YouTube doubles watch-hour requirement for new creators to start earning

YouTube announced Monday that new creators will have to clear higher thresholds before they can start earning money from ads and subscriptions. Creators who want to join the YouTube Partner Program will need at least 8,000 qualified watch hours over the past year, or 20 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days. That’s double the current bar: 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 watch hours over the past year, or 1,000 subscribers plus 10 million Shorts views over the past 90 days.

The change takes effect February 1. The Google-owned company said the update won’t affect creators already in the Partner Program.

YouTube also announced that creators will need to maintain 10 million Shorts views over a rolling 90-day period to keep earning through the Shorts Creators Pool. Channels that fall below that threshold stay in the Partner Program and keep earning on long-form content, with Shorts revenue resuming once they cross 10 million views again.

YouTube said the changes are meant to “keep pace with the growth of YouTube,” which the company said now sees over 200 billion daily Shorts views and over a billion hours of watch time on TV every day.

The higher bar makes it harder for creators to enter and remain in YouTube’s monetization program, particularly for Shorts creators, putting more pressure on their ability to consistently draw large audiences before they can start earning on the platform — which could mean fewer new entrants able to monetize their content.

As part of Monday’s announcement, YouTube said it’s expanding its more affordable Premium Lite subscription to all countries where YouTube Premium is available. Creators receive a share of subscription revenue based on member watch time and views, with 55% going to long-form video creators and 45% to Shorts creators; the company said partners on average earn more from a Premium signup than from a user who was watching ads. Premium Lite offers an ad-free experience on most videos, along with the ability to download videos for offline viewing and play them in the background.

YouTube isn’t the only platform revising its creator payouts: over the weekend, Elon Musk’s X also revamped creator rewards to only reward original content, and Facebook launched a new monetization program this spring to attract creators from TikTok and YouTube.

Why it matters

Raising the bar to monetize — especially on Shorts, YouTube’s fastest-growing format — signals the platform is prioritizing established creator quality over raw growth in creator numbers, a shift that could ripple into how competing platforms calibrate their own payout thresholds.