What is RPM?
RPM is revenue per mille, the amount a creator actually earns per thousand views after the platform takes its cut, calculated as total revenue divided by views multiplied by one thousand.
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How RPM is calculated
RPM = (your estimated revenue / total views) x 1,000. Two details in that formula do the work. The revenue is your share, after the platform's cut, and the views are all of them, including the ones that never carried an ad. That is why RPM always reads lower than CPM, which is the advertiser-side price on monetised impressions only.
YouTube reports both figures in the Revenue tab of Analytics, and its definition of RPM covers every income line it can see, not ads alone: ad revenue, YouTube Premium watch time, channel memberships, Super Chat and Super Thanks, and Shopping. A channel with heavy membership income can show an RPM well above what its ad performance alone would suggest, which is the point of the metric.
Using it to plan
RPM is the only per-view number you can safely multiply. Views needed = (target revenue / your RPM) x 1,000, so a creator sitting at a $4 RPM needs 2.5 million monthly views to reach $10,000 a month from the platform, while one at $12 needs 833,000. Both figures come from your own Analytics, not from a published average, and they are the fastest way to see whether the gap between your channel and your target is a traffic problem or a monetisation-mix problem. Our creator revenue calculators run the same arithmetic against your numbers.
What moves it
We publish no typical RPM, because the figure is a function of things specific to your channel: the subject you cover and how many advertisers bid against it, the countries your viewers are in, the split between long-form and Shorts, how many of your views come from logged-in Premium members, and whether memberships or Super Thanks contribute at all. A single RPM figure from another creator tells you about their audience, not yours. Compare your own months against each other, and read RPM beside watch time so you can tell a pricing change from a traffic change.
Where you read it
Revenue figures come from YouTube Analytics and nowhere else, so third-party tools work on the inputs instead: impressions, click-through, topic competition and publishing cadence. vidIQ charges $7.50 per month for Pro and TubeBuddy $4.99 per month for Pro, prices checked in June 2026, and the vidIQ and TubeBuddy comparison covers which of them is worth paying for at what channel size. The wider creator analytics category covers cross-platform reporting, and how to monetize YouTube walks through the revenue lines that feed RPM.
Frequently asked questions
Is CPM or RPM better?
They answer different questions, so neither replaces the other. CPM is the advertiser's price per thousand impressions and is the number to argue about in a sponsorship negotiation. RPM is your income per thousand views after the platform's share, and is the number to plan with.
How much is paid per 1000 views on YouTube?
That figure is your RPM, and it is channel-specific rather than a rate card. It depends on your subject, your viewers' countries, the long-form and Shorts split, and whether memberships contribute. Read your own RPM in the Revenue tab of YouTube Analytics rather than a published average.
How many views do I need to make $10,000 a month on YouTube?
Views needed = (10,000 / your RPM) x 1,000. At a $4 RPM that is 2.5 million monthly views; at $12 it is 833,000. Take the RPM from your own Analytics for the last full month, because using someone else's number makes the answer meaningless.
How do you raise RPM on YouTube?
By changing the mix rather than the view count: cover subjects advertisers bid on, add revenue lines RPM includes such as channel memberships, and check whether ad formats are enabled on your long-form uploads. Shorts views sit in a separate pool and dilute a channel-wide RPM.