YouTube to let Shorts creators in India monetise from early 2023

YouTube announced today that it is expanding its creator monetisation program to Indian creators, starting early 2023. In a blog post published earlier today, Amjad Hanif, vice president of YouTube’s creator products, said that creators who make Shorts videos can apply for the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) if they have 1,000 subscribers, and deliver 10 million views in the past 90 days or 4,000 viewed hours in the past 12 months, on YouTube Shorts.

Hanif also added that YPP will be extended to early stage creators on the platform as well. “A new level of YPP with lower requirements will offer earlier access to Fan Funding features like Super Thanks, Super Chat, Super Stickers and Channel Memberships. To reward creators across a range of formats, we’ll have paths for long-form, Shorts and Live creators to join this new tier in 2023,” he said.

YouTube’s monetisation plan comes as similar plans have rolled out from various platforms. Instagram, the Meta-owned social media platform, has announced the intent to allow creators to monetise their work. In June this year, Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg said that while the company eventually plans to set-up a revenue sharing model with its creators to monetize their content on the platforms, it will likely put off such a model to onboard more creators on the platform.

On July 22, a report by market research firm Redseer projected short video monetisation to scale $19 billion by 2030. As of this year, the firm projected that short video monetisation in India was worth only $150 million — which the official advent of YouTube in this sector may help improve.

Hanif detailed that YouTube will now include ads, which will run in between videos on its Shorts feed. The total ad revenue from all ads running on Shorts in India will be added at the end of the month, and distributed among eligible creators who qualify for the program.

YouTube will offer 45% of the total advertisement revenue it earns from India to its creators, while the remaining amount will contribute to paying for licensing music that its creators use for content on the platform. The company further added that YPP has seen creators collectively earn over $50 billion around the world, over the past three years.

“We expect the majority of our Shorts Fund recipients to earn more money under this new model, which was built for long term sustainability. Instead of a fixed fund, we're doubling down on the revenue sharing model that has supercharged the creator economy and enabled creators to benefit from the platform's success,” Hanif added.