Everyone is well aware now quite how much money you can make on YouTube if you're successful, but you might be shocked to learn quite how much the most viewed video on the platform has made over the years.
While Jimmy "MrBeast" Donaldson might be the leading creator on the platform with over 451 million subscribers at this point in time, he's quite a way from having the most viewed video on YouTube.
This accolade has been traditionally held by music videos, with Psy's Gangnam Style holding the record for a long time before being overtaken by other hits from Wiz Khalifa, Ed Sheeran, and Luis Fonsi over the years.
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However, there remains one video that has become so popular that it has nearly double the views of the next highest contender, but due to a specific rule implemented by YouTube's management, it's not earned quite as much as you might expect.
As reported by Dexerto, Pinkfong's 'Baby Shark Dance' was an instant hit with kids when it was uploaded over nine years ago, and has earned 16.38 billion views since it was first posted onto the site.
It overtook the aforementioned Luis Fonsi song Despacito in 2020, and has since nearly doubled the view count due to its continued popularity with children across the globe that continue to sing and dance along to the playful song.
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You'd understandably expect 16 billion views to work out to an insane amount of ad revenue, but a 2019 settlement between YouTube and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) saw the platform change its rules over content under the designation 'made for kids', which Baby Shark Dance obviously falls within.
This rule change removed comments, notifications, and several other engagement drivers from videos of this kind, but most importantly it got rid of any personalized ads which significantly reduces the amount of ad revenue that creators can earn.
As a result, numbers obtained by the Wall Street Journal indicate that Pinkfong as a whole earned roughly $67 million across its entire operations last year, with 'only' $13 million in operating profit — far less than you'd expect for a channel hosting something what should be a cash cow.
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It's impossible to know quite how much Baby Shark has earned the company on its own, but even with four other videos in and around the 1 billion mark on YouTube, it's likely to still represent a significant portion of the company's revenue.
Intriguingly, there are four other child-focused videos currently in the top 10 most-viewed videos on YouTube, making up half the list if you include Baby Shark, so it shows that while this content may prove to be incredibly popular, it's not necessarily as financially successful as you might expect.