What is a good engagement rate on YouTube?

For a single video, engagement rate is the likes and comments divided by the views, shown as a percentage. A video with 40,000 views, 1,500 likes and 100 comments has an engagement rate of 1,600 / 40,000 = 4%. Likes and comments are the two reactions anyone can count from outside the channel, which is why they're the ones used.

One video tells you little. A creator's engagement rate is the typical value across several recent videos:

1. 01

   Open the channel's Videos tab

   Use the Videos tab, not Shorts, if long videos are what you're sponsoring. Treat Shorts as a separate set of numbers.

2. 02

   Skip anything less than a few days old

   A new video's views keep arriving for days, while its first viewers, often the most loyal subscribers, react early. So a fresh video's rate starts high and drifts down. Start from videos at least three days old.

3. 03

   Note views, likes and comments for the last 10 or so

   Ten to twenty videos is enough to see the pattern without reaching back to a time when the channel was different.

4. 04

   Work out the rate for each video

   (Likes + comments) / views, for each one. The engagement rate calculator does this for a list of videos at once.

5. 05

   Take the median

   Sort the rates and take the middle one. The median ignores a single viral video or a single flop, which the average does not.

Say a channel with 300,000 subscribers has these eight most recent long videos. The numbers are made up for illustration.

Sorted, the seven rates are 1.1, 2.9, 3.2, 3.6, 3.8, 4.1 and 4.5%, so the median is 3.6%. Compare the shortcuts:

• Yesterday's video alone says 11.7%, because its views haven't caught up yet.
• Pooling all seven (15,582 likes and comments over 855,000 views) says 1.8%, dragged down by the viral video.
• Average views are about 122,000, while median views are 42,000. The viral video nearly triples the average. A sponsor paying on the average would pay for views the typical video doesn't get.

Median views of 42,000 against 300,000 subscribers also gives views per subscriber of 14%. Median views are the number to price a sponsorship on; how much to pay YouTubers shows how.

Not a universal one, and be wary of anyone who quotes one without saying where it came from. Engagement rate depends on things that have nothing to do with how good a creator is:

• Niche. Tutorials and reviews invite questions in the comments. Music, comedy and background-viewing channels can draw many viewers who never react.
• Format. Shorts and long videos behave differently, so never compare one with the other.
• Video length. A long video is watched by people who chose to stay. A short one is easier to watch and leave.
• Channel size. A small channel may have a closer audience that comments more, so its rate can run higher.
• Calls to action. A creator who asks viewers a question at the end will get more comments than one who doesn't.

The useful comparison is with similar channels: the same niche, the same format, a similar size. Work out the median for five or six of them and you'll see what normal looks like for your market. Then read the comments, because a high rate made of "nice video" is worth less than a modest one made of real questions. Our guide to vetting a YouTube creator covers that.

Views per subscriber

Median views divided by subscribers. It answers the question engagement rate doesn't: does the audience the channel built still watch? A low figure on every recent video suggests subscribers who moved on, a change of topic, or bought subscribers. A high one means videos reach well beyond the subscriber base, often through search. Note that YouTube abbreviates public subscriber counts, so treat the result as approximate.

Shorts

YouTube counts a view the moment a video starts to play, for Shorts as well as long videos (how views are counted). In the Shorts feed, a Short starts playing as soon as someone swipes to it, including people who swipe straight past. That tends to push a Short's views up and its engagement rate down, compared with the same creator's long videos. A channel whose numbers mix both formats can look busier and less engaged than its long videos really are.

Nakodo works this out for every creator it finds. It takes up to 20 recent uploads and, from videos at least 3 days old, preferring long-form over Shorts, calculates median views and median engagement rate. Channels with more than 60% Shorts are flagged as Shorts-heavy. The engagement part of the fit score then uses these fixed thresholds, with straight lines between the points:

In the example above, 3.6% would score 66 and 14% views per subscriber would score 72. Each channel is scored on its own numbers and never ranked against others, and the score always shows its reasons, such as "Likes and comments are 3.6% of views (median)". The full method is on how Nakodo works.