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unleadedfangs · 2 years

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YouTube VS Twitch: The Dilemma

So you're a streamer or content creator trying to decide what streaming site you should use, there are a lot of them, but really only two stand at the top fighting it out. YouTube and Twitch. TikTok maybe being a close third runner.

I want to compare the two in this post and give you the factual pro and cons of the two in comparison; and clarify things that are opinion.

I have streamed on both sites and now I stream exclusively on YouTube. So these are the facts and my overall thoughts. (This is a very long informational/educational thread)

For starters, lets get monetization out of the way since that is something a lot of people will worry about first.

YouTube definitely has a higher threshold for getting monetized in the first place; there are reasons for this. They are currently working on a new streamer specific monetization option that we don't know a lot about currently but, for normal monetization via videos you need 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 public watch hours in the last 12 months or 10 million shorts views in the last 90 days. It is expected that the streamer monetization option will be more similar to Twitch Affiliate.

In practical terms these seem like a lot, especially in comparison to Twitch affiliate but they aren't terrible, they are more in comparison to Twitch Partner.

YouTube offers a 70/30 split for all monetization options other than ads. So memberships, super chats, stickers, gifted memberships all will give the creator a 70/30 share. Ad revenue is shared at 55%, with shorts ad revenue share beginning in January 2023.

Twitch recently announced that the 70/30 share for Twitch Partners is gone forever and that all creators will be 50/50. This isn't really new news, as only the top 0.01% were actually getting the 70/30 share. However, until this update they were only sharing 45% of ad revenue. Now Twitch is sharing 55% of ad revenue from my understanding. So on Twitch, for Subscriptions and Bits you are getting 50/50 share. They recently also announced Elevates which are YouTube Super Chats, except a lot worse, because they are more expensive and stay for less time overall but, they will share 70% of this revenue specifically. (There is also the new Ad Incentives program but I do not feel that I am in a spot to really talk about it or share my thoughts on it; there are other people who could explain it way better)

Now in terms of YouTube memberships vs Twitch subscriptions (Oh man this terminology is confusing between the two sites) there are some interesting differences.

YouTube Memberships allow you to set up 6 tiers, that you decide the pricing on. You can price these tiers from $0.99 to $100.00 you control the pricing of them for what you feel is best for your community. You fully set up what each tier means for perks and rewards; you can set up custom discord roles, special videos, member only posts, member only streams/videos there is a lot you can do with them so I'll leave this a bit vague. Memberships also get access to custom emotes and badges. You get 4 emotes by default at 0 members and unlock more emotes for the more members you get. As for badges, you get new badges for 1, 2, 6, 12, 24, 36 and 48 month milestones. (After thought; Custom Emotes on YouTube are channel specific and not universal like Twitch)

Twitch's system is a little bit different and more confusing overall so I'm going to explain the basics of it. When you become an affiliate on Twitch you will receive 5 follower emotes, these can only be used on your channel specifically and will be available to followers. As an affiliate you get 5 emote slots by default, with another 4 able to be unlocked by gaining subscriptions. You also have 1 animated emote slot by default and can unlock 4 more animated emote slots. Affiliates also have 1 emote slot on their Tier 2 and Tier 3 subscriptions as well. There are also bit emote rewards that you can set up emotes for people to earn by spending bits exclusively. This system is really confusing and I get lost trying to explain it. Twitch Partners gain access to 50+ emote slots for the more subscriptions they get.

Twitch Subscriptions are also set in their pricing; $4.99, $9.99 and $24.99 and also limited to only 3 tiers. If you want exclusive perks for these Subscriptions as well you have to clarify them somewhere else.

Twitch forces you to run ads through out your stream whether you like it or not, or even opt into doing so; you will run ads regardless of what you do.

YouTube on the other hand runs pre-roll ads at the beginning of the stream; then fully leaves it up to you when ads are ran throughout the stream, so you can run them if you afk or etc. (YouTube may occasionally run an ad on a per user basis for some reason, but it will not run ads for EVERYONE like Twitch does). YouTube also focuses other ad types, banner ads, overlay ads, sidebar ads, card ads, they do every kind of ad to avoid showing an un-skippable ad; or even a 5 second skippable ad in streams.

I think that's everything in terms of monetization so lets talk about the sites and what they offer in quality.

In terms of stream quality; Twitch Affiliates and below have a "limit" of 720p60 @ 5-6k bitrate limit. The reason limit is quoted is because you can stream at 1080p60 @5-6k bitrate but, you will not have access to transcoding. Transcoding is the ability for a viewer to select the quality of the stream locally; so 144p, 240p etc. So by losing access to transcoding some viewers with bad internet quality or slow internet will not be able to watch your stream. You can get access to transcoding at 1080p as an affiliate if you're lucky because its a soft lock where; priority is given to all partners, so if you start and stop your streams enough times you might get a server that allows you to have it. The 6k bitrate limit of Twitch also can make streams look very compressed and meh quality in fast paced games like Apex Legends.

YouTube allows creators to stream at 4k/2160p60 with a limit of 51k bitrate. There is no limits between partners and non partners, this is a flat limit for the service. A max quality of 4k at 60 fps and a max limit of 51k. Transcoding is also guaranteed at all times for all creators. Generally I stream at 1080p60 @ 10k bitrate for fast paced games like Apex Legends and the quality is far better than Twitch.

YouTube recently updated their UI so now Livestreams, Shorts and Videos are all separated into their own specific categories on your channel page making it easier for people to find exactly what they want and removing the need for you to unlist vods on YouTube.

An argument I see a lot of the time is "Discoverability" this is a hard because there is some truth to it but a lot of it is opinions. Discoverability for certain topics on YouTube is at a disadvantage; an example being art streams. If you created a following on YouTube for speed paints or art videos, your art streams would do amazing on YouTube. If you start out day 1 streaming art with no uploads and no history as a creator, Twitch will do better overall. Its really circumstantial. Some things will do better on YouTube because of the search results and your stream being pushed like a normal video but some stuff will do objectively worse without being established.

YouTube is working on a streaming homepage similar to Twitch, which will really assist in this issue overall, as YouTube partially has it in the sense that you can go to each games category on YouTube like Twitch and find all the streams currently for it, but its a lot harder to do right now than Twitch. I've tested both and have my opinions; You can stream on Twitch and have 0 viewers and you can stream on YouTube and have 0 viewers. So in the end its whatever you are more comfortable with in my opinion. Either is fully viable regardless of opinions.

Random extras:

YouTube does require a thumbnail for every stream. Streams on YouTube also will not be archived if they are over 12 hours long. (Sometimes they will but usually not)

YouTube overall wants to encourage shorter streams, so that way creators have more time to work on videos and shorts. So YouTube's ideology is stream for a couple hours, maybe upload a video and a couple shorts instead of stream 15 hour straight.

This is a contrast vs Twitch where if you aren't streaming your channel is essentially dead. Twitch wants you to stream more and longer every day, which is reinforced by all of their Partner contracts and the Ad incentives program.

There is a difference in YouTube and Twitch chat function and culture. YouTube does not have channel points or redeems. (I personally like this) YouTube chat functions different than Twitch in how it loads messages; I personally prefer it again but there are extensions such as TruffleTV by Ludwig to make YT chat feel like Twitch. Extensions like BTTV and 7UP are adding or have added support for YouTube as well. Both sites have Polls and a few functions like so. On YouTube you can also pin an announcement to the top of the live chat.

I hope overall this has been informative and helpful to you and gave you a clearer cut comparison of the two sites side by side in just flat features. If you have any questions about the two sites, or something you feel should be added to this blog post please share it with me via reblog, message, ask or so on.

If you found it helpful, consider checking out my YouTube. Happy streaming and good luck on the content journey. :)

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