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By Gavin Boyle
A week after Netflix said it views YouTube as a direct competitor, YouTube executive Justine Ryst explained how the platform is a companion to all other entertainment.
“YouTube isn’t here to replace television [and is the] best ally to the television industry…the broadcasters and the producers,” Ryst said.
“YouTube doesn’t buy upfront and doesn’t commission content as a broadcaster or streaming platform do, but we pay back more than half of our revenue to the right owners who are behind the YouTube channels,” she added, explaining why YouTube is different from streaming and broadcast.
Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos, however, argued that whatever content audiences watch on the TV at night is in direct competition with Netflix.
Related: Streamers Have Something to Say About YouTube’s Dominance
“YouTube is a straightforward direct competitor for television, either a local broadcaster or a streamer like Netflix. The connected television market is a zero-sum screen. So whichever one you choose, that’s what you’re watching tonight,” Sarandos said.
“You know, about 55 percent of all YouTube engagement now is on the television through their app,” he continued. “So to me, that’s the thing to keep an eye on. It’s a pretty straightforward, competitive model and we think probably should have a level playing field relative to everybody else.”
In this case, both companies’ arguments have a point.
On one hand, many of the most popular videos on YouTube come from a streaming platform for a television broadcast, such as highlights from a sporting event or clips from a late night show. The spread of these videos helps this content garner more viewers who move over to the original source to catch it live in the future.
At the same time, however, YouTube has been at the top of the Nielsen chart for years, receiving 12.5% of all TV viewership in January of 2026, and holds a particularly strong grip over the child content market. In fact, many of the most popular children’s IP on streaming originated with a YouTube channel, such as COCOMELON or MS. RACHEL.
YouTube does also appear to be making it possible for creators to release TV-style episodic videos – something that would make its content look identical to streaming and broadcast even if it is not directly funded by YouTube.
“Turns out, a ton of our creators are really leaning into that format too. They’re doing 20 to 40 minute videos, there’s kind of a season arc to it, there’s multiple episodes in it, so we’re giving them the tooling to really create what we’re calling Creator Show Pages so that if you’re a fan of Michelle Khare, you can go to her channel page and actually just kind of go on that sort of binge episodic experience that I think the lean back TV environment really lends itself to,” Christian Oestlien, VP of product management at YouTube, told The Hollywood Reporter.
As the world of TV and streaming continues to evolve, it is interesting to see how YouTube plays such a large role in the industry and continues to lead the field, even if it does not intend to.
Read Next: Will These Changes Keep YouTube on Top of Streaming?
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