Meet Africa’s YouTube millionaires | News24

North African content producers are the top YouTube earners. Mateusz Slodkowski/Getty Images

• North African content producers are the top YouTube earners in Africa.
• Even with only 22% access to the internet, African content producers are coining it.
• South Africa’s Michael Jamison, famous for his zoo house, is among Africa’s YouTube millionaires.

YouTube is king and content creation for children is a goldmine in which Ugandan, Kenyan, Nigerian, and South African creators are coining it, in a continent with only 22% internet access, a report by CashNetUSA revealed.

Despite the three African countries showing some marked improvement, the Arab states in Africa rule the roost.

“African YouTubers haven’t traditionally been able to reach the viewing figures of large content creators in other regions; they face an uphill struggle as only 22% of Africa’s population have access to the internet. 

“Despite this, there are signs of growing demand for YouTube content in the region. Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa all have at least 300 channels with more than 100 000 subscribers,” the report says.

The biggest earner in Africa, according to the report, is Creative Crafts in Five Minutes YouTube channel. 

Since its launch in 2017, it has made about R152 million. 

“The handy how-to guides have been viewed more than 4 billion times,” the report said.

It’s followed by Algerian cooking YouTuber Oum Walid with about R84m in earnings.

READ | About 300 million Africans affected by internet restrictions in 2022 – report

The biggest earner in Sub Saharan Africa is Nigerian comedian Mark Angel with about R73.5 million.

Below Mark Angel, there’s Moroccan Baraka Ibaraka raking in about R50 million, and then the Senegalese duo of Hussein and Zeinab with a total of R40 million.

Masaka Kids Africana, a children’s musical ensemble from Uganda, has earnings estimated to be around R22.75 million.

Their latest post is a thrilling groove to Selena Gomez and Rema’s Calm Down.

To round up the dollar millionaires is South Africa’s 48 year-year-old Michael Jamison.

He is famous for his self-named zoo house. Jamison rose to prominence for living with his two Bengal tigers, Enzo and Diego, and Ozzy, a Siberian tiger, and has made a cool R17.5 million ($1 million) from his YouTube channel.

YouTube still reigns despite the rising popularity of other content creation platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Twitch.

It boasts 14.3 billion views every month, which is more than Facebook and Wikipedia combined, and is the second-most frequented website after Google.

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