Gaming YouTuber Earnings Breakdown — Full Breakdown & Transcript

[00:02] brain or attention spam, you just an exact number and then you're going to click off. It's fine. I'm not judging. click off. It's fine. I'm not judging. So last month in October, I earned 6,870

[00:15] 70p. So, for everyone else who's staying, we're going to do a breakdown of how much I typically earn, where the money comes from, what kind of content the money comes from, and basically what goes into actually making money off

[00:28] YouTube as a gaming YouTuber, cuz I do think it's different from other different genres in the YouTube space. Also, this month was actually a low earning month for me relative to me because I understand that it is a lot of

[00:41] money and I'm very grateful for it. But it is lower than what I usually earn. So, I would also like to explore why. Traditionally, this has been my vlog channel and I'm changing this channel into more of a how to be a YouTuber

[00:55] YouTube, it was so difficult to find actually good advice. There's so much to name channel names, but you know those clickbait channels that are like how to hack the algorithm in three simple steps. Like it is just such a

[01:08] waste of time consuming this kind of content because it's not there to advise don't want to be one of those people. That's why I wanted to make this channel. It's more casual. I'm not doing a jump cut every other second in order

[01:21] to retain your attention. This video is for people who actually want to learn For those of you with a brain or attention spam, you can leave and go three-step hack in order to gain 100 subscribers in 3 seconds. I don't care.

[01:35] are willing to sit down and listen and learn. So, looking at my lifetime revenue, as you can see, since my channel has started, it's gone up and up and up. It's slightly flatline between 2024 and 2025. You can see in 2024, if

[01:52] that entire year, by the way, you can see it's just under six figures from YouTube ad revenue. And for 2025, it's just over six figures and we've still got another 2 months worth of ad revenue left. So, I'm very happy. I also want to

[02:07] iterate, this is not me bragging. This is just a genuine video for people who want to know how much a midsize YouTube channel can earn because I want to help you and be realistic with you and I want you to achieve your dream of becoming a

[02:19] YouTuber if that's what you'd like. So, October was a low month for me as you can see by this graph of every single month. You can see that my strongest months were actually January, February, and March for views, and then it

[02:31] gradually went down. And this is really strange, honestly, because a brand new Sims 4 pack came out last month, and nobody really seemed to care, and it something that we're going to be talking about. And it's also very weird that I

[02:46] and March, cuz usually these are my worst months. December is the worst month for me in terms of views. It is that way for the majority of YouTubers. January was very strange and I will definitely be doing some investigations.

[03:01] Why? Cuz I'd like to get my numbers back up. So, you can see it says here, "My views are 433,000 less than normal." I personally don't like it when YouTube does this in the faded out gray because views are so

[03:14] volatile every single month. So, it's not really representative. It never ever says it's the same as usual. is always more than usual or less, but never the same. And that's cuz every single month on YouTube is different. YouTube is a

[03:27] seasonal job. And that means that your views and income changes drastically every single month. And what I mean by seasonal is if you're a health and people want to get a hot body. It maybe in their January New Year's resolution,

[03:41] get fit. The rest of the year, nobody really cares about health and fitness. So you can imagine their views drop in those periods, but they go up in summer and in January. For a travel vlogging channel as well, it might go up in the

[03:55] summer because that's when people go on vacation. Arts and crafts channels will probably get a boost in views during the school holiday periods. So this is what I mean by seasonal. And when you're a gaming YouTuber like me who plays the

[04:07] Sims, this can be very volatile because it's basically dependent on how much evidently by this there was not much hype around the most recent pack which is my reviews which is why my views were quite low. Watch hours were lower than

[04:21] usual. Although they're not massively low and it's because I've been making an effort to try and do longer videos. You may have noticed I have lost 4.5,000 subscribers this month. The haters will be cheering on. For those of you who

[04:34] don't watch my Sims channel, I got cancelled by the Sims community because Being canceled is quite normal as a content creator and receiving criticism. think it's called a hate train where people will mass unfollow you or they

[04:48] mass dislike your videos because I guess it makes them feel like they're part of something like they're doing the right thing. Maybe 10, 15 years ago, hate just stupid, I hate you." But these days, hate is more like you're problematic and

[05:02] you're being cancelled for not upholding the same values as me. I've always been very adamant on my channel that I don't like the Sims community and Saton Sims is a separate space where people are a bit older. At most Sims YouTubers,

[05:15] they've got a younger audience, whereas my audience is actually a lot older and their attitudes are different and their views are different and my videos are quite chilled as a result. There's no like big jumpy edits and stuff like a

[05:27] lot of other YouTubers do. It's not overly dramatic like content made for teenagers and kids. So, I'm very privileged to have an audience that's separate from the toxic Sims community. Even though a lot of them are in it,

[05:39] very lucky to have my sat on Sims audience. But over the last year, I haven't really been stating enough that I don't like the Sims community. In the people used to unfollow me all the time. So, I was able to wean out and filter

[05:53] watching my channel. Whereas, I haven't been doing that lately. So, I'm kind of glad in a way that it's happened. I will also go over my strategy later in terms of how I'd like to bring new audience in. So, let's look at my most viewed

[06:07] content for October, which is exciting. My most viewed video is my brutally honest review of The Sims 4 Adventure Awaits, and we will be looking at this my ad revenue for this video. You can see the next best one. Oh, was my

[06:21] apology video. How exciting. We can see how much I earned on there. You can also here. And interestingly, I have not uploaded any shorts for like months and months and months. Yet, my most viewed videos are YouTube shorts. Most of these

[06:36] videos are actually recent videos that I have uploaded this month. However, that is actually a problem which I will be explaining later. Interestingly, I did a 2-hour long live stream and even I don't know what the earnings are from this.

[06:49] streams. There's this video here, which pack should I get for the Sims 4 Ultimate Guide 25? This was uploaded in April and it was one of my top viewed looking at that. Same with this video, Playing Wicked Whims Properly for the

[07:03] First Time, which was uploaded in January last year. And as you can see, videos. So, looking at my adventure awaits reviews, The Sims 4 pack reviews typically get a lot more views than usual. They also earn a lot more money.

[07:16] You can see that advertisers are paying £1253 for every 1,000 views. And I'm £1253 for every 1,000 views. And I'm earning £7.51 per 1,000 views, which is a little bit higher than usual. Firstly, because it's a longer video, and

[07:29] secondly, because it's a review, and reviews naturally make more money from advertisers. And you can see most of my income comes from skippable video ads. And the thing about these review videos, why they're so good, is because they're

[07:42] actually evergreen content. Let's split YouTube videos into two main types. Firstly, crash and burn videos, I like to call them. These are the videos that get a big spike in views straight away and then they never get any more views

[07:54] again. And these are typically views on trending topics. As a YouTuber, it's good to make videos on trending topics because they get a lot of views straight views over time, so they're not generating that passive income, which I

[08:07] know a lot of YouTubers want. And then we've got the evergreen content, and it's called evergreen because this kind of content is always being watched in the future. So my Sims 4 pack reviews, for example, people are purchasing Sims

[08:19] 4 packs now. Even packs that were released 5 years ago. New people are new people are thinking about what packs they want to buy. So they watch my reviews, even my really old videos. I also get a lot of views on older videos

[08:32] speaking about mods as well, my favorite mods, my how-to guide kind of videos. In this video. This video is called, "Which pack should I get for the Sims 4 guide to 2025?" And you can see this hasn't really had a huge spike in video

[08:46] flatline. This video has actually started off slowly, but it's very very steadily just getting more and more views over time. And you can see the income is going up over time. So, this is what I mean by passive income. And

[08:58] you can see a big source of traffic for this video was YouTube search. So, people are searching for the best packs to buy for the Sims 4. So, if we look in the last 7 days, this has earned me £16, which is quite good. So, it's earning

[09:11] roughly like 2 to3 per day. So, that might not sound like a lot of money, 2 to3 per day, but if you're uploading, let's say, 100 videos that are earning you £2 per day to be modest. That's £200 per day you are earning in [music]

[09:26] passive income, which is pretty cool because it was something that you did in the past. And this is one of the main benefits as a YouTuber. You always need to be making these evergreen videos because your audience will enjoy them

[09:38] because it's something that they can go back to again and again and again and good for you because it helps to generate more views and income and subscribers. So, this is my apology video. I actually turn off monetization,

[09:51] so I don't know why I earn 1321. Where the hell? Oh, it's from people giving donations. People on YouTube do give donations through super thanks and also in detail today, but a lot of people are very kind and they will make donations.

[10:05] Over the last couple of years, I've actually donated my donations to my local food bank charity, but this year I've earned a lot more and I don't really know what to do with it. So, if you want a whole video on memberships

[10:17] and that kind of earning, let me know. But, as you can see, this video didn't Interestingly, I gained subscribers. I probably lost a few, too. We can actually have a look if we go through to content and then subscription source. I

[10:30] content and then subscription source. I gained 520 but lost 349, which sounds honestly don't know why I didn't lose most people, they don't really care about the truth. They don't care about

[10:44] care about is the drama. You know, people are lying. They're basement dwellers. They like drama. So, it's surprising to me that I actually gained anything from that. So, this video, Paralyives: The Sims Killer, is a very

[10:56] video. You can see it got a lot of views instantly, but it's pretty much flatlined since it's been uploaded and it probably won't make me any more income. So, this is another example of as a midsize channel how I can get a lot

[11:09] of views. As you can see, I've almost earned more than 10k more views than usual, but the video is also flatlining. So, you've got to be careful with your videos and not do too much of the crash and burn videos and mixing some of the

[11:21] evergreen with it. We've then got this one, playing Wicked Whims, which was released January last year. And you can see this video has steadily got a lot a lot of views. It's one of my most viewed videos ever. And you can see as well

[11:33] income is going up very steadily from the video as well. Interestingly, you uploaded, the video actually stopped earning money for a bit because the video was temporarily demonetized, but then I got the video reviewed and it was

[11:45] remonetized and then the income went up. And this is another example of evergreen. And you can see for this one almost 70% of the views comes from YouTube search. That is why it's so important to do these evergreen videos

[11:57] because these will help to bring in new viewers from YouTube search as opposed to just suggested videos of existing viewers. Next, I want to look at my I've never actually looked at this before. So, I only gain four subscribers

[12:10] from this video, which honestly feels like it makes sense because YouTube is not great for discovery when you're live streaming. I heard Twitch isn't either. it makes sense. So, let's have a look at revenue since published. Live videos do

[12:25] actually earn revenue from watch page ads. As you can see, this one earned ads. As you can see, this one earned 168 pounds. And honestly, for a 2hour long live stream, it's not as much as I thought. I understand they show a lot

[12:37] less ads on lives. I don't have any control, by the way, over like what ads you see on YouTube live videos. I don't know. I only live stream like twice a year. I also earn almost 90 from supers which is like donations and also 1 155

[12:52] from somebody or a couple people joining my membership my channel memberships and interestingly with this live you can see that I actually earn more money during the replay rather than during live which I think is really interesting though for

[13:07] me personally live streaming is not a big revenue source for me so I won't be doing it much I also find it quite exhausting on my voice and just yeah don't like doing live streams that often, but maybe I'll do it more in the

[13:19] future. So, in terms of why my views were lower this month and my income was actually a lot lower than normal. Firstly, I think it's seasonal. It's normal for me to have a drop in views in October especially. That's when I really

[13:31] see the initial drop normally in the year. Secondly, the latest Sims 4 pack flopped and people just weren't really interested in it and my content on it also flopped. And thirdly, you might be thinking, Satch, does being cancelled

[13:44] Typically, no. In the past when I've been cancelled, it's got me an increase videos, leave hate comments, and then you know they leave. So, I don't think that's had a negative impact on my viewership. It's probably had a positive

[13:58] one. I think the first two, the season and the bad pack has had a big impact. So, taking a look at my let's play of The Sims 4 Adventure Awaits, episode one got 26k views, which is low for an episode one of a let's play on my

[14:13] channel. Episode 2 got 21K. Episode 3 got 19K. Episode 4 got 9.3K. This is my first video, honestly, in like over a year that got less than 10K views. People were just not interested in this pack. The Sims 4 is flopping regardless

[14:27] of the political issues that's going on in the Sims community right now. The game is generally flopping. So, as you can see, because of that, I totally switched up my content and I started to focus on the more evergreen videos for

[14:40] this month, which got a lot more views. But the first half of the month was a lot worse. So that obviously had a very big impact. Now this is from the end of December to the start of January and I got a lot more views in January earlier

[14:54] this year. So I actually just want to look at my videos and see what I did. So I can understand what my audience actually want to see because my views were just so much better in this period. So firstly, you can see I uploaded a lot

[15:06] more let's plays. Scamming old men to get rich. Can I simplify the stone age? A wicked whims let's play. Wicked whims videos are always popular, honestly. Can my child survive living alone? We finally have genies in the Sims 4. I've

[15:18] done a lot of let's plays in this period, which I think has really helped. I also did some more of that evergreen content, too. So, as an example, why the Sims 4 will never get better, like a timeless video essay, which doesn't

[15:31] really go out of fashion. 10 ridiculous Sims 4 features EA lock behind a pay wall. That kind of thing won't go out of fashion. I've done three kit reviews in this period, all of which got a lot of views. Honestly, were Sims 3 packs

[15:43] that's quite timeless. Deleting and refreshing my Sims 4 CC folder. You can watch that at any time. Ways The Sims 4 is better than The Sims 3. So, over this period, it seems like we had a lot more video essays. We also had a lot more

[15:57] really important for those evergreen views, too. And in fact, just a couple weeks ago when I started making that shift again, my views actually started going up slightly. There's still quite a few risky videos here. For example, the

[16:10] Halloween videos, ranking every Sims 4 occult, and can my Sim survive a deadly retreat. Now, Halloween videos, like Christmas videos, Easter videos, any kind of holiday video, they always perform really, really bad. Always. So,

[16:25] that makes sense. My build videos typically do bad. And this one, The Sims Now, this is an old trend from like 3 or 4 years ago. I knew this video would tank in views before I even uploaded it. But here's the thing I want to say.

[16:40] YouTube is not just about getting views. It's about enjoying yourself. And I really wanted to make that video, I genuinely found it fun doing it. And I knew before I even recorded it that it would flop. But I just wanted to make it

[16:52] content creator, in order to avoid burnout, you have to sometimes make videos that don't appeal to everyone because you've got to stay sane. You've got to do other things that make you happy because it's not just about money.

[17:06] that's the great thing about being a YouTuber. It is a really fun job and I think it's so important not to revolve your channel around money making content. You simply just need to start off having fun. Especially if you're a

[17:19] monetized yet. Like don't worry too much about making the most monetizable content. You've just got to make fun content. In terms of me going forward, The Sims 4 is in a really weird state right now where Simmers are boycotting

[17:34] the game because next year The Sims will be bought out by Saudi Arabia and Simmers don't like this. And there's an expectation now for Sims content creators to stop playing The Sims. And there's honestly been a little bit of

[17:47] bullying. I don't know if you guys saw my apology video if you go on my gaming channel, but a lot of Sims creators have basically been bullied into not playing The Sims 4 anymore or not buying packs. I'm not one of those people. I haven't

[17:59] been bullied into doing anything. What I said in my video was I'm just going to wait and see how things go and I'm going to stay in my own lane and do my own thing and figure it out as I go along at my own pace because the deal hasn't even

[18:11] gone through yet. So, I'm not making any rush decision cuz it's just way too soon. What I do plan on doing is every single Wednesday, I plan on now uploading a cozy game video that's not The Sims 4 and just seeing how it goes.

[18:24] Typically, I don't actually upload videos on Wednesdays anyway. So, it's not replacing another video that would have got more views that would have been normally I wouldn't have uploaded on Wednesdays anyway. I'm working an extra

[18:38] couple hours of the week, but with the benefit of potentially bringing in new viewers by playing other games and experimenting and seeing what my think is important. You can see I uploaded a video and this is called my

[18:51] favorite and least favorite cozy games of 2025. And you can see I lost subscribers cuz the whole cancellation thing. And the video also flopped in terms of views and it didn't make that much money and it's kind of tanked now.

[19:03] In terms of this video of me playing the video game Town to City, it's got less got more than the other videos. So, I definitely think let's plays are the way forward for me in terms of experimenting with new games and I've only got a

[19:17] really show you, but I honestly think it's going to do a lot better than that the way forward in terms of the new videos. So, as I said, this channel is transforming it into a how to be a YouTuber channel. If you have any ideas

[19:31] of what you genuinely want to know, how to make a clickbaity thumbnail, how to get more views, how to be monetized, if you want to know anything about being a gaming YouTuber, please leave a comment down below. I really just want to help

[19:44] out as many people as possible. And I also have another couple of videos on this channel. I actually did the same thing in October of 2022. So, if you're curious to see the difference in earnings, then you can. Otherwise, thank

[19:57] you so much for watching this video. Subscribe so you don't miss another.