How to Make Money on YouTube in 2026: 11 Ways That Pay

Updated October 2026. Every YouTube rule, threshold and revenue share below links to YouTube Help or the official YouTube Blog, checked this month.

To make money on YouTube, join the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) and earn a cut of ad and Premium revenue: 55% on long-form videos and 45% of your allocation from the Shorts Creator Pool. Then stack income YouTube doesn’t control: memberships and Super Chat (you keep 70%), YouTube Shopping, sponsorships, affiliate links and your own products. Fan funding opens at 500 subscribers. Ads need 1,000 subscribers plus 4,000 watch hours or 10 million Shorts views, and that bar doubles for new channels on February 1, 2027.

That is the short answer. The useful one is about order. Most new channels chase AdSense first and treat everything else as a bonus, which is backwards for the people who earn the most. YouTube’s own CEO letter says that in 2024, more than 50% of channels earning five figures or more made money from sources other than ads and YouTube Premium (YouTube Official Blog, Feb 11, 2025).

Below: the 11 ways that pay, what each requires, how the money reaches your bank, and what TubeGen’s channel data says about which niches actually show ads.

How do you make money on YouTube? 11 ways, ranked by how soon they open

The list runs roughly from “needs YouTube’s permission” to “needs nobody’s permission.” Thresholds are from YouTube Help’s YPP overview and eligibility page unless noted.

1. Ad revenue on long-form videos (YouTube Partner Program)

The classic. Ads run before, during and after your videos, and Partner Program creators get 55% of net revenue from ads on their public videos (YouTube Help: partner earnings overview).

To qualify today you need 1,000 subscribers and either 4,000 qualified watch hours in the last 365 days or 10 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days. You also need an AdSense account and content that meets YouTube’s advertiser-friendly guidelines. The full checklist, step by step, is in our YouTube monetization requirements guide.

What you earn per view swings hard by niche and audience country, and YouTube publishes no standard rate. Our breakdown of how much YouTube pays per view runs the math.

2. Shorts revenue

Shorts pay differently. Ad revenue from the Shorts Feed goes into a monthly Creator Pool, your slice is set by your share of engaged views, and you keep 45% of that slice, with or without music (YouTube Help: Shorts monetization policies).

Two catches. A Short that uses music sends part of its revenue to music licensing before the pool is split. And from February 1, 2027, a channel needs at least 10 million qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days to earn Shorts revenue at all. Channels under that line stay in YPP and keep long-form earnings; Shorts revenue switches back on when they cross 10 million again (YouTube Official Blog, Aug 10, 2026).

3. YouTube Premium revenue

Premium subscribers don’t see ads, so YouTube pays you from their subscription instead. As of the August 2026 announcement, YouTube allocates 30% of net subscription revenue for Premium and 60% for Premium Lite to creator pools. Creators then get 55% of that for long-form and 45% for Shorts. YouTube also says that, based on 2026 performance, partners earn more on average from a Premium subscriber than from a viewer who watches ads (YouTube Official Blog, Aug 10, 2026).

You don’t apply for this one. It comes with accepting the right YPP modules, and it shows up in your RPM.

4. Channel memberships

Viewers pay a monthly fee for perks: badges, emoji, members-only videos or posts. Creators keep 70% of net revenue (YouTube Help). Memberships open on the lower fan-funding tier: 500 subscribers, 3 public uploads in the last 90 days, and either 3,000 watch hours in the last year or 3 million Shorts views in the last 90 days. YouTube reported memberships grew more than 40% in 2024 (YouTube Official Blog).

Memberships reward depth over reach. A channel with 20,000 loyal viewers can out-earn one with 200,000 drive-bys here.

5. Super Chat, Super Stickers and Super Thanks

Tips. Super Chat and Super Stickers pin a paid message or animation during live streams and Premieres; Super Thanks lets viewers tip on regular videos. Same 70% share as memberships, and no extra subscriber count beyond being in YPP, 18 or older, in a supported country, with the Commerce Product Module accepted (YouTube Help).

Small money for most channels. Turn it on anyway. It costs nothing.

6. YouTube Shopping

Two flavors. Connect your own store and tag your products, or join the Shopping affiliate program and earn commission tagging other brands’ products. The affiliate side requires YPP membership, the YPP subscriber threshold, and a channel based in a supported country (the US, South Korea, Indonesia, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Brazil, Taiwan or Japan). Music channels, Made for Kids channels and channels with active Community Guidelines strikes are out (YouTube Help: Get started with Shopping).

YouTube had over 500,000 creators in Shopping as of January 2026 (YouTube Official Blog, Jan 21, 2026), and it has said Shopping bonuses are coming for channels below the new Shorts threshold, with details still to be announced.

7. Sponsorships and brand deals

A brand pays you a flat fee to mention or feature its product. In buyer-heavy niches like software, finance and tech, one deal can be worth more than a month of ad revenue. No YouTube threshold applies, but disclosure does: tick “My video contains a branded content” in YouTube Studio, or choose “Yes, my video includes branded content” under Paid Promotion when uploading (YouTube Help: paid product placements).

Brands buy attention from a specific audience, so views per video and audience fit tend to matter more than the subscriber count on your banner.

8. Affiliate links

Put tracked links in your description (Amazon, software referral programs, course platforms) and earn a commission on each sale. No YouTube permission needed, and it works from your first video. Tutorials, reviews and “best X for Y” videos convert best because the viewer already wants to buy.

9. Your own products

Courses, templates, ebooks, coaching, consulting, merch, a paid community. The margins are the best on this list because YouTube takes no cut of the product itself. A small channel that teaches one skill well only needs a sliver of its viewers to buy.

10. Licensing your footage

If you film something newsworthy or original, media outlets, brands and other creators may pay to use it. Some creators sign with licensing agencies that handle the deals. This is lumpy income. Great when a clip takes off, zero the rest of the time.

11. Off-platform fan funding

Patreon-style memberships, Ko-fi tips, paid newsletters. These do the job of YouTube memberships without waiting for 500 subscribers, and you keep the audience if your channel ever has a bad month. Many creators run both.

How do YouTubers get paid?

Everything YouTube pays you (ads, Shorts, Premium, memberships, Super Chat) flows through AdSense for YouTube. Four steps, per YouTube Help’s how to get paid page:

1. Verify your identity and address. Once earnings hit the verification threshold, YouTube mails a PIN to your payment address. It can take 3 to 4 weeks to arrive.
2. Submit tax info. Skip it and Google may withhold up to 24% of your total worldwide earnings.
3. Pick a payment method. EFT, wire transfer, check and others, depending on your country.
4. Reach the payment threshold. YouTube’s example uses $100: if your balance hits $100 in January, you’re paid at the end of February. Under the threshold, earnings roll over to next month.

So the money from a viral week lands roughly a month or two later. Plan for that lag. YouTube says it can’t issue payments early for any reason.

Sponsors, affiliate programs and your own store pay you directly, on their own schedules.

How many subscribers do you need to get paid on YouTube?

It depends on the stream:

Income stream	YouTube requirement (October 2026)
Sponsorships, affiliate links, own products, licensing	None
Memberships, Super Chat, Super Stickers, Super Thanks	500 subscribers, 3 uploads in 90 days, 3,000 watch hours or 3M Shorts views
Long-form ads and Premium revenue	1,000 subscribers + 4,000 watch hours (365 days) or 10M Shorts views (90 days)
Same, for new channels from Feb 1, 2027	1,000 subscribers + 8,000 watch hours or 20M Shorts views
Shorts revenue from Feb 1, 2027	10M qualified Shorts views in the last 90 days, every month

Sources: YouTube Help: YPP eligibility; YouTube Official Blog, Aug 10, 2026.

YouTube says fan-funding and Shopping thresholds are unchanged in 2027, and the new entry bars don’t affect channels already in the program. Current partners do need to accept the updated terms in YouTube Studio by January 31, 2027 to keep monetizing fully. We go deeper on the subscriber question in how many subscribers you need to get paid, and on who each 2027 rule hits in our YouTube Partner Program changes for 2027 explainer.

The practical read: if you’re starting now, long-form is the safer base. Its entry bar doubles in 2027, but once you’re in, there’s no rolling 90-day threshold to keep clearing.

Which niches show ads? TubeGen’s data on 112,154 channels

YouTube doesn’t publish which kinds of channels monetize, so we checked our own index. According to TubeGen’s Niche Finder data (112,154 channels, October 2026), ads were detected on 63.4% of the channels with a known status.

Split by format, the gap is small:

• On-camera channels: ads detected on 64.1% (50,879 of 79,382 with a known status)
• Faceless channels: ads detected on 60.8% (8,770 of 14,435)

One caveat before anyone screenshots this. “Ads detected” means ads were found running on the channel. It is not confirmed monetization, and it is not proof of Partner Program membership. These are also the channels TubeGen tracks, a set that leans toward channels creators research, not all of YouTube.

By niche, for faceless channels (share with ads detected, counting channels with an unknown status in the base):

Niche	Faceless channels (n)	Faceless: ads detected	All channels: ads detected
Listicle / top-10	158	73.4%	54.3%
Meditation	84	67.9%	60.0%
Tutorial	1,600	65.1%	66.6%
Tech	889	61.8%	60.8%
Gaming	5,349	60.3%	63.0%
Education	1,746	56.4%	59.5%
Personal finance	114	54.4%	62.3%
History	877	53.8%	59.8%
AI (as a topic)	229	45.9%	49.1%

What stands out:

• Most faceless niches land between 52% and 68%, close to the on-camera rate. Showing your face is not what decides whether a channel carries ads.
• Listicle channels run highest at 73.4%, but on only 158 faceless channels. Meditation’s 84 is thinner still. Treat small rows as hints.
• Channels about AI as a topic are the low outlier at 45.9%. That’s channels covering AI news and tools, not channels made with AI.
• Faceless finance is rarer than the pitch suggests. Only 6.3% of classified personal-finance channels in the index are faceless; the niche is mostly on-camera creators and podcasts.

Ads detected also says nothing about how much a niche pays, which is a matter of RPM. Our YouTube RPM guide has working ranges by niche. The niche counts, format splits and upload-timing data behind this section are in the full report. You can run the same filters yourself in Niche Finder; searching and filtering are free.

How to make money on YouTube, by channel stage

Eleven options is too many to chase at once. A sequence that matches when each one opens:

1. Day one: affiliate links in every relevant description. Free, and it teaches you what your audience buys.
2. Around 500 subscribers: apply for the fan-funding tier and switch on memberships and Super Thanks.
3. At 1,000 subscribers and your watch hours: ads and Premium revenue. If you’re close, note that the bar doubles for applications from February 1, 2027.
4. Once views per video are steady: pitch sponsors in your niche. Have one page of numbers ready: average views, audience countries, age range.
5. When comments keep asking the same question: build a product that answers it.

Shorts sit alongside all of this as discovery. From 2027 they’re a weak primary income source unless you’re clearing 10 million qualified views every 90 days.

Can AI and faceless channels make money on YouTube?

Yes, and the rule is the same as for everyone else. In July 2025 YouTube renamed its “repetitious content” policy to “inauthentic content” to clarify that mass-produced or repetitive videos are ineligible. The same page names AI used to edit a script, generate a unique visual, or bring a character and story you invented to life as fine to monetize; what it rules out is AI content built on generic templates that gives the impression of mass production (YouTube Help: channel monetization policies).

Translation: originality and a point of view get paid; copy-paste channels don’t. That’s also the competitive problem. In a 10-title spot check, TubeGen’s Niche Finder found breakout faceless titles re-uploaded near word for word by as many as 18 to 20 other videos within a month. Channels that win write their own angle. Our posts on whether YouTube monetizes AI videos and how to make money with an AI YouTube channel cover the policy line and the build.

Where TubeGen fits

If your plan is a faceless channel, the hard part isn’t knowing these 11 streams. It’s producing enough good long-form video to reach the thresholds that open them: 4,000 watch hours today, 8,000 for new channels in 2027.

TubeGen is the all-in-one YouTube platform built on the AI models creators already use. You find a niche in Niche Finder (or model a channel you admire with Copy Style), then the Project Builder takes a title through script, voiceover, visuals, soundtrack and description, with thumbnails and a timeline editor alongside, for videos up to 2 hours long. Every tool runs on its own too, so an on-camera creator can use just the script writer or the thumbnail studio. Plans are on the pricing page.

What it won’t do is pick your angle for you. The channels that get paid still have one.