Money · Data study
How Much Does YouTube Pay? 82 Creators’ Real RPMs, by Niche
what a typical long video paid per 1,000 views
By Elijah Westbrook · 2026-10-19 · 2 min read
A typical long video paid about $6.19 per 1,000 views. That’s the median RPM of 70 creators who said their real number on camera. Shorts paid about 16 cents. Personal finance paid the most at $11.74, and beauty and gaming paid around $4.
n = creators per group
Shorts pay a tiny fraction of long videos
The biggest gap wasn’t between niches. It was Shorts versus long videos. The 12 creators who shared a Shorts RPM had a median of 16 cents, while long videos sat around $6.19.
One creator’s short hit 7.9 million views and still paid less than half a dollar per 1,000 views.
A short needs about 39 times the views to pay what a long video pays. If you want YouTube money, it comes from long videos. Use Shorts for reach and for testing ideas.
Finance pays almost 3× gaming
Personal finance creators reported a median of $11.74. Gaming creators reported $4.38. Advertisers pay more to reach people who are about to make money decisions.
The highest single number we found was close to $21, from a finance creator with about a million subscribers. The lowest number anyone reported was 25 cents.
Niche sets your ceiling. But a niche that pays well per view can still earn less if small channels in it barely get views. See the faceless niche study for that side of it.
Three things moved every creator’s number
Inside every niche, creators kept naming the same levers. Longer videos had room for more ads. Viewers in the United States paid more than most other countries. And December paid the most, while January paid the least.
One creator’s 24-cent short had an audience that was only 47% from the USA.
Make videos long enough for mid-roll ads, know where your viewers live, and never judge your channel’s pay in January.
From my channel
How I did it
We collected the 1,000 most viewed videos where creators talk about their own YouTube pay (24 searches), read 923 that had captions, and kept the 82 creators who stated their own RPM as a fact. Hypotheticals, “Google says” numbers and website RPMs were dropped.
The limits
These are self-reported numbers, and some groups are small (3 to 12 creators). Creators who share their earnings may not be typical. Treat the niche ladder like a map, not a law.
Questions
What is RPM on YouTube?
RPM is what you keep for every 1,000 views after YouTube takes its cut. It counts every view, including ones with no ad, so it’s lower than CPM, which is what advertisers pay.
How much does YouTube pay for 1 million views?
At the $6.19 median, about $6,190 for long videos. At the Shorts median of $0.16, about $160. Your niche and audience can move this a lot in either direction.
How many views do you need to make $1,000 on YouTube?
About 162,000 long-video views at a $6.19 RPM, or around 6.25 million Shorts views at $0.16.
Which YouTube niche pays the most?
In this data, personal finance: a median RPM of $11.74 from 11 creators.