How Much YouTube ACTUALLY Pays for Shorts in 2026?

[00:00] So, inside this makeshift piggybank is

[00:02] exactly how much we made from our

[00:04] highest earning YouTube short over the

[00:06] last year.

[00:10] But, before I show you what's inside

[00:12] here, I need you to do me a little

[00:13] favor.

[00:14] Go down to the comments and put in your

[00:17] own guess.

[00:18] How much do you think 2.5 million

[00:21] YouTube shorts views pays in this day

[00:24] and age?

[00:27] Written it down? Good. Because I

[00:29] guarantee half of you are going to feel

[00:31] really good about your guess.

[00:33] And the other half are going to be

[00:35] really confused about how YouTube works.

[00:38] Either way, I spent the last few weeks

[00:40] going through every single YouTube short

[00:42] we've posted on this channel in 2025 and

[00:45] into 2026. The views, the revenue, the

[00:47] RPM, all of it. And I'm about to expose

[00:50] what I found across our channel. And not

[00:52] only that, we're going to back this up

[00:53] with data from other channels from

[00:55] different niches to see what they've

[00:57] been making as well.

[01:01] Now, here's the thing that most people

[01:03] get wrong about YouTube shorts. They

[01:05] assume that with more views comes more

[01:08] revenue. Yeah, it's not as simple as

[01:10] that. The numbers tell a really

[01:12] interesting, contrasting story. So, as I

[01:15] mentioned earlier, this YouTube short

[01:16] got us 2.5 million views, which is not

[01:19] too shabby. And it made us

[01:25] $178.

[01:32] Thank you, but YouTube calculates the

[01:34] revenue of a short based on engaged

[01:37] views. That's how many people actually

[01:39] watch a short for a certain length of

[01:41] time as opposed to swiping immediately

[01:43] to the next short. Why YouTube has two

[01:46] different metrics for views?

[01:49] I don't know, you'll have to ask them

[01:50] yourself. So, when we factor that in,

[01:52] the number of engaged views plummets to

[01:55] just over a million. And those are the

[01:57] views that earn the YouTube short money.

[02:00] And for every 1,000 engaged views on

[02:02] this particular YouTube short, it pays

[02:05] 16 cents

[02:07] or around about 10 English pennies.

[02:11] However, although this short got a lot

[02:14] less engaged views, just 40,000 of them,

[02:18] it made $23.

[02:20] And that's an RPM of almost 60 cents,

[02:23] which is basically four times as much.

[02:30] So, one short is earning four times more

[02:33] revenue per view than another. But, the

[02:36] one earning more revenue has 40 times

[02:40] fewer views. So, why such the big

[02:42] difference? Well, let's dig into those

[02:43] three letters I've already casually

[02:46] tossed into this conversation.

[02:48] RPM.

[02:51] Now, the technical term RPM stands for

[02:53] revenue per mille, but you don't really

[02:55] need to understand that, to be honest.

[02:57] What you need to know is that RPM

[02:58] calculates the money you earn per 1,000

[03:01] YouTube shorts views. Those are engaged

[03:04] views remember.

[03:06] As we've already shown you in the two

[03:07] examples so far, one short earned 16

[03:10] cents per 1,000 views, while another one

[03:13] earned 59 cents per 1,000 views. Now,

[03:16] that in itself is pretty simple, right?

[03:19] But, here's where things get really

[03:20] interesting. RPM, as we've already shown

[03:24] you, is not a fixed number. YouTube

[03:26] doesn't assign you a RPM for your

[03:29] channel. On the contrary, RPMs vary

[03:32] wildly from one YouTube short to the

[03:34] next. Across all of our shorts in 2025

[03:37] and leading into 2026, the average RPM

[03:40] on our channel sits at around about 13

[03:43] cents per 1,000 views. And the good news

[03:45] is, for shorts creators in general, is

[03:49] that RPMs over time continue to be

[03:53] yeah, trending upwards. So, in summary,

[03:55] with admittedly a lot of fluctuations,

[03:58] that means more revenue for all. But,

[04:00] watch what happens when you look at

[04:02] individual shorts.

[04:05] There are huge variations. This short

[04:08] about YouTube demonetization, around 75

[04:11] cents per 1,000 views. Again, that's

[04:13] another one with four times our average

[04:16] RPM. And this one about a YouTube

[04:18] update, 53 cents per 1,000 views, more

[04:20] than three times our average. But,

[04:22] obviously, if some shorts have a much

[04:24] higher RPM than others have to

[04:27] underperform. This short about the best

[04:29] time to post your videos on YouTube got

[04:31] 150,000 views, but made only 9 cents per

[04:35] 1,000 views, below our own average

[04:37] despite the higher view count. So, it's

[04:39] the same channel, and it should be the

[04:40] same audience and the same team making

[04:42] the content, but completely different

[04:45] RPMs for every single video. And it's

[04:47] not just us who are seeing those

[04:49] patterns.

[04:49] >> And how much did this 4.5 million view

[04:52] short pay me? It gave me 9,600

[04:55] subscribers. That is crazy. And it paid

[04:57] me $158.

[04:59] You know what I mean? Like, oh, what is

[05:00] this? 5 cents per 1,000 views. 99.7%

[05:05] stayed to watch. 99.7,

[05:08] what is that? I've never seen such stats

[05:09] before. How is that even possible?

[05:12] So, the views were massive, and the

[05:14] retention was nigh on perfect. But, the

[05:17] RPM, quite frankly, was shambolic. Now,

[05:20] compare that to his main channel.

[05:22] >> 10 million views, guys. 10 million

[05:24] views. How much does 10 million views of

[05:27] YouTube shorts pay? $1,105

[05:30] from a 56-second video that took half an

[05:34] hour to make. That's kind of bonkers,

[05:35] isn't it? And if we look at the revenue,

[05:37] it pays pretty much the average 20 cents

[05:39] per 1,000 views. Wow. So, double the

[05:42] views, but more than six times the

[05:44] revenue at over $1,000. It's the same

[05:47] creator, but the RPM made all of the

[05:49] difference. So, now that you understand

[05:51] that RPMs can be pretty agile, let's get

[05:54] into our full numbers. Every major short

[05:57] we posted in 2025, what it made, and

[06:01] what

[06:03] we can learn from it. We've posted over

[06:06] 160 shorts in 2025 and into 2026. And

[06:10] here are the five biggest by engaged

[06:12] views. The first one you already know

[06:14] about, 1.1 million engaged views and

[06:17] $178 revenue earned. And this is what

[06:20] these 1 million people were engaging

[06:22] with. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. How?

[06:30] And why? Here's another one with 1.1

[06:33] million engaged views, but only $145

[06:36] earned this time because of a slightly

[06:38] lower RPM. But, this next one has just

[06:40] over 800,000 views, so that's 300,000

[06:43] less views than the previous short, but

[06:46] it's earned three more dollars at 148

[06:49] thanks to its higher CPM. And this one

[06:52] is just about to crack 800,000 engaged

[06:55] views, but now we're earning less than

[06:57] $100 because the RPM just isn't high

[06:59] enough this time. And finally, this

[07:01] short, ironically about how much YouTube

[07:03] pays me for YouTube shorts, got a little

[07:06] over half a million engaged views and

[07:09] $80 in revenue. All right, then. So, as

[07:11] a quick calculation,

[07:15] that's 4.3 million views in total, which

[07:18] has brought us in

[07:22] carry over one.

[07:23] $652.

[07:26] That's an RPM on our biggest YouTube

[07:28] shorts on the channel of

[07:34] 15 cents, which is slightly higher than

[07:37] the channel's average. And just in case

[07:38] you enjoyed that, here's a little bit

[07:40] more touchscreen tapping ASMR.

[07:46] Like and subscribe.

[07:47] >> It's clear then that making money from

[07:48] YouTube shorts still continues to be

[07:50] what you might call a quantity game. To

[07:52] live sustainably from that type of

[07:54] content, you will need tens of millions,

[07:57] if not hundreds of millions of shorts

[07:59] views per month. That's if we're just

[08:01] talking about ad revenue from YouTube

[08:03] shorts. Because there's something really

[08:05] interesting to look at that most

[08:07] creators probably miss. This short,

[08:09] relatively speaking, has an astronomical

[08:12] RPM. And that's because the majority of

[08:14] its revenue comes from

[08:16] YouTube memberships.

[08:18] Yeah, someone has signed up to the VidIQ

[08:20] membership that gives you custom emojis

[08:23] from this short and has been a member

[08:25] ever since. So, cheers, whoever that is.

[08:28] You see, the monthly recurring revenue

[08:31] from that membership is attributed to

[08:33] this short and its RPM. And that's the

[08:35] subtle difference between CPMs and RPMs.

[08:38] CPMs only concern themselves with ad

[08:41] revenue. RPM includes everything from

[08:43] memberships to super chats to super

[08:45] thanks. In other words, the community

[08:47] directly supporting the channel. So,

[08:48] once again, I say cheers to all of you

[08:51] who've been doing that over the years.

[08:52] Because now I've dug into the data, it

[08:54] happens a lot more than I thought. The

[08:56] highlight of which is this short that

[08:58] not only has membership purchases, but

[09:00] also some super thanks as well that

[09:02] pulled the RPM up to an insane 76 cents.

[09:06] So, maybe instead of wasting time in

[09:08] your YouTube short asking people to

[09:10] press this,

[09:13] instead, you should encourage them to do

[09:15] this.

[09:16] So, that is our channel, but how does

[09:18] this look across the entire YouTube

[09:21] landscape? Different creators, different

[09:23] content, different sizes, different

[09:25] niches. Because this is where things get

[09:27] really intriguing.

[09:31] Let's start off with a big creator,

[09:33] Nathan. After 10.8 million views, we

[09:37] ended up receiving $1,502

[09:41] dollars.

[09:41] >> Nathan has multiple YouTube channels, by

[09:43] the way. The biggest of which has 20

[09:45] million subscribers. So, let's check out

[09:47] a smaller creator, a consistent poster,

[09:50] no viral moments, they're just showing

[09:52] up every single day.

[09:53] >> This is my performance. This, $18.80.

[09:59] My shorts gave me $400

[10:02] and 67 cents. And then my live stream

[10:06] gave me $6. That is lifestyle content

[10:08] and they are making 94% of their total

[10:12] YouTube revenue from shorts and feeling

[10:14] pretty good about it.

[10:15] >> So those of you who are saying "Shorts

[10:18] don't pay. I'm not doing shorts. Shorts

[10:21] don't pay."

[10:23] Like what are you waiting for?

[10:25] >> And then there is this.

[10:26] >> And my audience watched 266 million

[10:30] views, which was mainly YouTube shorts.

[10:32] That sounds like a lot of views, which

[10:34] it is. In 2024, YouTube paid me

[10:37] $29,824.08,

[10:41] which I'm thankful for, but honestly,

[10:43] it's not that much money when you're

[10:45] considering how many videos I had to

[10:47] post.

[10:47] >> Let me try and put that into some sort

[10:48] of context. A quarter of a billion views

[10:52] for less than $30,000 in revenue.

[10:55] Average salary in the US

[10:58] is around about $60,000. And if we put

[11:01] all of these engaged views through the

[11:03] RPM meat grinder, that is a return of 11

[11:06] cents per 1,000 views. Admittedly, a

[11:09] couple of years ago, so it might be a

[11:11] little higher these days. But even so,

[11:13] the creator themselves admits that they

[11:15] can't make enough money from their

[11:17] content by just ad revenue alone.

[11:19] >> Luckily, I have awesome brands that have

[11:21] supported me through the years, which

[11:23] makes it possible to do this full-time

[11:25] because I think I spend a little bit

[11:27] more than that every single year just on

[11:29] travel alone.

[11:30] >> So yeah, the creators making real money

[11:32] from YouTube shorts aren't just looking

[11:34] at the ad revenue numbers. Instead, they

[11:37] are building

[11:38] highly engaged audiences who support

[11:41] them through memberships and super

[11:43] thanks and brand deals, shopping for

[11:46] products, and a whole host of other

[11:48] income revenue streams. Shorts are just

[11:50] the top of the funnel.

[11:54] The ad revenue is just the beginning. So

[11:56] the question for you in the future might

[11:58] not be how much does YouTube pay me for

[12:01] my YouTube shorts? It should be more

[12:03] along the lines of how much does my

[12:05] audience pay me for the value I offer.

[12:08] And if you want to understand exactly

[12:11] what keeps your top of monetization

[12:13] funnel healthy

[12:15] and what helps you get your shorts

[12:16] monetized, but also what might get them

[12:19] flagged, we sat down with a YouTube

[12:21] employee recently who revealed pretty

[12:23] much everything and you can watch it

[12:25] over here.