TimTheTatman simulcast on YouTube and Twitch on 1 September 2024, returning after three years under an exclusive YouTube contract. Ben Woods of Enders Analysis wrote of the end of such deals: “Audiences proved harder to move than talent”. Even so, YouTube is this year, according to Bloomberg, again offering millions of dollars for creator exclusivity to stop Netflix, which is going after its biggest stars.
Until then, his exclusive contract had not allowed him even to simulcast, which Twitch permitted less than a year before his return for all creators without exclusivity in their contract. In 2024, YouTube did not renew his contract, or those of DrLupo and other creators.
On the day of his return, more people watched him on Twitch at peak than on YouTube. For DrLupo, who returned the same day, Twitch's advantage was even more pronounced. Both returns coincided with the beta of the shooter Black Ops 6. Anyone watching beta streams on Twitch could earn in-game rewards for watching, which, according to Streams Charts, significantly boosted viewership of the returning streams.
This time YouTube wants popular channels to grant an exclusive window, meaning a set period during which their videos run only on its platform. On the table are show financing, a share of the big ad deals that YouTube negotiates, and cash up front. According to Bloomberg, however, it still had no deal signed with anyone as of 19 August 2026.
Netflix and Disney+ go after the first window
In its shareholder letter, Netflix says it is increasingly working with leading creators from open platforms and that it has already succeeded with Ms. Rachel and Mark Rober. New full episodes of Jay Shetty's video podcast On Purpose have not appeared on YouTube since 13 July 2026, only on Netflix and Spotify. Alan Chikin Chow, with whom Netflix announced a partnership, releases there on the same day as on YouTube.
Tubefilter concluded after both deals that “YouTube’s hold on the creator economy’s first window is not as secure as it once was”. Woods, head of creator economy analysis at Enders, divides the roles: “YouTube helps build the value; Netflix licenses without the development risk.” In his view, YouTube risks becoming a funnel that brings in the audience while others make more money from it.
Disney+ pays for YouTube shows in the EU too. In the 2026/27 season it is the main sponsor of The Overlap's football show Stick to Football, which runs on Disney+ in the UK and in Ireland alongside the YouTube channel. Twenty episodes with guests are available for a limited time to Disney+ subscribers only, and reach YouTube only afterwards.
Gary Neville, co-presenter and co-chair of The Overlap, promised of the deal in Disney's press release: “Our community will continue to enjoy our content in exactly the way they always have through YouTube”. For episodes with guests, that promise holds only after a delay.
The music industry has tried windows before
The music industry tried exclusive windows in the 2000s. In its analysis of the offer, The Next Web recalled the lesson the labels of the day learned, “exclusivity windows are expensive to buy, difficult to police, and resented by the audience”. Audience resentment, it says, comes roughly last, after the cost and the difficulty of enforcement.
Both TimTheTatman and DrLupo came to YouTube from Twitch. Woods estimates that earning on multiple platforms does not significantly reduce the viewership of YouTube shows on their home platform.
A creator who releases episodes of their show simultaneously on Netflix risks YouTube not putting them on the stage at its Brandcast advertising showcase, leaving them out of campaigns and removing them from the advertising programme for the very top creators. A window contract determines where an episode appears first and who pays for it. Where people will watch cannot be written into a contract.
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