In this post (and in the video above), we're going to guide you through what it takes to get 4000 hours of Watch Time on YouTube.

We're all adults here, so I'm not going to insult your intelligence and ask you why you want to get 4000 hours of Watch Time. It's obvious - it's the only way you're going to be able to monetize your content on the platform. 4000 hours of Watch Time was never a milestone for any creator until YouTube introduced it as a rule for applying for the 

. Now that YouTube has set that unique benchmark, let's find out what Watch Time is all about.

What Does 4000 hours of YouTube Watch Time Actually Mean?

In order for the 4000 hours of Watch Time to count, your videos have to be public. So that means you can't do a live stream, and then set it to unlisted. You also can't make videos and then six months down the line, delete them or set them to private. They have to remain public to count.

Also, you have to achieve that 4000 hours in 12 consecutive months. So, from today's date, going back 365 days. The videos don't need to have been published in the last 12 months, but they need to have been watched on your channel in the last 52 weeks.

But we have covered the 4000 hours topic to within an inch of its life 

 so please take time to watch if you want more details.

How to Keep track of 4000 Hours of YouTube Watch Time

If you want to keep track of your Watch Time hours, YouTube Studio has a dedicated page in the left-hand navigation panel called ‘Monetization’. This will show you both subscriber and Watch Time progress.

Alternatively, if you want to keep tabs on your Watch Time, subscribe account, and other channel stats, anywhere on YouTube, 

, and you'll get this awesome realtime stats bar. No need to worry about the price either, this one's on us, completely free.

Why 4000 Hours of YouTube Watch Time is a Major Creator Goal

With that all being said, let's get into mindset. This is something I frequently talk about with creators who have these types of goals in mind. If you start a YouTube channel with the sole intention of getting 

4000 hours of Watch Time, and 1000 subscribers,

 and then monetizing your content, then I'm afraid to say, the majority of you are never going to make it.

First of all, you're thinking far too much about yourself, as opposed to your audience. Second of all, it's too big a goal to achieve when you first start out on YouTube.

__4000 hours of Watch Time is a lot. It's 240,000 minutes or to put it in another way, it's a single person watching your content continuously for 166.6 days. __

If you publish your first video on YouTube, and you get just an hour of Watch Time out of it, over the first week, I would be pretty satisfied with that. Not going to lie - 4000 hours of Watch Time is hard for a reason.

YouTube wants as much data as possible out of your content so that it can trust you with their advertising partners. Remember, it's not YouTube who's paying you directly, it's those advertisers. YouTube essentially is a middleman in this case, and it needs to make sure that the content it broadcasts on its platform doesn't create controversy. There has been a whole ton of that in the last decade.

__And this is where we've ended up, 1000 subscribers, 4000 hours of Watch Time. __

Now, some people may disagree with this but I believe YouTube doesn't owe you anything. They allow you to broadcast your content to a global audience for free. When you are, over time, able to prove yourself to your audience and YouTube, then yes, let's start making some money together. But don't see monetization as an entitlement, see it as a privilege. Work for it, earn it, respect it.

Why Evergreen Content is the Key to Watch Time Success

Take a look at these stats. They are real-time view counts for some of our best performing videos on the vidIQ YouTube channel. Notice anything in particular? Take a look at the publish date:

Almost all of these videos were published more than six months ago, and yet today they still bring in thousands of daily views for us. These videos work for the channel days, weeks, months, even years after I've published them.

You've probably heard of these types of videos before. They are evergreen content, and we've done a very detailed case study into how we implemented that strategy into our channel:

To get discovered on YouTube can be quite difficult. One of the ways to do that is for your content to appear in the search results. If you can answer questions, provide valuable information on topics people are searching for, especially if those topics are recent, for example, the latest software update on a game, new beauty products, the latest tech, etc, you can establish yourself in the search for those topics.

And depending on the shelf life of that topic, your videos can last longer in terms of getting views, and Watch Time. It may not be as sexy as viral content that gets you lots of views in a very short space of time. But if you get it right, you can see your videos generate consistent views over a long period of time.

We've seen this happen many times on our YouTube channel. And once you have 5 or 10 pieces of evergreen content, you'll soon see your views graph go up and to the right, and you'll rapidly start chasing those 4000 hours of Watch Time.

How Live Streams Can Accelerate Watch Time Hours

If you're a user or follower of VidIQ, you’ll know that every Tuesday, we do 

 where you submit your YouTube channel, and we give you constructive criticism.

When we first started doing these live streams two years ago, we were getting maybe 50 to 100 people watching them. Now we get on average between 600 and 700 people. And every time we check our live stream analytics, we see Watch Time bombs!

if 600 people watch a two-hour live stream, that's 1200 hours of Watch Time

. Now I can't promise you those types of numbers, and I wouldn't even recommend it doing live streams when you first start your YouTube channel, because the chances are, you might not get a single person joining you on it.

When you're 6, or even 9 months into your YouTube journey, and you have built up an audience of a few hundred subscribers, even if you get maybe 10 or 20 people joining you for a live stream for one or two hours, that's a nice bit of Watch Time.

Those people who join your live streams are your super fans. They care about you and your progress on the YouTube platform. But it does take time to cultivate that audience.

Here at VidIQ, we've been live streaming for two years. But in the last few months, something amazing has happened, and it seems to have happened organically. A meme culture has sprouted up around the live streams, and we've embraced this so much so that we incentivize our viewers to make fun of us in exchange for channel audits.

We have no idea it was going to go in this direction, but we love this type of community engagements, and apparently so do you. So when you find your YouTube audience, make that audience your community, part of your channel, and you can do that through live streams, which means lots of Watch Time for you.

Why Consistency is Key to YouTube Watch Time Growth

Don't get me wrong, viral videos are a wonderful thing. They really give your channel a kick up the backside. But I never go into the video-making process with the intention of making a viral video. It's just a very happy and very welcome bonus when it does happen. When people ask this question, and they do genuinely ask it, "How do I make viral content?" This is my answer:

"Aim to make better content on a consistent basis"

Be consistent with every aspect of your YouTube workflow, whether it’s the way you film, the scripts that you write, how you present on camera, how you edit, the custom thumbnails you create, or the titles that you write - aim to improve on your previous content by 1% or 2% every time.

If you create 50 to 100 videos over a year, you'll look back at those videos from 12 months ago and say, "Wow, those were terrible, but look where I am today." If you put all of your effort into just one video, determined that this is going to be your viral moment, you are going to drive yourself insane, and 

you'll burn out on YouTube very, very quickly

Let me give you an example. We launched our 

 just over a year ago, and at first the channel grew very slowly. But we knew we were creating good content on a consistent basis. And once YouTube had enough data, and positive signals from our content, the channel started blowing up.

No viral videos, just good consistent content being shared more and more by YouTube to the right audience. And in the end, we didn't just reach 4000 hours of Watch Time, we crushed it. But we had to be patient. Now that content attracts pretty significant views like this one with 257K at time of writing:

The Secret to YouTube Watch Time Success: Quantity vs Quality

All right, let's start off with the obvious. Everybody wants to create the best quality content they can, but at what point do you reach diminishing returns? Is it worth putting in extra resources to make this video even better, or there is a cutoff point where you end the video and say, "I'm going to move on to the next thing?

It’s that classic question of quality versus quantity. My personal opinion is that quantity has more value to you as a creator when you first start out on YouTube. Let me explain.

First of all the experience you build by being consistent on YouTube helps you learn how the platform works. If you're focused solely on making videos all of the time, and never take the time to read the comments you attract or the metrics, you're never quite sure how your audience is going to react to that content.

Second of all, the more videos you publish on YouTube, the more data YouTube has to play with, in terms of serving up your content to the right audience. Think of it as filling out an application form. The more boxes you tick, and the more thorough your answers are, the faster and more efficiently this application form can be processed.

Also, when it's time-sensitive content, you really do need to consider how fast you can a video out. For example, when there is a big new story, yes, you could spend an extra few hours or even days working on the video to make it of higher quality, but then you're losing out on the potential audience that wants that information right now.

Now, this is not a hard and fast rule. For example, 

 is a very popular tech YouTuber, who does amazing reviews on products. But he doesn't try and rush those reviews out as a product is released.

He may do a quick hands on when it first comes out, but then he spends a considerable amount of time creating a very high-quality piece of content after. So in this sense, he gets the best of both worlds, a video that rides the waves of a trending news story, and then a really high quality, very high-value video for his audience. Like this one:

And finally, when you're creating content as a new channel, you don't have the volume to send YouTube enough positive signals so it recommends that content for a longer period of time.

How to Analyse YouTube Data to Understand Watch Time

There are a lot of YouTube education channels out there, ourselves included, but you know who else is a really good YouTube educator? It's YouTube itself with all the data they have to offer you.

Ignore YouTube's analytics at your peril. If you didn't already know this, on the ‘Reach’ tab of the ‘Analytics’ dashboard in YouTube Studio, there is a data funnel of impressions, click-through rates, and Watch Time stats.

If you mouse over the information icon, it tells you in YouTube's own words, that you can increase the chance of YouTube suggesting your content by increasing click through rates, and your video Watch Time.

When it comes to Watch Time, you can analyze each video in great detail by looking at the audience retention. You can do this via the ‘Videos’ dashboard on YouTube Studio.

Of course, you want to get as high a Watch Time as possible, and while there is no magic Watch Time percentage, if you're getting over 50% consistently, you're doing a good job. People usually abandon videos when they are bored, or when the video doesn't deliver what was promised in the title in the thumbnail.

Through this graph, you can see where you might have pain points. Maybe your intro is far too long for example and you lose viewers before you even start.

Every once in a while, check out your audience retention on the last 5 to 10 videos and determine whether or not there is a consistent pattern of audience dropping off your content.

And while we're on the subject of Watch Time, and audience visualization, don't fall into the trap of making longer videos in an attempt to get more Watch Time. Make the video as long as it needs to be for your audience.

For example, we cannot make a video on how to delete a YouTube video for 20 minutes. But we can create a bite-sized, two to three minute video, that gives the viewer exactly what they want. It also gives YouTube positive signals and launches our content to the top of the search rankings.

We received hundreds of comments from the vidIQ community saying that they wanted to get 1000 subscribers so that they could get a 

We already knew we had a lot of gamers who follow and watch VidIQ, but what we didn't realize was just how many of those gamers play Fortnite, and specifically want this Support-A-Creator pack.

While it is true that you will find out a lot about your general audience from YouTube analytics, you'll never find out key nuggets of information like that. And all we had to do was simply ask you our audience a question. and I bet you can guess what we did with that information.

That's right, we assigned Dan, our gaming expert, to get the answers that you needed, and to create a video on that topic. At the ti,e of writing, the video has generated nearly 150K views, and perhaps more importantly, now sits at the top of the YouTube rankings for a very juicy search term.

Given the evergreen potential of this video, I think that if it stays at the top of the search rankings, it will have half a million views by the end of the year.

If your community is generating video ideas for you, and they respond really well to those videos, you'll get to 4000 hours of Watch Time in no time.

 then make sure to download vidIQ. Over 1 million creators use vidIQ to help with keyword and competitor research, channel audits, and so much more. 

If you’re serious about growing your YouTube views and subscribers, sign up for exclusive access to the 

. Learn how to launch a successful YouTube Channel in just 30 days.

Want to get 4000 hours of Watch Time on YouTube so you can begin to monetize your content? Find out how with our new guide!

Make Money on YouTube: How to Get 4000 Hours Watch Time

It's no secret that YouTube has been dogged by controversy over these last two years, with questionable content that seemingly gets pushed by the algorithm. Now, it's been confirmed that the platform has been working on two new metrics and they are both designed around the concept of gaging and promoting quality content. So what are these metrics, and what do they potentially mean for video creators?

New YouTube Metrics: Engagement Watch Time?

The first one sounds like a jacked up super enhanced version of session watch time. It will track, not only time spent on the YouTube platform watching videos, but also time spent posting and reading comments. So while posting comments may seem like something that's pretty easy to gain (after all how many sub-comments do you have on your channel?), if YouTube is going to start tracking how long a viewer spends on a Watch page reading comments, that's an entirely different and interesting proposition.

This sounds like a metric that might be called Engagement Watch Time. But, on the other hand, earlier on in the year YouTube was forced into a sweeping blanket 

ban of comments on videos containing children

, and while YouTube are slowly resolving this problem, if you do have comments disabled on your videos, for any reason, how do you benefit from this particular metric?

The second metric is simply and mysteriously called ‘Quality Watch Time’ which as of now, nobody outside Google completely understands. However, 

 that the new metric aims to “spot content that achieves something more constructive than just keeping users glued to their phones or desktops.”

What this potentially means is that YouTube maybe starting to distance themselves from what is considered the most important metric on YouTube, raw Watch Time. With the consensus being that more outlandish, more risque content leads to more Watch Time which is something YouTube keeps being dogged by because of controversial content.

Bloomberg goes on to say “the changes are supposed to reward videos that are more palatable to advertisers and the broader public, and help YouTube ward off criticism that its service is addictive and socially corrosive.” Did you notice an important word there? Advertisers. Does that mean search and discovery of your content could be influenced by whether or not its monetized in the future?

If you want to take your YouTube channel to the next level then make sure to download vidIQ. It will help you research YouTube, analyze videos, audit your own channel, and take actionable steps 

Are you ready for a brand-new YouTube metric? One that could change the entire course of a platform and the fate of your channel. Here’s what we know about Quality Watch Time.

Quality Watch Time: YouTube's New Metric Could Change Everything

With the New Year having just passed, you might be asking yourself “Do I need to start my watchtime from scratch to reach 4,000 hours in 2019?”

The short answer is no… but it’s a bit more nuanced than that.

YouTube’s 4,000 hour of watchtime: A breakdown

According to YouTube, in order to be eligible to apply for the Partner Program (YPP), you must meet the following requirements:

You have more than 4,000 watch hours in the previous 12 months

You create content that meets YouTube Partner Program policies

You have linked an approved AdSense account

In this post, we’ll be focusing primarily on requirement number two: You have more than 4,000 watch hours in the previous 12 months.

Now you might be thinking, 12 months is a calendar year, but YouTube doesn’t measure watchtime by calendar years. Instead, YouTube measures the last 365 days of watchtime from your channel. In a nutshell, you need 4,000 hours of watch time in the last 12 months, up until today's date.

For example, let’s say today is January 2, 2019. YouTube will track watchtime all the way back to January 3, 2018. The next day (January 3, 2019), YouTube will track back to January 4, 2018, and so on.

This is why your total watchtime may actually go up and down as you try to achieve 4,000 hours. Large spikes in watchtime will be negated when they reach that 12 month threshold, as will large dips, so it’s smart to keep a watchful eye on this metric.

If you have the totally free vidIQ Chrome extension installed, you can easily track your watchtime in real-time on the top-right hand side of every YouTube page on desktop.

In the example below, the vidIQ displays the channel’s watchtime total as 3,100 hours over the past 12 months. You’ll notice the metric is in amber, meaning the channel hasn’t yet reached 4,000 hours. Once it has surpassed 4,000 hours, however, the metric will become green (you hit the target, pal!), and once you surpass 5,000 hours, it will disappear.

Along with watchtime hours, vidIQ also tracks number of subscribers, so you can keep those numbers top of mind, too.

Mouse over the little graph icon to reveal a full breakdown of channel stats, including the watchtime over the past 12 months and… (drumroll, please), a progress bar showing you exactly how close you are to hitting 4,000 hours.

Don’t see the watchtime metric with the vidIQ extension? Chances are you’ve already surpassed 5,000 hours, so way to go!

What happens when I hit 4,000 hours of watchtime?

Here’s some good news: You don't have to wait 12 months to hit that monetization threshold.

If you get 4,000 hours of watchtime in three months (umm, wow), so long as you have 1,000 subscribers you're already eligible to apply for the YPP. Note the keyword being eligible — you've still got to apply and then be approved before you can actually start monetizing your content.

Upon acceptance you might be stressing about keeping those watchtime hours up, but don’t panic, YouTube won’t kick you out if you dip below 4,000 hours so long as it’s clear you’re still active. Keep working hard, posting content you’ll be just fine.

Answer directly from YouTube Help. Cue huge sigh of relief.

Still have questions about 4,000 hours of watchtime, monetization and even demonetization? Peep our deep dive video here and our 

If you’re a video creator working towards monetizing your YouTube channel, you likely already know that in order to do so you need 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time over 12 months.

I Didn't Get 4000 Watch Time Hours on YouTube... Do I Need To Start Again?

This video breaks down how to get 4000 hours of watch time on YouTube:

Breakdown this into 20,000 minutes a month

Accpet that it takes a long time to grow on YouTube

Use the vidIQ real time stats bar to see how your doing

You now need 4000 hours of watch time and 1000 subscribers to qualify for monetization on YouTube.

YouTube Watch Time

Make Money on YouTube: How to Get 4000 Hours Watch Time

Carla Marshall

Quality Watch Time: YouTube's New Metric Could Change Everything

Carla Marshall

I Didn't Get 4000 Watch Time Hours on YouTube... Do I Need To Start Again?

Rob Wilson

How to Get 4000 Hours Watch Time on YouTube So You Can Monetize Your Videos

Carla Marshall