| Gate line | Requirement | You today |
|---|---|---|
| Early tier (fan funding: memberships, Super Thanks) | 500 subscribers + 3 public uploads in 90 days + either 3,000 public watch hours in the past year or 3M Shorts views in 90 days | |
| Full tier (ad revenue) | 1,000 subscribers + either 4,000 public watch hours in the past 12 months or 10M Shorts views in 90 days | |
| Applying after Feb 1, 2027 | new applicants: 8,000 qualified watch hours in 365 days or 20M Shorts views in 90 days (fan-funding thresholds unchanged) | aim here if your first year runs past the date |
| Clock note | watch hours get a rolling year; Shorts views only ninety days; review after applying typically takes about a month | |
| Subscribers | ||
| Public watch hours (trailing 365 days) |
Worked checkpoint math: a hundred videos averaging forty watch hours each clears the current 4,000-hour number, roughly a year of weekly publishing at modest traction. On long-form you keep 55% of ad revenue; Shorts run in a pooled feed at 45% of the pool, RPM about $0.01 to $0.07 per thousand views.
Reference bands: most channels land between $1 and $5 RPM long-form (all-niche average about $2 to $4); finance/business $8 to $22; software and tool tutorials $6 to $15; entertainment and gaming $1 to $5. Sponsorships price at roughly $15 to $40 per thousand expected views for a 60 to 90 second integration. Affiliate example: a $200 tool at 5% commission pays $10 per sale.
| Month | Ad revenue $ (RPM x views / 1000) | Affiliate $ | Sponsor $ | Email list subscribers | Total $ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Line | Budget band | Spent $ |
|---|---|---|
| Audio (wired lavalier; USB mic $50-100 is the upgrade) | $15 to $35 | |
| Light (window is free; one ring light or softbox LED) | $0 to $40 | |
| Camera (the phone you own; cheap tripod or books) | $0 | |
| Editing (free software only) | $0 | |
| Total | under $200 ($100 if a window handles lighting) |
Skip for now: second and third lights, wireless mic kit, teleprompter hardware, interchangeable-lens camera (a tier-two stage, roughly $1,000 to $3,000, that most never need).
| Checkpoint | Judge only these | Pass ☐ |
|---|---|---|
| Day 30 | Did four videos ship on schedule? Is the pipeline surviving contact with your real week? Which retention curve taught the clearest lesson? | ☐ |
| Day 60 | Videos five through ten: kill what the graphs condemn, double what they reward; one recommendation-facing package tested beside the search packages | ☐ |
| Day 90 | A ladder of roughly ten evergreen videos, at least one ranking in search, a format hypothesis worth ten more videos, a list started, and one income stream live | ☐ |
Worked view arithmetic: 100,000 views in a mid-tier niche at $3.50 per thousand pays about $350; a genuinely good month for a channel that is a year in.