I do YouTube very part time, no more than 10 hours per week, although most weeks 5 or less.

I created my first "proper" channel and monetised it 3 months later back in 2022. In 2023 I created 3 new channels and got them monetised 3-6 months in. I play different games/genres, hence multiple channels.

Here's the breakdown for those new interested what it took.

ALL FIGURES ARE BASED OFF LIFETIME.

my first channel (a combat simulator) got 711,000 views with 48,700 hours and made £1,009

My second channel (a strategy game channel) got 730,000 views with 347,000 hours and made £3,390

My third channel (eSports for old game) got 284,000 views with 96.7k view time making £678

My newest channel (flight sim) got 172,000 views with 14k view time and made just £180.

In terms of effort, by FAR the most I put into the eSports one (because it's the most fun) having recently broke through 100 videos. They are live takes, although the effort behind the scenes pre recording means 1hr vid = APPX 3-4hrs work.

By FAR the easiest in terms of effort and work is actually my best performer. The vast majority of the views come from live streams. Please do no equate "easiest" with "lazy". I'm talking relative terms.

Other things I've picked up along the way (and seen it with others) is that doing the things honestly and openly works best (at least for me). I found that a very highly polished video definitely gets more views, it also takes far longer and sucks the enjoyment out of YouTube.

You can see based off these figures, I make nowhere near enough (remember all my channels are new and small, and I average 4-5 videos per month and split them).

Also to remember these are all gaming related, despite the wide variation between that. Also of note is my eSports channel with old game has an extremely high retention rate (85-90% still there after 30 seconds are still there after an hour) actually means very little in terms of revenue. Also I think being an old game = less stuff to sell, for example flight sim related stuff has expensive hardware to possibly market, and often attract completely different audiences.

My audience crossover is very low, less than 1% based on comments and other contact I get.

My eSports channel has a small patreon following (my only one) that has about 40 members since I created it 12 months ago, and grows about 1 member per 1-2 videos put out. Again small potatoes, but it still adds up.

One thing's painfully obvious doing this. If someone out there is really struggling to get their basic requirements together to get partnered (ie 4k hours) then they are going to really struggle anyway, because that amount of hours is worth about £40 - at least averaged out in the gaming niche. Those who are willing to learn, and have the ability to put in more time, will be the exception.