YouTube is a classic that we visit practically every day to watch videos, but Twitch has become the fashionable platform for streaming videos. You may have wondered which is better, what differences are there. Therefore, we compare them. What differences are there? What advantages do they have?
Which to choose? Both services are widely used, both are very useful and complete, but there are some differences that we have to take into account when choosing between YouTube and Twitch. There may be few people left with the Internet in Spain who do not know what YouTube is, but Twitch is still a somewhat more unknown area for many, still expanding. That is why we explain their differences so you can choose one or the other.
This is YouTube
YouTube emerged almost twenty years ago, a video platform launched in early 2005 that has become popular year after year until today. It has belonged to Google since October 2006 and is the second most visited site in the world, only behind the Mountain View search engine. YouTube has allowed a new form of content, popularizing youtubers. Since 2009, the service also allows live broadcasts.
Very generic content
It can be an advantage or a disadvantage, depending on what you are looking for. But YouTube is a platform with billions of online videos where we can find everything from video clips or concerts to memes or broadcasts or home videos of your neighbor’s high school graduation. It can be useful if you are looking for content of all kinds since Twitch is specialized in video games and we can find some podcasts, talks or topics that are not gaming as such but are usually more limited when it comes to having more general content. At least for now. On YouTube, practically everything we want fits even if we can’t fit it into a specific category on Twitch.
Not intended for live broadcasts
YouTube allows broadcasting live but it is not usual or is not designed for that. It allows it but the interaction tools are more uncomfortable, the chat allows fewer options and it does not have as many broadcast tools for creators as Twitch.
Worse for making money
YouTube’s monetization system consists of getting visits, increasing your followers, increasing your channel. There is no donation system within the tool itself as Twitch does, nor do subscribers invest in your content, as is the case with the competition. On YouTube you will receive money for advertising, for memberships, for sponsors … It does not pay according to the subscribers you have but you will depend on collaborations, affiliates, advertising, etc.
This is Twitch
Twitch was born as a platform specifically focused on the gamer community, on video games. Twitch was born from Justin.tv as a specialized esports product. In 2014, the platform was bought by Amazon but registering and watching the videos is completely free and also broadcasting is free for anyone who wants to create a channel and create content.
Users broadcast their games live commenting on them so that viewers could see it. But time has passed and Twitch is no longer only designed for video games but the community has been expanding and we find all kinds of different content and categories among the most popular channels, such as music. The gaming approach is the most common in most popular channels but there are also other categories such as “Chatting”, podcasts, food and drink, science and technology …
The point in favor of Twitch is that it is a platform for live broadcasts or streaming. Content creators broadcast live and viewers can interact using chat. This is precisely one of its strengths: Twitch is based on the community created, on the live content, on the reactions. Its success has been growing remarkably since the confinement by coronavirus in 2020 in Spain thanks to the fact that it is a continuous source of entertainment and disconnection as well as an increase in the free time of many people. It is easy to use, easy to see and it is easy to participate and be part of that community that allows continuous interaction with the creator and with others.
Thematic
Twitch has all kinds of organized themes and a much clearer and more comfortable order than YouTube if we want to watch live broadcasts. On YouTube you can follow your favorite users or creators and they will notify you if they are live. You can also go to the “live” panel and see recent broadcasts or broadcasts that are currently on, but finding them by theme is somewhat more tedious or annoying. The Twitch interface is very clean and fast for that: by opening Twitch TV and tapping on “explore” you can find themes, categories, filter by tags, find the exact game you want to see the broadcast of.
Twitch’s specialization in video games, the theme with which it was born, makes any gaming lover turn to this website or platform to see streamers commenting on games, playing games . Video games of all kinds, from Fortnite to Mario Kart, League of Legends, FIFA 21, Call of Duty …
Broadcasts
The broadcasts last for hours and hours and are continuous. We can find live content at any time of the day and whatever the theme. They are not all successful but you can find broadcasts at any time of anything, from people who play the piano or the saxophone to debates about mental health or politics or influencers answering questions from their fans or cooking while others watch.
Better remuneration for creators
Beyond the options through sponsored videos or advertisers, one of the main advantages of Twitch is the option of receiving money through donations or from subscribers who decide to support our channel.
Easier to interact
The Twitch interface is intended for a community, as we have said before. This makes it comfortable to interact, have a conversation. All broadcasts have a chat where you can comment, read other comments, send all kinds of emoticons, highlight messages. The interface is designed so that users are part of the streaming.
YouTube vs Twitch: Differences
We have summarized the differences in previous sections: the way in which specific categories or topics are displayed is much more comfortable on Twitch, easily finding what we are looking for. Twitch is also the star platform for watching video games and facilitates interaction with followers and subscribers in a more comfortable and bidirectional way than YouTube. Instead, YouTube has more global content and is intended for a large audience who may still be averse to Twitch , for example, or who are looking for general content. For example, many media continue to use YouTube to broadcast live press conferences, press releases …
One of the differences between one and the other is that Twitch limits much more the option of uploading videos to watch delayed. You can save the entire live streams so that users can see them later if they have not asked to stream it but it will be complete, three or four hours, instead of making an edited video with the best moments and cutting out unnecessary content. YouTube does allow you to upload these videos to the platform to watch them whenever you want. Twitch does allow you to store specific clips to watch later.
Applications
They are not incompatible platforms with each other. In fact, most content creators bet on both at the same time with different uses, with different audiences. In 2021 the use of Twitch has become popular but YouTube is still a website or application to which we always go to consult all kinds of videos, to see some classics and content that we do not see on Twitch.
But also, the streamers themselves use both to reach their audiences. This is the case, for example, of Ibai Llanos. Ibai has become one of the most popular streamers in Spain and his broadcasts on Twitch are daily but he uses YouTube to upload compilations of the best moments , compilation videos of the talks or summaries of ten, fifteen or twenty minutes of talks that he can that have lasted hours. It’s a good way to post timeless, condensed content from full streams.
Monetization
Although ads and sponsors can work in the same way on both, there is a difference in the concept of “follower” or “subscriber” on Twitch and on YouTube. On YouTube we know that there are subscribers who are the people who follow our channel and who get new videos. These people have a Google or YouTube account with certain people who they follow and are notified when there is content.
It doesn’t work like that on Twitch. Subscribers on Twitch are not people who follow a channel for free but rather people who pay that content creator. On Twitch there are followers (which would be the equivalent to YouTube in terms of subscribers and who are watching our videos, etc) without paying anything but there are subscribers with different types of subscriptions who pay a monthly amount and receive in exchange a series of advantages such as custom emoticons, a subscriber emblem …
Subscribers vs followers
How much do you pay? There are three types of subscriptions on Twitch with different costs, but they all have the same purpose: to support the streamer to continue creating content. We can subscribe for free if we are Amazon Prime users (one subscription per month free) but the general is to bet on paid subscriptions of level 1, 2 or 3 for 3.99 euros or 9.99 or 24.99 respectively depending on the money that we want to contribute. It will also depend on the agreement between the creator and Twitch: the channels receive 50% of the amount of the subscriptions but some more successful creators have a distribution that is 70% for them and 30% for Twitch
For this reason, the way to earn money is different because on YouTube you will earn money based on the views, advertisers or sponsors but not on the people who follow you and want to pay a monthly amount for you. On Twitch, it is your followers who would make you earn money in addition to the monetization of videos for advertising, sponsors …
Which is better?
As always in these cases, it depends. It depends on the needs you have, what you want to do, the content you want to create. The way you want to communicate: with edited videos or live? YouTube continues to be the star platform for, for example, travel YouTubers who upload their compilations traveling the world or any other topic, with varied content. Twitch allows us to sit in front of the computer and start streaming chatting with other people, playing games, with all kinds of tools and with a very simple Twitch Studio adapted for beginners. As we have said in previous paragraphs, they are fully compatible tools and it is best that you learn to combine both to reach a larger audience.
