For some time now, Twitch has been challenging the previous placeholder YouTube in the battle for the crown of online video platforms. The winner is not yet really foreseeable, the fight has not yet been decided. Because with all the similarities between the two platforms, there are also some very significant differences. As part of our special topic, we want to show you how the platforms differ from a user perspective.
Twitch & YouTube - What are the differences?
The biggest difference between the two platforms lies in the basic orientation of the content for the respective community. Twitch is aimed at live streamers and is the largest live streaming platform in the world with a focus on gaming and entertainment. YouTube, on the other hand, is intended as a video-on-demand platform for long-lasting content and has a great search engine that helps those interested in a specific topic or niche. But it is to be expected that the platforms will become more and more similar in terms of content. Twitch now allows a wider range of content than gaming and is also increasingly incorporating Video on demand (VoD) content, while YouTube is experimenting with various live streaming solutions - not only, but especially in the gaming sector.
Creator vs content
Both Twitch and YouTube have search functions that enable users to master the sheer mass of content. But when it comes to implementation, the approaches are also very different. Twitch tends to focus on popular streamers. YouTube search, on the other hand, focuses on content. As a result, old videos that were uploaded several years ago appear within the first search results. So if you're more looking for specific content, you'll usually find what you're looking for on YouTube. Twitch also offers VoD for previous streams, but only for a certain period of time.
The number of viewers
While YouTube has around 1 billion users per month, Twitch has around 100 million monthly users. However, that's no reason to underestimate Twitch! Especially through live streaming, the bond between creator and viewer is very strong. It's just different whether you can interact live with the streamer or whether you just watch the finished video. The growth of the two platforms is also interesting. Challenger Twitch is able to score points here with an increase of around 25 percent more viewers compared to the previous year. YouTube is unable to keep up with this high growth due to its already very large reach, but it still manages to achieve remarkable growth of around 10 percent.
Different focus
What can be retained at the end? Basically, YouTube and Twitch are the two most well-known online video platforms in the world. Their focus, however, is different, at least for now. While YouTube is the platform for the masses, covering the entire spectrum, from cat videos to elaborately produced reports, Twitch is going its own way. It is mainly about live content, as well as interaction between streamers and viewers. In terms of content, Twitch currently consists primarily of gaming content. Both platforms show movements to open up in the other direction. Twitch continues to open up to an entertainment platform, especially in terms of content, while YouTube repeatedly starts attempts to make itself attractive to streamers and gamers. In the end, both platforms have currently found their audience and deliver exactly what users are there for: entertaining content — in their own way.
