YouTube is the new TV. It has come to the point where YouTube also has its own celebrities, influencers, and now even its own movies. If you have already garnered enough subscribers and views, all your videos are eligible for monetization; now it’s time to mark that option on. Regardless, how do you know if a video is monetized? Let’s take a double check first.
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How is Video Eligible for Monetization?
As of February 20th this year, to apply for monetization (and have ads attached to videos), creators must have totaled 4000 hours of overall watch time on their channel within the past 12 months and have a minimum of 1000 subscribers. This is the first part of knowing if you own the channel and tell if a video is monetized.
How Can You Apply Video for Monetization?
It’s pretty simple:
- Sign in to YouTube.
- Go to YouTube Studio.
- In the left menu, select content.
- Select a video.
- In the left menu, take monetization.
- Pick the kind of ads that you want to show.
- Click Save.
How Do You Know Your Video is Monetized?
Check out the icon beside your video. It will give you info on your video status. More of the explanation is on the official site documentation.
Checking
This icon shows that YouTube is still checking your eligibility.
On, Exceptions,
Sharing, Escrow,
Copyright Claim
Depending on your video monetization current status, it could be one of these icons if it’s monetized.
Limited
If you see this icon, then there is something wrong with your video. You need to check if it’s advertiser-friendly content. Right now, your video is displaying no or limited ads.
Ineligible
This icon says you cannot monetize this video because there’s a copyright claim.
Off
You will be starting off with this icon. You can check if the video is eligible for monetization or partial revenue sharing, depending on the description.
YouTube is currently conducting multiple checks to scan your video if it meets the advertiser’s standard. Overall, all the icons will stabilize within 48 hours. By then, you can be sure the video is monetized or not.
How Do You Know if Any Video is Monetized?
If you don’t own the channel, to know if any video is monetized is a matter of guess. Regardless of the creator’s monetization option for the video, YouTube will still display ads on videos. We can take an estimated guess as below:
SocialBlade
You can find it by copying the channel URL link, pasting it into the social blade, and reviewing the results. Usually, the SocialBlade will display the estimated amount a particular channel is making daily, along with the total number of views on the videos of the respective channel.
Like this one is monetized:
And this one is not:
An unusual number of ads
Another way on how to tell if a video is monetized is to check any of the videos and see if there are ads on the video, e.g., video ads that you can skip, small banners on the bottom of the video. It means the channel is monetized, and it is earning money from the YouTube ads.
This is different than YouTube would put on random un-monetized videos. The ad would be placed on the beginning, middle, and sometimes at the end of the video with a clear giveaway if you see a recommended channel ad on the sidebar. YouTube will rotate these ads’ views sparingly with the non-ad one, so you will probably see the ad every once in a while (not every time).
When the video is eligible for monetization
If you notice, copyrighted materials like music covers or movie scenes are usually on the owner’s terms for enabled monetization. Not every copyright owner will share the ad revenue or permit the copyrighted materials to display ads.
Finally, It’s safe to assume these kinds of videos are not or only partially monetized (the yellow dollar icon), even after checking with SocialBlade for the channel is on monetization. You can also check if the channel already has at least 1,000 subscribers as they have the option to monetize the videos.
The creator states in the video.
Not only from YouTube, but the creator can also place ads in their video; this is called an in-video ad placement. With this brought on, they will talk about the product in the video or even put it subliminally (like in the screen in the background, blackboards, or even the background music track).
Many creators think of it as an intelligent way to earn more than just from YouTube ads, not to mention link placement in the video’s description. Therefore, with this explanation, we can conclude our article on how to tell if a video is monetized.
