American YouTuber and media personality Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson has reached another historic milestone in online entertainment, as his main YouTube channel became the first ever to surpass 500 million subscribers. To mark the occasion, Donaldson hosted a special livestream, allowing fans to watch the record-breaking moment unfold in real time.
MrBeast has long been the undisputed leader on YouTube, holding a massive lead over every other channel on the platform. His closest competitor remains T-Series, the Indian music and film channel, with around 312 million subscribers. Given the scale of Donaldson’s audience and the type of content produced by most other top YouTube channels, it is hard to imagine anyone seriously challenging his record — or reaching the 500 million subscriber milestone — in the near future.
During the special celebration stream, MrBeast spent time chatting with viewers, revisiting some of his earliest YouTube videos, and sharing behind-the-scenes stories about how his channel grew into the global phenomenon it is today.
MrBeast rarely goes live, using YouTube primarily for pre-recorded uploads rather than livestreams. Before this celebration broadcast, he had hosted only two livestreams on the platform. The first took place in August 2025, when he streamed for roughly 40 minutes as part of a charity campaign and drew more than 70,300 peak concurrent viewers. His second livestream came in April 2026, when he gave away $1 million to viewers. That broadcast proved far more popular, reaching around 1.18 million peak concurrent viewers.
YouTube's most-followed channels
| # | YouTube Channel | Followers |
|---|---|---|
|
#1 |
500 000 000 |
|
|
#2 |
312 000 000 |
|
|
#3 |
201 000 000 |
|
|
#4 |
189 000 000 |
|
| #5 | Vlad i Niki
|
150 000 000 |
| #6 | Stokes Twins
|
140 000 000 |
| #7 | Kids Diana Show
|
138 000 000 |
| #8 | 김프로KIMPRO
|
133 000 000 |
| #9 | Like Nastya
|
132 000 000 |
|
#10 |
122 000 000 |
