Twitch vs YouTube - The Great Streamer Debate

How do the Partner Programs Compare?

The YouTube Partner Program or YPP is much more difficult to reach than the twitch Counterpart in terms of just flat requirements. Here’s how they break down.

YouTube Partner Program - Eligibility Requirements

• Follow all the YouTube channel monetization policies - The YouTube channel monetization policies are a collection of policies that allow you to monetize on YouTube. As a YouTube partner, your agreement including the YouTube partner program policies require compliance with these monetization policies to potentially earn money on YouTube.
• Live in a country/region where the YouTube Partner Program is available.
• Have no active Community Guidelines strikes on your channel
• Have more than 4,000 valid public watch hours in the last 12 months.
• Have more than 1,000 subscribers.
• Have a linked AdSense account.

Twitch Partner Program - Eligibility Requirements

To reach Twitch Partnership requires a channel passing a manual review from Twitch staff. To even be eligible to apply for Partner the minimum metrics required as stated by Twitch are:

• Concurrent viewership of 75 viewers within the last 30 days
• Stream at least 12 different times within the last month
• Stream for at least 25 hours over the last month
• In order to unlock the path to partnership, you must first become a Twitch Affiliate.
• Gain 50 followers.
• Maintain an average of 3 concurrent viewers.
• Stream 500 minutes or more within the last 30 days.
• Stream over at least 7 days over the last 30 days.

Here’s what I learned about YouTube

YouTube has an incredibly powerful platform. As with twitch it’s super easy to plug into OBS or Streamlabs and create your overlays, etc. Where YouTube shines is in its visibility. If you are even remotely knowledgeable in SEO, you can really make your videos stand out. You can also use things like TubeBuddy to help with things like keywords, analytics, and tagging.

Let’s get to the data, in November I had:
Views: 2.5k
Watch Time: 78.2 hours
Subscribers: 42
Impressions: 6.8k
Return Viewers: 23

How to Monetize Your YouTube Stream

There are currently five ways for you to monetize your stream using the tools given to you from YouTube.

1. Advertising revenue: Get ad revenue from display, overlay, and video ads.
2. Channel memberships: Your members make recurring monthly payments in exchange for special perks that you offer.
3. Merch shelf: Your fans can browse and buy official branded merchandise that’s showcased on your watch pages.
4. Super Chat & Super Stickers: Your fans pay to get their messages highlighted in chat streams.
5. YouTube Premium Revenue: Get part of a YouTube Premium subscriber’s subscription fee when they watch your content.

As you can see there are plenty of ways you can make money with the YPP, but in terms of how quickly you can get partnered, it looks like YouTube is more of a long tail strategy, that on average takes about a year for most people. This can be very hard for those who don’t have the means or the ability to last a year creating videos essentially for free.

YouTube Pros and Cons

One of the biggest strengths that YouTube has is its ability to keep going even when you are not streaming. Your videos (both live and uploaded videos) stay live on YouTube essentially forever. They will continue to help your channel grow and make revenue once you are partnered. For me this is a big selling point compared to Twitch, which I will break down in a moment.

Pros

• Highest yield for potential growth
• More paid out to you as a percentage
• Better visibility and faster growth

Cons

• Requirements to monetize are much higher
• Takes longer to get into the partner program
• Not as connected (technology wise) than Twitch

Here’s what I learned about Twitch

Twitch is a beast when it comes to streaming and community popularity. Where twitch shines is its ability to give your community ways to creatively (and most important) natively interact with you while you're on stream. Community and gaming means everything to Twitch and its users so having a big personality really makes a difference on this platform.

Let’s get to the data, in November I had:

• Views: 1.3k
• Watch Time: 60 hours
• Followers: 10
• Impressions: 6.8k
• Unique Chatters: 13

How to Monetize Your Twitch Stream

So, how do Twitch streamers who join the Affiliate Program make money? Well, once you’re eligible, you can begin generating income from 5 different sources:

1. Twitch Subscriptions: you’ll get 50% of the revenue from the subscribers to your channel, based on the tier they’ve chosen.
2. Twitch Bits: there’s a payout of $1 for every 100 bits your channel gets.
3. Video game sales: you can earn 5% of the revenue from games (or in-game add-ons) where the purchase originates on your Twitch channel.
4. Donations: you receive 100% of any donation made by a Twitch user.
5. Ad revenue: this is paid out in $100 installments whenever you reach the threshold, which rolls from month to month.

As you can see there are just as many ways to make money on Twitch as there are for YouTube, but the majority of the revenue streams here on twitch require you to have an active community and be live on stream (Bits and Donations).

Twitch Pros and Cons

Twitch really shines in the simple fact that it was built as a gaming platform with the concept of people who watch creators they have been trained to give to that creator. THeir system makes it incredibly easy for viewers to do just that. YouTube falls behind in that fact.

Pros

1. Quicker to become affiliate/partner
2. Community is very engaging
3. Very easy to get started

Cons

1. Twitch takes a much higher percentage of your earnings
2. Easy to get lost when there are a lot of streamers in your game category
3. Search capabilities are not as great as YouTube

Final Thoughts

So, this was a lot closer than I had originally thought. I was almost certain that I was going to go the YouTube route without hesitation, but Twitch makes it incredibly easy to hop on your computer and just start streaming. It’s an amazing service if that’s what you want to do and be a Twitch personality. The problem is that’s not all I want to do. I want to be able to create cool content as well as stream and that is where I think YouTube is a much better platform.

The reasons for me choosing YouTube became clear once I really started to figure out how much time I had to invest on BOTH platforms to be the type of content creator I want to be, and with all the improvements that YouTube is doing with YouTube Shorts and Super Chats and Stickers, I think it will far surpass Twitch. So, if you are ok with being a streamer (and only a streamer) go with Twitch, it’s awesome. If you envision yourself a content creator first, then YouTube is the platform for you.