A faceless video I produced got about 5.6 million views on YouTube and made about $8,000 in ad revenue, because the ad rate on that channel was only about $1.43 per 1,000 views. A video on another channel of mine got a little less than half the views and made almost $3,000 more. A third one got about 23.8 million views and generated about $111,000. What YouTube pays for 5 million views comes down to the ad rate of the niche, and mine ranged a lot from channel to channel.
- My 5.6 million view video made about $8,000 in YouTube ad revenue.
- The ad rate on that channel was about $1.43 per 1,000 views, which is pretty bad. It's one of the reasons I stopped pushing that channel.
- A video on another channel got a little less than half the views and made almost $3,000 more, at an ad rate of about four dollars and 12 cents per 1,000 views.
- That second video took about 100 days to blow up, then got around 300,000 views in a single day. Almost a year after we posted it, it was still producing about $1,000 a month.
- The biggest video in this comparison got about 23.8 million views and generated about $111,000.
- I don't show my face in any of these videos, and I don't produce them myself. Teams make the content.
How much did 5.6 million views pay?
About $8,000.
That's the ad revenue on a video I produced a couple of years before I recorded this. It went on to get about 5.6 million views.
It was one of the videos I posted on a brand new channel. I made a separate video about that launch, where the channel got 2 million views in 8 days starting completely from scratch, with no other videos on it. The written version is here: 2 million views in 8 days.
One thing I said up front in the video: YouTube doesn't like it too much when you show how much a video makes. I was willing to take the risk, because the real number is more useful to you than a guess.
Why 5.6 million views only made $8,000
The ad rate on that channel was about $1.43 per 1,000 views. I'll be honest, that's pretty bad.
That's a big part of why I quit progressing on that channel. The niche didn't pay all that well, and on top of that the videos were really difficult to make.
The ad rate is what YouTube pays per 1,000 views, and it changes with the channel and the niche. The view count on its own doesn't tell you what a video made.
The video with half the views that made more
Here's the comparison. On another channel that my team and I had been growing, one video got just about half the views of the first one. Actually a little less than half.
It made almost $3,000 more.
The ad rate on that channel was about four dollars and 12 cents per 1,000 views, against $1.43 on the first one.
Two more things about that second video:
- It took a while to blow up. We posted it in October of 2020. It took about 100 days, and then it finally blew up. It got around 300,000 views in a single day and over a million views in the span of three or four days.
- It kept paying. When I recorded this, almost a year after we posted it, that one video was still producing about $1,000 a month. It still generates views and it still generates revenue as time goes on.
If you want to see how far ad rates swing from one niche to the next, I broke that down in YouTube RPM by niche.
What 23.8 million views paid
The third video I showed is one that performed insanely well. It was posted in 2018, it got about 23.8 million views, and it generated about $111,000.
That's one video. It's insane to think about.
Here are all three side by side:
| Video | Views | Ad revenue | Ad rate per 1,000 views |
|---|---|---|---|
| Video 1 (the brand new channel) | About 5.6 million | About $8,000 | About $1.43 |
| Video 2 (another channel, posted October 2020) | A little less than half of video 1 | Almost $3,000 more than video 1 | About four dollars and 12 cents |
| Video 3 (posted in 2018) | About 23.8 million | About $111,000 | I didn't show it in the video |
Nobody knows I'm behind these videos
The part I like most is how these were made. I didn't show my face on any of them. Nobody knows that I'm behind them.
I also don't produce the videos. I have teams that make the content. When I recorded this, I hadn't edited a video in almost two years, other than the ones on my own channel (those are pretty simple to edit).
The reason I make videos like this one, to be blatantly honest, is that I teach people how to build these channels. For a wider look at the income side, read how much faceless YouTube channels make.
Video Chapters
- 0:00What I'm showing in this video
- 0:32Why showing ad revenue is a risk
- 1:03The video that got 5.6 million views
- 1:33About $8,000 at a $1.43 ad rate
- 2:03Why I stopped pushing that channel
- 2:35Half the views, almost $3,000 more
- 3:06The video that took 100 days to blow up
- 3:3723.8 million views and about $111,000
- 4:08Why I make these videos
FAQ
How much does YouTube pay for 5 million views?
It depends on the channel's ad rate. Devon Canup's faceless video with about 5.6 million views made about $8,000, because that channel was paid about $1.43 per 1,000 views.
Why did a video with fewer views make more money?
The second video Devon shows got a little less than half the views of the first but made almost $3,000 more. Its channel had an ad rate of about four dollars and 12 cents per 1,000 views, compared with about $1.43 on the first channel.
How much did Devon Canup's 23.8 million view video make?
About $111,000 in YouTube ad revenue. The video was posted in 2018 on a faceless channel.
Do YouTube videos keep making money after they're posted?
They can. One of Devon's videos was posted in October 2020, took about 100 days to blow up, and was still producing about $1,000 a month almost a year later.
Do you have to show your face to earn YouTube ad revenue?
No. Devon didn't appear in any of the three videos in this breakdown, and he has teams that make the content.
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