For many years Twitch has been reigning over streaming platforms. Despite multiple ambitious projects which were supposed to overthrow it, Twitch still remains the largest and the most popular service for broadcasting different sorts of content. Another media giant of 21st century — YouTube — is trying to cast down its main rival not only by increasing its compatibility, safety and hosting capabilities, but also by poaching some famous Twitch content creators of a different genres. Stream Charts prepared a list of the most well-known streamers who transferred from Twitch to YouTube streaming.
CouRageJD
CouRageJD & Ninja
One of the first Twitch streamers who moved from Twitch was CouRageJD. Jack Dunlop started his career as a Halo and Call of Duty gamer and streamer, and created content for many eminent esports teams like OpTic Gaming and 100 Thieves throughout his career. Among interesting facts about Dunlop is that he was invited as an official caster for Fortnite World Cup 2019. and featured in Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber`s music video Stuck with U, as he’s a good online friend of a popular American singer.
When both Ninja and shroud announced their transfer to Mixer, their friend Jack decided to take an even riskier move and switched to YouTube. During his birthday charity stream in 2020 CouRageJD raised more than $250K for relieving coronavirus consequences.
Recently, CouRageJD has been streaming various FPS games regularly and participating in various streamer tournaments held in Fortnite, Valorant and other shooters.
Valkyrae
Valkyrae for the 100 Thieves promo
CouRageJD`s friend and co-owner of 100 Thieves Valkyrae made the same move just a couple months later after Dunlop. Despite a rough start, her YouTube streams experienced a remarkable boost at the end of 2020 with her concurrent viewers count exceeding 100,000. That made her the fastest-growing female streamer and one of the most watched female streamers worldwide. Thus, she became the laureate of the Game Awards 2020.
Muselk and LazarBeam
The same day as Valkyrae, two Australians streamers LazarBeam and Muselk proclaimed that from now on they would stream exclusively on YouTube. LazarBeam, who was originally a Fortnite enthusiast, became the 8th most viewed YouTube streamer in the world and third in Australia with 2 billion views in 2019. His comrade from YouTube group Click Crew – Muselk — is also a fan of FPS games, who first gained recognition in Team Fortress 2. His YouTube channel has over 9 millions subscribers and over 2 billions views.
DrDisrespect
Another content creator who switched from Twitch to YT is DrDisrespect. It’s probably the only transfer which was caused not by YouTube’s rivalry with Twitch, but rather DrDisrespect’s issues with Amazon-owned platform. Hershel Beahm was a level designer who took part in creating Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, but left game development to concentrate on streaming in 2015. He became famous due to streams of various shooters like PUBG. Surprising permanent ban of his channel in June 2020 stirred up the whole twitch community. Despite renewed agreement in March 2020, Twitch terminated DrDisrespect`s contract and banned his channel for violating Twitch rules. The reason for this ban is still not disclosed. At the moment of ban, his channel had more than 3.8 million followers. However, due to the huge popularity in North America, he quickly gained a vast audience on YouTube: for example, his premiere stream amassed about 560K concurrent viewers.
DrLupo
In August 2021, DrLupo announced a multiyear exclusive contract with YouTube, which ended his partnership with Twitch. He is mainly famous for streaming different battle royale games. As a main reason for this decision Benjamin Lupo stated his willingness to spend more time with his family after years of keeping up a grueling streaming schedule. His Twitch channel comprised 4,5 million followers. But his family friendly content and regular charity streams found tremendous success on YouTube streams as well. In 2022 he was nominated for best philanthropic streamer at the Streamer Award.
TimTheTatman
TimTheTatman after joining Complexity Gaming
Lupo’s announcement was overshadowed by another hot take. His good friend TimTheTatman also made a statement in his Twitter about transferring to YouTube the day after Benjamin. For almost ten years of streaming he amassed about 7 million followers on Twitch. American streamer Timothy John Betar became well-known after his streams of Fortnite gameplay. Interestingly, he was awarded for Fan Favorite Male Streamer/Gamer of the Year At the maiden Gamers Choice Awards in 2018. Together with DrLupo and other creators he also participated in fundraising for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. By now TimTheTatman is part-owner and content creator for Complexity Gaming.
Ludwig
In November 2021, another big name of Twitch — Ludwig — also announced his departure from Twitch. Creator, who was the first to outscore Ninja on subscribers count, is best known for his hilarious Just Chatting streams, where he broadcasted video games as well as non video game-related content such as shows, contests, and gambling. He is also known as an author of podcast The Yard and was recognised as a Streamer of the year at the Streamer Awards 2022.
Sykkuno
The tendency of steamers leaving Twitch continued this year. On May 1, 2022, American live streamer Sykkuno announced that he will no longer be streaming on Twitch and will leave the platform for YouTube Gaming. He mainly focuses on streaming games such as Minecraft, Valorant, League of Legends, Among Us, and GTA roleplay and also streams Just Chatting content. Sykkuno is also known for his friendship with members of OfflineTV, but although he lived in their house for a while, he never was a part of their group.
As it seems, more and more content creators find YouTube a more preferable place to continue their career. And there is no signs of stopping, as DisguisedToast, who is a friend of Sykkuno shared an inside that at least five more streamers will soon leave Twitch. We will keep you updated about recent news from the world of streaming.
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When it comes to statistics, TimTheTatman turned out to be the most popular streamer among the ones mentioned above in terms of Hours Watched, Peak Viewers and Average Viewers in early 2022. As for the most active creator, DrLupo takes the #1 spot here: he was on air for 2.5 times more hours than the closest pursuer (Tim).
In terms of maximum concurrent viewership, only three streamers managed to break the 50k viewer mark, and they were TimTheTatman, DrDisrespect, and Ludwig. Interestingly, almost all streamers from the list mainly streamed various shooters like Fortnite and Call of Duty in January-April. The exceptions were Valyrae, who spent a lot of time in Among Us, as well as Ludwig, who regularly streams non-gaming content.
Detailed statistics on YouTube streamers (as well as creators on other platforms like Twitch, Facebook Gaming & Trovo) are available with our PRO subscription.
