With TikTok potentially poised for a U.S. ban, YouTube is touting how well its own TikTok competitor, YouTube Shorts, is paying off for creators. The company on Thursday said its short-form video platform now averages over 70 billion daily views and over 25% of channels in YouTube’s Partner Program monetize their videos through revenue-sharing on Shorts.
The news swiftly follows TikTok’s announcement earlier this month where the ByteDance-owned short video app said that its revamped creator fund had increased total revenue by over 250% in the last six months. TikTok’s year-old fund, which replaced TikTok’s $1 billion Creator Fund, is now exiting beta.
YouTube introduced monetization options for Shorts creators in September 2022, with its plans for expanding the YouTube Partner Program (YPP). Before, YouTubers producing long-form video content had to have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours to qualify for revenue-sharing. But starting in early 2023, Shorts creators could meet a new threshold of 1,000 subscribers and 10 million Shorts views over 90 days. These creators would earn 45% of the ad revenue from their short videos.
That program is now one year old, the company says. What’s more, YouTube notes that creators participating in the partner program for Shorts often monetize in other ways, as well. Over 80% of YPP creators generating money through Shorts also earn from long-form advertising, fan funding, YouTube Premium, BrandConnects, Shopping and other means. That indicates that creating for Shorts is not necessarily a standalone endeavor for many, but rather serves as one aspect of creators’ larger businesses.
In total, YouTube says its 16-year-old YPP now includes more than 3 million creators around the world and has paid out $70 billion to creators, artists and media companies in just the last three years. That’s larger than “any other creator monetization platform,” YouTube notes, in a swipe clearly aimed at TikTok.