How Many YouTube Views Do You Need To Make Money?

Money earned on youtube per view

As a partnered YouTuber I get this question a lot: how much do you earn as a YouTuber?

Here I’ll help you understand some of the requirements and milestones you need to achieve so you can start earning money on the platform, how much you may be able to earn, as well as some of the most common uncertainties regarding this journey. 

What Are the Requirements to Make Money on YouTube?

First of all, to earn money via content creation for YouTube, you need to be part of the Youtube Partner Program, which is the platform’s initiative that allows you to get paid through advertisements on your videos.  

To earn money from YouTube views you need to:

  • Have at least 1.000 subscribers
  • Reach 4.000 public hours watched in the past 12 months
  • Have an AdSense account
  • Sign and agree to the terms and conditions of the program
  • Get your channel reviewed and approved

In order to get actually paid by YouTube, you’ll have to reach a balance of at least $100. This means your channel has to reach the 20.000 views mark (assuming you’ll get the average $5 per 1000 views) for you to get paid by YouTube.

There are two methods for you to earn your money with the presence of ads in your videos: cost per thousand views (CPM) and cost per click (CPC). With CPM, you earn money based on every 1.000 views you get, and with CPC you earn it on the number of people that actually click on the ads present in your videos. 

Most people use (and recommend) the CPM method, as it tends to be more profitable for most of the users.

What Happens After I Get 1K Subscribers on YouTube?

Well, regarding profitability, nothing. If you reach the 1.000 subscribers mark, some things happen, but you still have to reach the other milestones we cited above for you to start earning money with your videos.

By only reaching the 1K subscribers milestone, here’s what happens:

  • You get a congratulatory email from YouTube
  • You become part of the Opal Club

Both of these actions taken by YouTube upon your channel are pretty much just symbolic. There are no practical benefits you get from hitting the 1K mark alone, except for the subscribers themselves, obviously. 

How Hard Is It to Make Money on YouTube?

Basically, it’s as hard as reaching 4,000 hours of watch time in the past 12 months. From personal experience, this part is much harder than getting your first 1,000 subs. There are a few tactics you can use to increase your watch time and grow your channel faster.

Do You Get Paid When Your Video Goes Viral?

Yes. As long as your videos are seen as adequate for ad placements on Youtube’s platform, you will get paid normally for them.

However, if your video promotes any kind of content that YouTube doesn’t see as fit for ad placements, your content will be demonetized, or in some cases, taken out of the platform, making you unable to earn any money. 

Some things that can get your content on YouTube demonetized are:

  • Copyrighted or duplicated content
  • Hate speech
  • Sexualized content
  • Cyberbullying or harassment
  • Content containing use of violence or drugs
  • Spam or scam activities

If your video goes viral but it contains any of the types of the content cited above, it most likely won’t be able to earn any money.

How Much Do Beginning YouTubers Make?

Well, being completely straight, not much or nothing at all. As we’ve said, you first have to reach a number of milestones in order to get your content adequate for monetization on the platform. Most of the time, by the time you get there, you can’t even be considered a beginner anymore.

Once you get to monetization territory, you’ll probably be earning something between $50-$150 in the first months. But the key, as we’ve said, is persistence. Putting out quality content on a regular basis is essential for you to grow your channel and eventually increase the rentability of your videos.

How Many Views on YouTube Do I Need to Make $100?

Every estimative exposed here will be assuming the average earning of $5 per 1.000 views, which is about the average you will earn by displaying ads to an English-speaking audience :

To make $100, you’d have to get 20.000 views with your videos.

How Many YouTube Subscribers Do I Need to Make $2000 a Month?

According to UK data scientist Taimur Abdaal, you’ll need about 100.000 subscribers to be able to earn about $2.000 a month. But subscribers are not what make you money on YouTube, but views. If your audience is American, you might get around $5 per thousand views. That means you would need 400,000 views to make $2,000

However, with a big channel like Taimur’s, other things would be taken into account and that profit would not be made exclusively from the ad placements. A portion of those $2.000 would have to come from other routes such as:

  • Sponsorship deals
  • Donations and subscriptions
  • Selling your merch to subscribers
  • Selling online courses or consultation services

How Does YouTube Pay You?

You get paid through Google AdSense. There, you’ll be able to accumulate the money in your account based on the number of views and clicks that are coming in through the ad placements in your videos and YouTube pages.

However, you can only deposit the money to an account of your choosing once you reach $100 or more in your balance. 

Let me end this article with this: do not do YouTube for the money.

Instead, do it because it’s fun and you love making videos or sharing things with other people from all around the world. The money will come if you’re happy with what you do and if other people find it entertaining. That’s it!