YouTube subscriber count abbreviations
On May 21, 2019, YouTube announced an update to the way subscriber counts were shown on the site, which would later be titled subscriber count abbreviations. Not only was the site changed to show these new subscriber counts, the public API was also updated to only return truncated counts up to 3 digits.
This update was heavily disliked by creators, especially in the statistics community, due to YouTube's unusual reasoning and the fact that it made live subscriber counts such as Social Blade and Livecounts.net no longer being able to track live subscriber counts.
First announcement[edit]
On May 21, 2019, a blog post was made by YouTube's product team. It stated:
To create more consistency everywhere that we publicly display subscriber counts, starting in August 2019, we’ll begin showing the abbreviated subscriber number across all public YouTube surfaces. Third parties that use YouTube’s API Services will also access the same public facing counts you see on YouTube. Creators will still be able to see their exact number of subscribers in YouTube Studio.
Though they stated that it would start rolling out in August 2019, they only started rolling it out on the site in the first week of September 2019,[1] and the API was updated not long after, on September 17.
The reasoning for the change is for concerns about stress and wellbeing, specifically around tracking public subscriber counts in real-time and to eliminate experiences of pressure about the numbers, though many didn't agree with this reasoning.
Examples[edit]
These examples were taken from the same blog post mentioned above.[2]
| Full count | Abbr.[a] | Next public increment |
|---|---|---|
| 123 | 123 | 124 (+1) |
| 1,243 | 1.24K | 1.25K (+10) |
| 10,486 | 10.4K | 10.5K (+100) |
| 536,862 | 536K | 537K (+1,000) |
| 1,783,744 | 1.78M | 1.79M (+10,000) |
| 53,324,899 | 53.3M | 53.4M (+100,000) |
| 103,538,378 | 103M | 104M (+1,000,000) |
YouTube API rollout[edit]
On September 17, 2019 at around 12 PM PT, the public API started returning truncated subscriber counts for some channels.[3][4] It started with big channels such as PewDiePie, and as the day continued, more channels would get truncated subscriber counts. By 4 PM PT, most, if not all channels, had truncated subscriber counts on the public API.
Controversy[edit]
The announcement was heavily controversial, especially in the statistics community, mostly due to live subscriber count websites such as Social Blade and Livecounts.net, would no longer be able to track live subscriber counts.[5][6] SMii7Y, a popular creator on YouTube, stated on Twitter that "YouTube's abbreviated [subscriber count] update is actually the dumbest [...] thing I have ever seen."[7]
The decision to truncate the counts on the public API was also heavily criticized,[8] with creators in the statistics community stating that it was completely unnecessary.
Two days after the update rolled out to the public API, a change.org petition was created. As of March 2025, it only has 252 signatures.[9]
Exactly a year after the update, creators like StatCounts, YT Battles, and Subscriber Wars, along with the creator of Livecounts.io, Shaz, started a protest on Twitter with "#BringBackSubCounts" to try and get YouTube's attention and potentially undo the update.[10]
Notes[edit]
- ↑ These examples only state abbreviations in English. They may look different in other languages.
References[edit]
- ↑ The moment Live SubCounts got abbreviated by Subscriber Battles (10s mark). YouTube. September 17, 2019.
- ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/6543166?hl=en&msgid=13119244
- ↑ The moment Live SubCounts got abbreviated by Subscriber Battles (21s mark). YouTube. September 17, 2019.
- ↑ YouTube Abbreviates Subcounts And it Sucks (47 hours in 5 Minutes) Time-lapse by Subscriber Wars (235s mark). YouTube. September 21, 2019.
- ↑ https://socialblade.com/blog/abbreviated-subscriber-counts-on-youtube/
- ↑ https://x.com/jaubreyYT/status/1174172975714713600
- ↑ Post on Twitter/X by SMii7Y, accessed on 28/03/2025 (DMY)
- ↑ The moment Live SubCounts got abbreviated by Subscriber Battles (60s mark). YouTube. September 17, 2019.
- ↑ https://www.change.org/p/revert-youtube-s-abbreviated-sub-counts-update
- ↑ https://x.com/pwnyygaming/status/1306661250370277378