What is the most subscribed YouTube channel? MrBeast made the first place in the ranking of the most-subscribed YouTube channels in January 2025. With 343 million subscribers, the U.S. based videographer and internet personality managed to surpass Indian music network T-Series, which held the number one place for several years, and sat at 284 million subscriber as of the examined period. How many hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute? YouTube was launched in 2005 as a platform for sharing user-generated videos such as vlogs, tutorials, or original series. The site grew rapidly and reportedly had 100 million video views per day and more than 65 thousand daily uploads only a year later. As of February 2022, more than 500 hours of video were uploaded to YouTube every minute, up from a mere 24 hours of content uploads per minute in 2010. YouTube Partner Program In the first quarter of 2024, YouTube’s ad revenue amounted to over eight billion U.S. dollars. Through its Partner Program, YouTube also rewards uploaders of popular videos with a share of the advertising revenues the content generates. This, paired with the fact that many users of the video sharing platform tend to have favorite channels that they revisit regularly, has given rise to another phenomenon: YouTube celebrities. Although some of these well-known figures were discovered on the website but then carved a successful career outside of YouTube, for many others the site is their primary platform for delivering content and staying in contact with fans, all while signing lucrative deals or promotional partnerships. Highest earning YouTubers In November 2022, MrBeast surpassed long-standing most subscribed YouTuber PewDiePie, having reached approximately 112 million subscribers. Due to the high number of subscribers and even higher number of views, these out-of-the-box stars not only have millions of fans, but also considerable earnings from their YouTube activities. In 2023, MrBeast was estimated to have earned around 82 million U.S. dollars, topping the ranking of the highest-earning YouTube creators. The ranking also included social media personality Jake Paul and Mark Fischbach, as well as Ryan Kaji from Ryan's World (formerly known as ToysReview), who started his YouTube career reviewing toys at three years old.

The most subscribed YouTube channels in the world are split evenly between brands and individual YouTubers. Many of the most successful company channels actually serve Indian audiences – such as T-Series, SET India, and Zee Music Company. All of these specialize in movies and music, often with Bollywood ties. One name even features twice on our Top 50 list: The main T-Series channel is the second-most subscribed YouTube channel in the world, at close to 300 million subs, while its devotional movies channel Bhakti Sagar ranks 26th. Among the 6 non-corporate YouTubers in the Top 10 are the overall leader MrBeast, three kids' content creators — Kids Diana Show, Like Nastya, and Vlad and Niki — and two newer additions, the Stokes Twins and KIMPRO. They both recently passed by PewDiePie, who has now dropped out of the leaders of the pack. You won’t be surprised that the creator with the most subscribers on the platform is Jimmy Donaldson. After shooting past long-time leader T-Series and cracking the magic 300 million mark in mid-2024, MrBeast is fresh off busting the 400 million milestone. It's a spectacular fanbase that earns him an outsize income. We’ve also already mentioned just how popular child YouTubers like Nastya or Diana are. Today, Vlad and Niki hold the #2 creator spot with 142 million subs, now pulling ahead of Kids Diana Show at 135 million (#3). Like Nastya is not far behind at 128 million subscribers in spot #4. Closing the distance are the Stokes Twins, Alan and Alex, who rocketed up this entire list last year to become the #5 creators and the top #8 subscribed channel overall. The sensation comedy duo nearly quadrupled their sub count within three months. The twin’s antics are now followed by a cool 127 million YouTube subscribers. The #6 creator channel is the South Korean comedy skit channel KIMPRO, which features the eponymous Kim Pro and a variable cast of female creators. At 111 million subs, too, KIMPRO is already the #10 most subscribed channel in the world. It, too, has been growing rapidly, adding millions of fans every week. Kim is fresh off overtaking former long-term subs leader, video game player PewDiePie AKA Felix Kjellberg (110 million, #7 creator). Kjellberg's channel is updated only sporadically, though. It has leaked about a million followers over the last year. Rank #8 now belongs to Shorts star Alan Chikin Chow on Alan's Universe. Chow's comedic talent has earned him 94 million followers - more than triple what he had a year ago, when he was crowned (once more) the most famous Shorts YouTuber. Not far behind him comes the comedy skit channel A4, run by a team of Belarusian creators. They have amassed 83 million subscribers. After edging onto the top 50 list at the beginning of last year, A4 are now #19 overall, and the #9 creator channel. Next up is Indian family comedy channel KL BRO Biju Rithvik, which made it onto this list just a few months ago, now with around 74 million subscribers. This makes them the #10 creator channel. Also on the list since the first days of 2025 is Instagram, TikTok and YouTube phenomenon Alejo Igoa, an Argentinian comedian filming silly stuff with his friends. At some 70 million subs, he's the #11 creator on this list – and he's been climbing fast. This leaves ex-NASA and Apple engineer Mark Rober in spot #12. His eponymous DIY engineering and science channel recently reached 69 million subs – and continues to grow slowly, but steadily. Immediately after comes Topper Guild - the TikTok personality whose first dubious claim to fame was wasting food for views, and who has now moved on to glitzy Beast-style clips. Having entered the list in March, he is already the #13 creator with some 69 million fans. He'll likely overtake Rober shortly. Next, there's Uruguayan comedy-horror YouTuber Fede Vigevani. Listed here for about a year - since June 2024 - he today has over 68 million subscribers, which earns him the #14 creator spot. Additionally, he is the single most-watched Spanish-speaking creator, just ahead of YOLO. The third newbie in 2025 is Japanese Short and TikTok creator ISSEI, AKA issei0806, whose funny travelogues and parodies of popular content formats launched him onto this list in June. He's already climbed to 63 million subs to the #15 creator spot. 2025's fourth new entry are the guys from YOLO AVENTURAS, a Mexico-based pranks, comedy and MrBeast-style challenge channel around Venezuelan Flavio Andrés Broianigo Muñoz (aka YOLO) and his siblings. Their 63 million subscribers make them the #16 creator channel. And: We're optimistic that they'll stay with us. Fresh on #17 with 62 million subscribers comes Indian child sensation Anaya Kandhal, who has finally shouldered Dude Perfect out of the top 50 YouTubers - despite their big plans.

In 2020, the Youtuber with the largest number of subscriptions in France was Squeezie, who ranked first, with **** million subscribers, followed by Cyprien with approximately *** million less. Norman fait des vidéos was ranked in third position with **** million subscribers. Tibo InShape followed the lead with *** millions and Lama Faché occupied the fifth position, with around *** million Youtube subscribers.

YouTube is the world's largest video-sharing platform, launched in 2005. It allows users to upload, view, and share videos, and has grown to be a central hub for content creators across various fields, including entertainment, education, music, and more. With over 2 billion logged-in users monthly, YouTube has become an essential platform for digital content and marketing.

The Top 1000 YouTube Channels Dataset captures detailed information about the top-performing YouTube channels globally. This dataset includes the following columns:

• Rank : The ranking of the YouTube channel based on its overall popularity and performance.
• Youtuber : The name of the YouTuber or the title of the YouTube channel.
• Subscribers : The total number of subscribers to the channel, indicating its reach and popularity.
• Video Views : The total number of video views the channel has accumulated, reflecting its engagement and audience interaction.
• Video Count : The total number of videos uploaded by the channel, showing the content volume produced.
• Category : The genre or category the channel belongs to, such as music, education, entertainment, etc.
• Started : The year the channel was created, providing insight into its longevity and growth over time.

This dataset is invaluable for analyzing trends, understanding content strategies, and benchmarking channel performances within the YouTube ecosystem.

In February 2024, YouTube counted approximately 100 million paid subscribers across its Music and Premium services. This represents an increase from the 50 million paying subscribers across the platform's services from September 2021. During the third quarter of 2023, YouTube generated almost eight billion U.S. dollars in advertising revenues.

As of February 2025, India was the country with the largest YouTube audience by far, with approximately 491 million users engaging with the popular social video platform. The United States followed, with around 253 million YouTube viewers. Brazil came in third, with 144 million users watching content on YouTube. The United Kingdom saw around 54.8 million internet users engaging with the platform in the examined period. What country has the highest percentage of YouTube users? In July 2024, the United Arab Emirates was the country with the highest YouTube penetration worldwide, as around 94 percent of the country's digital population engaged with the service. In 2024, YouTube counted around 100 million paid subscribers for its YouTube Music and YouTube Premium services. YouTube mobile markets In 2024, YouTube was among the most popular social media platforms worldwide. In terms of revenues, the YouTube app generated approximately 28 million U.S. dollars in revenues in the United States in January 2024, as well as 19 million U.S. dollars in Japan.

Context

Who are leading Pakistan on YouTube? Here is the list of Top 250 channels based on their subscribers count

Content

The dataset contains Top 250 ranking of YouTube Channels in Pakistan along with Channel's name and subscribers count

Inspiration

Let's find out what Pakistan is watching?

Few individuals better represent the rise of the YouTube celebrity than Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg, operating on YouTube as PewDiePie. The Swedish YouTuber was the content creator with the largest audience on YouTube for several years, until he was surpassed by American YouTuber MrBeast. As of January 2025, the popular creator had around *** million subscribers. In total, videos on the PewDiePie channel have been viewed approximately ** billion times. Subscribe to PewDiePie meme The surge in subscriber numbers from the end of 2018 onwards is attributable to PewDiePie’s “Subscribe to PewDiePie Meme“, a demonstration of his immense ability to mobilize his subscribers. In the campaign to overtake T-Series and become the channel with the most subscribers, PewDiePie’s challenge required followers to plaster words to the effect of ‘Subscribe to PewDiePie’ wherever possible, either in the physical or digital realms. Despite the obvious success of the campaign in terms of subscriptions, PewDiePie recently called for the campaign to be stopped following three major incidents. In the first a World War II memorial was defaced in New York City, and in March 2019 a gunman uttered the phrase before opening fire on a mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, killing ** people and wounding several more. In April 2019, the gunman who opened fire on a Southern California synagogue, killing one and wounding at least three others, also referred to the campaign.   The rise of the YouTuber Now a decade old, YouTube’s ability to connect content creators with massive audiences has led to the emergence of channels that rival mainstream media outlets in terms of audience size. In some cases, videos can reach 100 million views in just a matter of days . It isn’t just traditional celebrities that are finding audiences either, with channels for kids such as Cocomelon - Nursery Rhymes attracting over *** billion views, and generating significant revenue in the process.

Reaction video channel Panda Short was the most subscribed YouTube channel in Sweden as of ************, with over **** million subscribers. Second in the ranking was Tim Bergling, who was better known as Avicii, with **** million people subscribed to the electronic musician’s channel. RobTopGames followed with **** million subscribers. DIY/beauty channel Narins Beauty ranked fourth, with **** million subscribers. YouTube usage in Sweden According to a 2023 survey of internet users in Sweden, seven out of every 10 respondents reported using social networks such as YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat, this highlights the popularity of media-sharing platforms in the country.The number of YouTube users in Sweden is projected to increase by ** percent, reaching approximately *** million viewers in 2025.  Youngest generations in Sweden are all YouTube users As of *************, children aged between ***** and ** in Sweden used YouTube mainly for watching entertaining and fun content. In 2022, around ** percent of Swedish viewers who were born in the ***** used YouTube on a daily basis, while the same percentage of viewers born in the ***** watched content on the platform daily.

Alan Walker had the most viewed videos on YouTube in Norway in January 2025. The Norwegian DJ and record producer had well around ** billion views. What is more, he also came first in the ranking by number of subscribers, with over ** million subscribers in January 2025. The animation channel thelovelyhorrorshow ranked second and was viewed roughly *** billion times. The other well-known Norwegian musician Kygo, came third in the ranking of most video views, with roughly **** billion views. Of what age are most YouTube users?   A study conducted in the fourth quarter of 2023 investigated the share of Norwegian YouTube users, by age group and gender. The platform was most popular among the youngest representatives, aged between 18 and 29 years. ** percent of the men and ** percent of the women of that age group used YouTube that year. YouTube in the Nordic countries    Norway was second, among the other Nordic countries, regarding daily use of YouTube in 2017. In fact, ** percent of the Norwegians interviewed that year used the platform daily, while the Finnish who used it, were ** percent. Sweden and Denmark were respectively third and fourth in the ranking.

As of January 2025, the ranking of the most popular YouTube channels based on monthly views is dominated by music and children's content. Wiz Khalifa's Music channel was ranked first with a whopping six billion channel views, while Wow Kidz ranked second with over five billion video views in the last examined month. Indian music record channel T-Series -which ranked first continuously in 2021 and 2022, placed third with 2.72 billion video views. Most subscribed YouTube channels When looking at the most-subscribed YouTube channels: Indian music label T-Series was ranked first with 229 million channel subscribers. The video game commentator Felix Kjellberg, aka PewDiePie, ranked seventh, with roughly 111 million subscribers, after being surpassed by Jimmy Donaldson, aka MrBeast in November 2022. As of June 2022, PewDiePie was still the most subscribed gaming-content channel on YouTube, followed by Salvadorian YouTuber Fernanfloo with 45 million global subscribers. Creators' earnings MrBeast was the highest-earning YouTuber in 2021, with 54 million U.S. dollars. Ryan Kaji from Ryan's World was among the youngest content creators making the rankings of the highest-earning YouTubers in 2021, with an estimated revenue of 27 million U.S. dollars. Ryan’s channel was set up by his parents in March 2015, when the young content creator was three years old. MrBeast was also the leading content creator on YouTube based on Influence Media Value, while PewDiePie ranked third with an evaluation of around 3.91 million U.S. dollars.

In 2020, the popular social video platform YouTube counted roughly 20 million paying users subscribing to its premium services in the United States. By the end of 2024, this number is forecasted to increase by almost eight million users, reaching 27.9 million paying subscribers in the U.S. YouTube premium plans allow users to have an ads-free experience, as well as video and music downloads.

Jimmy Donaldson - operating on YouTube as MrBeast, saw approximately ************* new subscribers on his popular YouTube channel in December 2024. In November 2022, MrBeast overtook PewDiePie as the most subscribed YouTuber on the platform. PewDiPie counted approximately *** million subscribers on YouTube as of June 2024. Most engaging YouTube channels and content As of January 2025, MrBeast counted the largest number of subscribers on YouTube, with an audience of around *** million viewers. However, other famous YouTube channels were not far behind on the subscribers’ leaderboard. T-series and Cocomelon - Nursery Rhymes followed with *** and *** million subscribers, respectively, during the same examined period. When it comes to the most viewed YouTube channels of all time, T-series had the highest viewership, with over *** billion views as of January 2025. Cocomelon and SET India followed with around *** and *** billion lifetime views, respectively. With a viewership of billions of users, content for children and music were the most popular types of videos on YouTube. As of January 2024, Baby Shark Dance was the most watched YouTube video of all time, with around ** billion views. Puerto Rican song Despacito and children’s rhyme Johny Johny Yes Papa followed, with **** and ***** billion lifetime views, respectively. Who uses YouTube? The number of YouTube global users has been continuously growing over the years. Between 2020 and 2029, the number is expected to increase from *** million to **** billion users. As of July 2024, more than 54 percent of the YouTube audience comprised of men, while women held 45.7 percent of YouTube’s audience share. Over ** percent of the YouTube global audience were men between the age of 25 and 34 years during the same examined period. The region with the largest number of YouTube users was India, with an audience of approximately *** million video viewers. The United States and Brazil followed, with around *** and *** million users accessing the popular video platform, respectively. As of July 2024, YouTube exhibited the highest penetration rate in the United Arab Emirates, where more than ** percent of the total digital population used the platform. Israel and United Kingdom followed with YouTube penetration rates of **** and ****, respectively.

This dataset and supplementary tables are released in conjunction with the TPDL 2025 paper titled “How Retracted Research Persists on YouTube: Retraction Severity, Visibility, and Disclosure.” They provide detailed information used in the analysis to promote transparency, ensure reproducibility, and facilitate future studies on scholarly communication and retractions.

The dataset contains the following files:

Filename	Data Format	Description
01_dataset_scholarly_references_on_YouTube.json.gz	JSON Lines	An integrated dataset of scholarly references in YouTube video descriptions, covering videos posted up to the end of December 2023. This dataset combines the Altmetric dataset and the YA Domain Dataset and is the basis for identifying references to retracted articles. This dataset contains 743,529 scholarly references (386,628 unique DOIs) found in 322,521 YouTube videos uploaded by 77,974 channels.
02_dataset_references_to_retracted_articles_on_YouTube.json.gz	JSON Lines	A dataset of retracted articles referenced in YouTube videos, used as the primary source for analysis in this paper. The dataset was created by cross-referencing the integrated reference dataset with the Retraction Watch database. It includes metadata such as DOI, article title, retraction reason, and severity classification (Severe, Moderate, or Minor) based on Woo and Walsh (2024), along with video- and channel-level statistics (e.g., view counts and subscriber counts) retrieved via the YouTube Data API v3 as of April 22, 2025. This dataset contains 1,002 retracted articles (360 unique DOIs) found in 956 YouTube videos uploaded by 714 channels.
03_full_list_table3_sorted_by_reference_count_retracted_articles_on_YouTube.json.gz	JSON Lines	Complete list corresponding to Table 3, "Top 7 retracted articles ranked by the number of YouTube videos in which they are referenced." in the paper.
04_full_list_table5_top10_most-viewed_video.json.gz	JSON Lines	Complete list corresponding to Table 5, "Top 10 most-viewed YouTube videos that reference retracted articles, sorted by video view count." in the paper.
05_detailed_manual_coding_40_sampled_retracted_articles.xlsx	XLSX	This file provides detailed annotations for a manually coded sample of 40 YouTube videos referencing retracted scholarly articles. The sample includes 10 randomly selected videos from each of the four analytical groups categorized by publication timing (before/after retraction) and retraction severity (Moderate/Severe). The file includes reference stance for each video, visual/verbal mention of the article, and relevant timestamps when applicable. This dataset supplements the manual analysis results presented in Tables 6 and 7 in paper.

Due to concerns over potential misuse (e.g., identification or harassment of individual content creators), this dataset is not made publicly available.
Researchers who wish to use this dataset for scholarly purposes may contact the authors to request access.

References

• Woo, S., Walsh, J.P.: On the shoulders of fallen giants: What do references to retracted research tell us about citation behaviors? Quantitative Science Studies 5(1), 1–30 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00303
• Kikkawa, J., Takaku, M.: How Retracted Article Persists on YouTube: Retraction Severity, Visibility, and Disclosure. Accepted for publication in the Proceedings of the 29th International Conference on Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries (TPDL 2025).
• Accepted Papers (TPDL2025) - https://tpdl2025.github.io/Program/accepted_papers.html

Fundings

JSPS KAKENHI Grant Numbers JP22K18147 and JP23K11761.

As of October 2023, Indian music company T-Series had the most-subscribed YouTube channel from Asia and in the world, with more than 250 million subscribers. The leading three most-subscribed channels from Asia were from India, including SET India and Zee Music Company, followed by the South Korean girl group BLACKPINK, who had over 91 million subscribers as of October 2023.

YouTube in India

YouTube was the second most-used social media platform in the Indian market during recent years. Facebook still rules the Indian social media landscape with a market share of over 50 percent. Nevertheless, YouTube secured the highest brand index score among the youngest demographics – Gen Z surpassing Facebook, and Instagram in that regard.

 YouTube in Asia

The largest YouTube audiences in Asia are in India and Indonesia, with the former leading the ranks. Meanwhile, the service is restricted in China. Despite the growing number of viewers, YouTube’s usage rate has declined. Thus, the monthly market share of YouTube on mobile devices dropped to 5.5 percent in January of 2023, compared to around 7.5 percent recorded in the year prior.

YouTube boasts an average of 23.7 hours per month spent by users.

As of December 2023, Doc Tops and Soy Suco were the most subscribed YouTube channels in Ecuador, with approximately **** million subscribers each. RaptorGamer ranked third in the list, with **** million subscribers. Despite ranking fourth in the number of subscriptions, the channel MIS PEQUEÑOS ACTORES was the most viewed Youtube channel in the country at the time.

The global number of Youtube users in was forecast to continuously increase between 2024 and 2029 by in total ***** million users (+***** percent). After the ninth consecutive increasing year, the Youtube user base is estimated to reach *** billion users and therefore a new peak in 2029. Notably, the number of Youtube users of was continuously increasing over the past years.User figures, shown here regarding the platform youtube, have been estimated by taking into account company filings or press material, secondary research, app downloads and traffic data. They refer to the average monthly active users over the period.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to *** countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the number of Youtube users in countries like Africa and South America.

As of May 31, 2025, Mengmeng and Wutong was the most-subscribed YouTube channel in Hong Kong, attracting about 27.7 million subscribers worldwide. Other most popular YouTube channels in Hong Kong were Super Beauty Team and Chaoren Buhuifei.

Seen the popularity of the YouTube platform among younger users and children, kids-themed YouTube channels are among the most popular types of content on the platform. As of March 2024, ChuChu TV Nursery Rhymes & Kids Songs was the most subscribed kids' content channel, with approximately 94.7 million subscribers. Spanish-language channel El Reino Infantil ranked second with approximately 67.5 million subscribers, while Masha and the Bear ranked third with 53.3 million subscribers. Kids on YouTube According to a survey of global parents conducted in September 2022, over half of the respondents reported that watching YouTube videos was a popular online activity their children chose to engage with. In the United States, children were using the YouTube app to watch content for over one hour daily on average in 2023. Children media consumption As of May 2022, software, audio, and video content were the most popular categories for global children to interact with online, with approximately 44 percent of younger users visiting and engaging with these content formats. Between 52 percent and 55 percent of children in India, Saudi Arabia, and South Africa were reported visiting software, audio, and video websites between 2020 and 2021.