YouTube built one of the creator economy's biggest payment systems, but now it is raising the bar for who gets to share in it.Beginning Feb. 1, 2027, new creators will need 8,000 qualified watch hours over the previous year or 20 million qualified Shorts views within 90 days to earn advertising and YouTube Premium revenue, the company announced Aug. 10.
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Both figures are double YouTube's current requirements of 4,000 watch hours or 10 million Shorts views. The announcement did not mention a change to the existing requirement that creators have at least 1,000 subscribers.
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The new rules will also affect creators who are already part of the YouTube Partner Program. To earn ad and subscription revenue from Shorts each month, they will need to maintain 10 million qualified views during a rolling 90-day period.Channels that fall below the threshold will remain in the program and can continue making money from long-form videos. Shorts revenue sharing will resume automatically if their views climb back above it.YouTube said creators who already earn "significant revenue" from Shorts are unlikely to be affected, but did not disclose how many channels currently fall short of the requirement.The updates mark the first significant overhaul of the Partner Program since 2018. More than 3 million creators now participate in the program, which distributes revenue from advertising and subscriptions and provides access to fan contributions and shopping tools.YouTube’s business has grown considerably since its last overhaul, particularly around short-form video. The platform now records more than 200 billion Shorts views each day, nearly three times the 70 billion daily views it reported in 2024. Viewers also reportedly watch more than 1 billion hours of YouTube on televisions daily.
