all the below.
Firstly, content is king. It sounds cliché, but it’s cliché for a reason. All the tricks in the world will only get you temporary success (if any) if the underlying content isn’t up to scratch.
The next universal thing you do is be honest with your viewers when making sponsored content.
This applies to YouTubers of all stripes, but even more so when we’re talking about YouTubers who review products. If you have been paid to do a particular review, regardless of whether the review is 100% honest and not flattering at all for the product, even if all the company did was send you a free product to do the review with and aren’t actually paying you, you need to tell your viewers.
It might put some people off, but not nearly as many people as it will put off if they find out you have been getting paid to review products and not been up front about it. In some situations, this can also get you in legal trouble.
Finally, as we touched on above, make sure you give the viewers the information they came for.
There is nothing wrong with making content where you throw an iPhone in a blender or drop a laptop from water tower to see if it still works after, but if you want people to come to your channel for product reviews, you need to give them the important information somehow.
A Basic Product Review Channel
With a basic review channel, you would be monetising your videos through the YouTube Partner Programme, earning revenue from the ads displayed on your videos. In terms of a pure views-to-revenue conversion, this isn’t the most effective way to monetise your content, but it is the easiest.
Your channel will need to meet certain criteria to be allowed into the YouTube Partner Programme, such as having at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours combined watch time across the whole channel over the last year, as well as some other criteria.
Relying solely on the YouTube Partner Programme will limit what you can review. For example, if you are reviewing fire arms, you probably aren’t going to be able to monetise that content using YouTube’s monetisation programme.
The same goes for things like tobacco products, adult toys, and host of other things that advertisers aren’t necessarily keen on their ads being displayed next to.
Affiliate Linking
The natural next step to monetising product reviews is affiliate linking. There is a multitude of affiliate networks out there; some may cover purely electronic goods, others may focus on healthcare products, for the purposes of this example, we are going to focus on by far the most commonly used affiliate programme; Amazon Affiliates.
Amazon Affiliates enables users to get a special link to Amazon products and pages that they can give to their viewers, and any time someone buys a product through one of those links, the affiliate gets a little cut of the profit. The price is exactly the same to the consumer, but some of the money is redirected back to the affiliate who shared the link.
This system works very well for product reviewers who are reviewing things you can buy on Amazon, since almost anything on the site can earn you affiliate revenue, and the mechanism by which you earn is quite organic. You review the product as if you would, and you casually mention that there will be links to the products in the description (while being honest about the fact that they are affiliate links, of course).
First Looks and Exclusives
This is a little more indirect, but if you can build up a good enough reputation, you can get your foot in the door for first looks and exclusive content.
You may not get paid directly for these, but having a first or exclusive look at a highly anticipated product can do wonders for your channel’s prestige, boosting your viewing figures and increasing your earning potential from the other methods of monetising your content.
If you do manage to get these kinds of exclusives, it is important that you abide by any non-disclosure agreements and other restrictions placed on your content as part of the deal.
Not only are you opening yourself up to legal problems if you don’t, you are pretty much guaranteeing you won’t get those offers again.
Final Thoughts
Product review videos are an excellent way to earn money through YouTube, in no small part because a love of the subject matter is not necessary for success (though some expertise is necessary). Honesty is perhaps more important than usual in for reviewers, however, since the risk of being caught lying is substantial. If it gets out that you are being dishonest in your reviews, you can essentially kiss goodbye to any hope of making money with product reviews on YouTube.
And, like all types of content on YouTube, the better the quality, the better your chances of success. Great quality videos aren’t guaranteed to succeed, but poor quality content is almost always guaranteed to fail eventually.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube
I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.
I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.
That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.
5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
Though it’s becoming less of a thing as YouTube and other video platforms become evermore pervasive in our lives, there is a weird psychological aspect to seeing someone on screen.
Almost certainly left over from the not-too-distant days when broadcast television was the only way to get video content and being on TV in any significant capacity almost inherently meant you were famous, we have a tendency to “celebritise” (yes, I made that word up) our favourite YouTubers.
And, if someone is a celebrity, they’re probably making plenty of money, right?
Of course, while the likes of James Charles and DanTDM are making a small fortune and can be considered to be celebrities by most reasonable standards, the truth is that the overwhelming majority of YouTubers—even the ones that make their living from YouTubing—are living considerably more modest lives than your average A list celebrity.
So, when asking the question, “do all YouTubers make money?” – we can confidently and absolutely say no, no they do not. Many YouTubers make nothing at all from their YouTubing exploits. Making money on YouTube depends on niche, consistency and the ability to monetize properly. If you can convert views into clicks and sales you can do very well.
But it is the grey area between no money and filthy rich that is the most interesting, and that’s what we’re going to take a look at today.
YouTubers Who Make No Money
Before we get to that more interesting area, let’s take a look at the people who don’t earn money from their YouTube channels.
As implied above, we are generally more savvy to the fact that literally anyone can become a content creator, and no matter how exciting and lavish something looks on YouTube, there is a good chance they are filming in a studio flat in between shifts tending bar. There’s nothing wrong with bar tending, of course, but it’s not something people who don’t need the money typically choose to do for fun.
The first thing to consider is that changes to YouTube’s monetisation policies not so long ago made it so that many YouTubers can’t monetise their channel.
They could monetise their content in other ways, of course, but a channel that doesn’t meet the criteria for the YouTube Partner Programme will often be too small to make any significant income from other means.
There are exceptions to this rule, of course; some YouTubers may make content in niches that YouTube will not allow to be monetised, but still have a big enough following to make money in other ways, such as selling merch, but for the most part, people who can’t monetise their YouTube content are probably not making any money from their channel.
Of course, there is a whole separate discussion to have over whether making money should be considered important. While life is rarely ideal, the ideal scenario would be that the YouTuber makes videos they want to make regardless of whether they are getting paid, and any revenue can then be treated as a nice bonus, and if things progress to the point where you can earn your living from the channel, event better! That being said, we know life is not ideal, and YouTube is a regular job for many people, rather than the dream career it can sometimes look like to outsiders.
How the Other Half Lives
Much like society, the very successful make up a tiny fraction of the total number of YouTubers out there.
The exact amount that any given view is worth varies quite significantly depending on the type of content and things like how long the video is, but as a rough guide, YouTubers can expect to earn between $3 and $5 per thousand views of monetised content. Using the aforementioned DanTDM as an example, Dan consistently gets 2-3 million views a day. Using these numbers and sticking to the conservative end of the scale, we can estimate that Dan makes around $6,000 per day from the YouTube Partner Programme alone. And that doesn’t factor in things like merchandise sales, sponsored videos, super chat money, and anything else he might be doing that earns revenue.
And if that makes you feel a little jealous, Dan ranked approximately 50th (at the time of writing) in terms of video views across the whole platform, meaning there at least 49 YouTubers out there probably making a lot more money!
The reason we’ve included this envy-inducing section is to illustrate just how big the numbers we are dealing with can get. Even with YouTube’s notoriously low rates of pay and unreliable nature when it comes to changing their terms of service, there are YouTubers out there who can easily break a quarter of a million dollars in one month on ad revenue alone. They are by far the minority, but when it comes to YouTubers who get millions of views a day, it’s probably harder for them to not make money.
The Grey Area
So now we come to that interesting middle ground between the people who make nothing and the people who make more money than they know what to do with.
The YouTubers we are talking about here can be a mixed bunch. We might be talking about YouTubers who have a substantial following but make the kinds of videos that YouTube refuses to monetise.
We might be talking about people whose channel has grown enough to be approved for the YouTube Partner Programme but is still relatively small and not making a great deal of revenue.
This swath of YouTube covers everything from people who spend large portions of their week making YouTube content and make very little money, to people who spend a few hours a week streaming off-the-cuff content and make thousands.
And, of course, the many YouTubers whose time-to-earnings ratio is comparable to a regular job.
Understanding Revenue and Motive
When trying to wrap your head around this topic, it is important to remember that YouTubers do what they do for a variety of reasons.
Some people have no interest in money, and only do the bare minimum of monetisation on their channel. Some people do absolutely everything they can to monetise their content and end up making a respectable income from a relatively small number of views.
It is also important to remember that revenue is far from a simple, clean system that looks the same for every YouTuber. For one thing, even the ad revenue earned through the YouTube Partner Programme can vary dramatically between YouTubers. Not only are some ads worth more than others, but the watch time can play a huge role. Consider a two-minute video; YouTube might put an ad at the start of that video, earning the YouTuber a cool $2 per thousand views. Now let’s say a different YouTuber in the same niche puts up a video that is ten minutes long, has two ad placements and gets the same amount of views; that YouTuber will be making $4 for their thousand views. Same amount of views, twice as much revenue.
Of course, this example assumes that both videos are watched all the way through and all the ads are seen, but the fact that we need to clarify that fact illustrates another way in which revenue calculation on YouTube is a messy business.
Then, of course, there are the many and varied ways that YouTube content could be monetised. Someone who seems to be getting relatively low viewing figures on their YouTube channel could be making a comfortable living from their content over on Patreon.
We tend to think of viewing figures through the YouTube revenue lens, which is to say, we assume you need at least 50,000-100,000 subscribers before you can have any hope of making decent money. The truth is you can do it with a lot less if that audience is dedicated and invested in your channel. If a YouTuber had 5,000 subscribers and 5% of those subscribers are happy to send the
YouTuber $10 a month in YouTube memberships, Patreon subscriptions, or something similar, that YouTuber could easily live off the money they make, even if they are getting viewing figures in the hundreds, rather than tens of thousands. Conversely, a YouTuber making all of their earnings through the YouTube Partner Programme would have be getting at least 800,000 views a month to make the same amount of money.
Final Thoughts
Do all YouTubers make money? Certainly not. At least, not from YouTube. But there are so many factors that go into how much money YouTubers make that it is almost impossible to make an accurate guess based only what you can see from the outside.
They could be a relatively unknown YouTuber with a dedicated following who makes plenty of money in memberships, or they could be a well-known YouTuber who gets millions of views, but their content is in a poorly-paying niche, constantly has videos demonetised, and pays agent fees.
The truth is, unless a channel has no subscribers or millions of subscribers, the only way to be sure is to ask, but you probably won’t get an answer.
“Influencer” should be a word familiar to anyone who is venturing into the world of social media and, by extension, YouTube (don’t worry if it’s not, we’re going to explain it in a little more detail below).
But something that could less familiar to many is the term “virtual influencer”.
What are virtual influencers? – Virtual influencers are people that use digital avatars to represent themselves online. This means they don’t have to physically show their face or in some cases even exist. They can then make money with brand deals, merchandise or even traditional marketing using this persona.
A recent influx of “virtual” characters on platforms like YouTube and Instagram have created a whole new arena for creators, and that arena is producing plenty of influencers of its own. Virtual YouTubers are a new breed of YouTuber that are essentially digital beings controlled by regular flesh-and-bone people, often in much the same way that Jim Henson’s muppets are made to act as though they are real by their puppeteers.
Virtual influencers, of course, are virtual characters that have reached influencer status.
What is an Influencer?
Let’s start with the basics. We’re assuming that most people reading this post know what an influencer is, but in the interests of providing a comprehensive answer to the question posed here, we’re going to give a brief explanation for those that don’t.
An influencer is exactly what you might think from the name; a person who influences other people. In the context of the Internet and social media, it is an almost crass term, as it relates primarily to a person’s ability to influence the purchasing decisions of a significant number of people. This, in turn, corresponds to the financial opportunities that that person can leverage. In other words, people who are influencers will have more opportunity to get paid to use their influencing power to promote things.
Influencers typically have spheres of influence. For example, immensely popular YouTuber, Zoella, has a lot of influence in the realm of beauty products. The fact that she has so much influence in that sphere means she is likely to be able to command a very high asking price for her services, but the focus of her sphere means she is unlikely to be approached to promote, say, a video game, or mechanic’s tools. The people she influences simply aren’t interested in those things.
The nature of successful advertising is one of accurate targeting. Advertisers like to be able to direct their advertisements at the most receptive audiences possible. This is why there are often diminishing returns on audience size when it comes to how much your influence is worth.
Take PewDiePie, for example. If we take a simplistic approach to audience size and just count YouTube subscribers, PewDiePie has somewhere in the region of ten times the audience size of Zoella. Of course, he makes a handsome amount of money from this audience, but you don’t tend to get an audience that size without it becoming unfocused and more diverse. While advertisers can be relatively confident that the people watching Zoella are interested in fashion and beauty products, they can’t have the same confidence with PewDiePie because his content is more varied. This is why an influencer can be someone with as little as a few tens of thousands of subscribers or followers; it is more about the market impact they can command than the raw number of subscribers or followers.
There are also side roads into influencer status, such as people who themselves may not have a big following, but appear on podcasts or YouTube channels that have a big audience.
What Are Virtual YouTubers?
So, we know what the “influencer” part means, but what about the “virtual” part? We touched on this above, but for those who are still unclear, we thought we’d best dig a little deeper. Incidentally, if you would like a more in-depth look at what virtual YouTubers are, check out this post.
Virtual YouTubers are YouTubers that run their channel from behind the guise of a digital avatar. For the vast majority of virtual YouTube channels, this digital avatar will be in the form of a Japanese anime character, though more and more alternative styles are creeping in as the channel type becomes increasingly popular.
A variety of techniques are used to bring the virtual avatar to life, but the basic premise is usually one of live motion capture where, using one of a few techniques, the YouTuber’s motions are captured and translated to the digital avatar. This allows the YouTuber to record a video as though they were recording a regular video, but the result would be of their digital avatar rather than themselves.
What are Virtual Influencers?
Being a primarily YouTube-orientated blog and channel, we have mainly focused on virtual YouTubers around here, but the premise is essentially the same whether it be on YouTube, Twitch, Instagram, or any other video platform. And there is often a lot of crossovers, with virtual YouTubers quite often streaming on Twitch, and almost anyone with a remotely high profile having an Instagram account.
Virtual influencers are influencers in the sense we discussed above who also happen to be virtual characters like the virtual YouTubers we described, though not limited to the YouTube platform. These influencers will usually present themselves as real beings in much the same way that any other fictional character would. To continue with the example of the Muppets mentioned above, you don’t see Kermit acknowledging that he is a felt puppet with a human controlling him; he acts as though he is a real frog. Virtual influencers do the same. They may present themselves as a self-aware computer program, a real girl who just happens to be animated, or they may not even reference the fact that they are digital at all, and present their content as though it were just like any other video. In any case, it is rare for virtual influencers to break the fourth wall, as it were.
Why Virtual?
There are many advantages to being a virtual influencer. For one thing, it can be very freeing to play a character, rather than yourself.
Many actors are notoriously shy and reserved in their everyday life but have no problem getting on a stage in front of hundreds of people; it is one of the quirks of human nature.
Another reason to go virtual is that it removes a lot of restrictions on what is possible. Your avatar is not limited to things like the laws of physics, or your location in the world. If you want them to fly around, you can do that. If you want them to present a video from the surface of the Moon, you can do that. The only limitations on what you can do with a virtual avatar are those of your own ability or resources. Which is to say, if you don’t know how to do something yourself; there will always be someone you can pay to do it for you.
What’s in it for Brands?
A natural follow-up question in this topic—especially if you are thinking about the financial future of your potential virtual influencer career—is what might be in it for brands. Specifically, does being virtual give you any kind of edge over the conventional way of doing things? Could it harm your chances of getting a lucrative brand deal?
Unfortunately, there are no real advantages from a marketing perspective. That is, none that are universal. For example, a virtual YouTuber might be an especially good fit for a particular niche, such as gaming, but that is more down to the specifics of that niche than the fact the YouTuber is virtual. Being virtual would not help them with other niches.
The good news is that there are no real disadvantages to being a virtual influencer when it comes to getting brand deals. Brands care about your audience and whether they consider your content appropriate for them. Whether or not you are virtual is unlikely to factor into this.
Brand Mascots
Though not necessarily much use to an aspiring YouTuber or general Internet influencer, some brands are starting to see the advantages of using virtual avatars rather than real people in their promotional material.
This isn’t new, of course; mascots have been around for centuries. Probably longer. But the advent of virtual avatars gives brands a much easier way to create a public face that can be easily managed and stay in rotation for as long as they need.
As a brand, you don’t need to worry about a virtual avatar having an off-day, getting older, dramatically changing their look, being convicted of a crime, or any number of other things that would be a nuisance at best or a PR nightmare at worst for a brand. They can also be managed by different people, meaning the brand is not beholden to a single actor or voice actor. If your current digital avatar’s voice actor quits, you can simply hire a new one with a similar sounding voice, and things carry on as normal.
As we said, this isn’t much use to your average Internet influencer—unless they are planning land a career as the person behind a brand’s virtual mascot—but it helps to understand the full landscape of virtual influencers when first venturing into this new facet of online influencing.
How to Become a Virtual Influencer
We’d love to say there are some unique tips for succeeding on your path to becoming a virtual influencer, but the truth is that things work almost identically to how they are for regular influencers, and if there was some secret sauce to that, everybody would be an influencer. There are certain tips you can follow that will at least keep you on the right path.
Pick Your Niche
As we mentioned above, it is much easier to become an influencer in a focused niche than it is with a broad audience, so you will increase your chances of reaching influencer status if you grow to prominence in a particular area. That way, brands whose primary audience is in that same niche will see you as a more compelling option when looking for influencers to work with.
Be Mindful of Your Own “Brand”
An influencer who is not working with brands to promote things and get paid is just someone who is popular, so we’re going to assume that if you are reading a post on influencers, you are interested in the money-making side of things. With that in mind, you will need to be careful with your own brand because it will affect what other brands will be prepared to work for you.
Of course, you can choose what kind of brand you want to be; there are plenty of different types of company out there, so you can certainly pick your lane, so to speak. The important part is to be consistent with that lane. As many celebrities, YouTubers, and influencers have found, even one “off-brand” slip up can be costly in terms of deals with other brands.
To give a fictional example, say you build yourself up as an influencer in the vegan niche. Even a single tweet about enjoying a beef burger from years ago could be enough to stop you getting brand deals with vegan companies.
Don’t Rush It
It can be tempting to take shortcuts—things like buying subscribers—but resist this temptation.
The nature of your audience will have a big impact on the future of your audience, and things like bought subscribers will dramatically reduce the quality of your audience. People (and certainly brands) will spot this kind of dishonesty, which will reduce the rate at which your influence can grow, if not stop it altogether.
Final Thoughts
Being a virtual influencer may not be much different from being a regular influencer from the influencing side of things, though the process of being virtual is a little different.
Overall, the advantages of being virtual tend to benefit the brands that adopt them more than they benefit the influencers who are them. This is not to say you shouldn’t do it if the virtual influencer life appeals to you, but make this decision on its own merits—decide if being a virtual character is right for you without the external branding side of things—since you are not likely to be much better off as a virtual influencer than you are as a regular one.
How YouTubers get paid is often a point of interest for people who are considering getting into the platform.
And, for that matter, many people who have no interest in becoming a YouTuber but nevertheless are curious.
There are, of course, several ways in which a YouTuber can get paid from their channel, and there is plenty of information about the different aspects of YouTuber earnings, many of which you can find on this very blog.
Do YouTubers Get Paid for Views?
So, straight to the meat of the topic. Do YouTubers get paid for views? The answer is a little mixed – YouTube channels need to be part of the YouTube Partner Program to earn money directly from the adverts displayed on their videos. Once a channel has 1000 subscribers, 4000 watch time hours and are accepted into the program they ca earn anywhere between $1-10 per thousand advert views.
There are other YouTubers that do get paid but that choose to operate in ways that don’t earn them money on a per-view basis.
Let’s back up a little.
It’s worth noting that, effectively, all YouTube earnings are based on views one way or another. Even YouTubers who earn their revenue primarily through things like brand deals and crowdfunding need to have enough interest in their content to make money, and that interest is expressed through views. Granted some methods of generating revenue require considerably fewer views to make a given amount of money than others, but it all comes to back to views one way or another.
Still, a channel getting a lucrative brand deal because they have millions of views a month is not what we typically mean when talk about getting paid for views on YouTube. So what do we mean?
The YouTube Partner Programme
We are, of course, talking about monetisation through YouTube’s Partner Programme, which is the most common way that YouTubers monetise their channels—at least in the beginning.
This programme works by displaying ads on your content and, for channels that qualify, splitting the revenue. There are certain criteria that need to be met, such as how long an ad is watched for, or whether the ad was interacted with, but for the most part, the basic rule of more view equals more revenue applies.
Watch Time
Of course, like most things in life, the reality is a little more complex. We’ve already hinted that the amount of time an ad is watched affects whether it earns any money, but when we are talking about revenue per view, the length of the video is also important.
YouTube doesn’t just show one ad on a video, it will cram as many in there as you let it, and the longer the video, the more ads that can be shown. Again, whether the ads get watched is a different matter, but a video that is long enough to show four advertisements has the potential to earn four times as much revenue as one that only shows one ad.
Engagement
Those of you who can read between the lines may already have made this connection, but the natural result of more ads increasing the revenue doesn’t just mean that longer videos have the potential to earn more money, it also means that engagement is important, too.
The crucial point about having that video we mentioned that is long enough to show four times as many advertisements is that those advertisements only earn revenue if they are watched. That means that if a viewer checks out before the second ad, the rest of those ads may as well have not been there for all the good they do.
How is Revenue Calculated?
For view-based revenue on YouTube, there are two central metrics for calculating how money a channel is making; CPM and RPM.
CPM—cost per mille—refers to the amount of money that a channel is making per thousand views. CPM factors all the videos that are eligible for monetisation (and only those videos), which means that you get an average spread in terms of revenue, which is to say that videos that make very little will bring your CPM down, whereas videos that make a lot will bring it up.
CPM does not account for YouTube’s share of the revenue, nor does it factor any of the many other ways which you can make money through the platform, or external to the platform for that matter.
RPM—revenue per mille—is a metric designed to give YouTubers a better sense of how much revenue their channel is making. Like CPM, it refers to the amount of money you are making per thousand views, but unlike CPM, it factors in all views. It also factors in several other sources of revenue (from within the YouTube platform) such as memberships, and super chat.
Revenue Sources YouTube Doesn’t Account For
YouTube can only factor in revenue that you make through their platform, but there are other ways to earn money from the success of your channel.
Let’s take a brief look at some of the more popular ones.
Third Party Subscription and Donations
The most direct way for your viewers to support you is by sending you money, of course.
This can be done through direct donations, such as through PayPal, but it can also be done using platforms like Patreon, which allow your viewers to set up a recurring payment to support your content.
This is essentially the same model that the YouTube Membership system is based on.
Brand Deals and Endorsements
For YouTubers who have a significant influence in a particular area—or just a heck of a lot of subscribers—brand deals and endorsements can become an option.
This is where a company comes to you directly, paying you to endorse a product or service, sponsoring a video.
These deals are typically far more lucrative than anything you would get through the YouTube Partner Programme, but are much harder to get since your channel has to be very successful to get noticed by brands. It is possible to get brand deals as a smaller channel, but you generally have to be a big player in a specific niche for that to happen.
Affiliate Marketing
For YouTubers whose content lends itself well to affiliate marketing, tying in your content to a relevant affiliate program can be a great way to increase the revenue your channel earns.
The most common example of this is YouTube channels that review or highlight products sharing Amazon Affiliate links to those products in their descriptions.
How to Increase Revenue Per Views
Though there is no one-size-fits-all solution, we can boil down the keys to success to a few significant points. Firstly, focus on watch time and engagement. The longer your videos are, and the more watch time they accumulate, the more revenue they will have the chance to generate.
There are also ways to direct your content so that it is more likely to earn more money. Generally speaking, targeting niches that have a high click through rate, or that get bid on highly by advertisers, will mean that your videos generate more money per view.
Beyond that, though it no doubt feels like a bit of a cop out, the best advice for increasing the revenue of your channel is to focus on the content and make the best videos you can. High quality content is the foundation upon which successful channels are built, and starting with a good foundation will always give you a better chance of success in the long run.
How Much is a View Worth on Average?
As we have hopefully made clear, there is no fixed amount we can give, but for a rough idea of how much a view is worth, the average ad view on YouTube will make somewhere between $0.01 and $0.03.
This is, of course, subject to any criteria regarding how long the ad is watched for. Ads that are watched for less than a given amount of time will not earn the channel any money.
If this number seems a little low, it generally is considered to be, which is why YouTube Partner Programme earnings are rarely deemed a good method to base your entire income on.
Final Thoughts
Trying to put a solid number on something like YouTube earnings is a losing battle; there are simply too many variables that can change that number.
And, while YouTubers can often calculate their earnings as a per view metric, the reality of those earnings is often considerably more complicated, with revenue coming from several different places, and at a far from consistent rate.
If you are becoming a YouTuber with revenue generation being the primary goal, it will help to shape your channel from the very beginning with that in mind; focusing on appropriate niches, making content that lends itself well to earning money.
If you are joining YouTube for the love of making content, however, just focus on that to begin with, and figure the rest out as you go along.
