[Editor’s Note: Tubefilter Charts is a weekly rankings column from Tubefilter with data provided by GospelStats. It’s exactly what it sounds like; a top number ranking of YouTube channels based on statistics collected within a given time frame. Check out all of our Tubefilter Charts with new installments every week right here.]
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As the 2021 calendar year turns over into June, we can glean plenty of online video insights by analyzing the data from the month that was.
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May 2021 was a fascinating time on YouTube, with the company’s nascent Shorts platform bringing billions of views to pranksters, foodies, and many other videomakers. Let’s take a look at the 100 most-viewed YouTube channels of the month to see how it all shook out.
Chart Toppers
If you follow YouTube closely, you’re probably expecting a certain Indian music hub to top this chart, but that’s not the case. The channel that received the most hits in May is Topper Guild. The 18-year-old burgeoning social media star has brought his practical jokes and pranks over from TikTok (where he has over 23 million followers) and picked up over 3.5 million YouTube subscribers and 3.2 billion monthly views in the process. Much of this viewership has come on videos released before May, which are just now gaining more attention on the YouTube Shorts platform.
In contrast, T-Series has posted consistently massive viewership for years now, but the Indian record label doesn’t use YouTube Shorts as frequently as some other channels, and so it will be settling for second place in our monthly global ranking. That said, it still received 2.9 billion monthly views in May. That’s a bigger number than the populations of China and India combined. Not bad!
Third place in our monthly chart went to KIM ORO, another channel that has been using YouTube Shorts to its advantage. Its short-form, family-friendly, feel-good clips received 2.87 billion monthly views in May, which puts it just ahead of fourth-place finisher SET India. That Sony-owned South Asian hub, which briefly surpassed T-Series as the top channel in our weekly top 50, ended May with 2.84 billion monthly views.
Cocomelon – Nursery Rhymes rounded out this month’s global top five. The American content producer, which offers cute animations to young viewers, picked up 2.4 billion monthly views during May.
Top Gainers
As far as our YouTube charts are concerned, one trend dominated May 2021: the ascendance of YouTube Shorts. The Shorts platform was designed to compete with TikTok, and the two platforms share the same basic viewership pattern: Users are encouraged to watch many short videos in a row, which results in massive traffic figures.
It would be easy to argue that Shorts viewership is artificially inflated, but it has brought some much-needed variety to our weekly and monthly rankings. Those charts, previously dominated by kid-friendly content, Indian TV networks, and pop stars, now feature a great diversity of content, with everyone from gamers to DIYers finding their place in the top 100.
Take KKS Street Food, the only Filipino channel to make the top 100 in May 2021. The channel bills itself as a hub for “homemade noodle,” and in the context of YouTube Shorts, that translates into brief clips that feature flamboyant street food chefs around the world. This video, for example, has a hypnotic quality to it. Perhaps that’s why it has received more than 140 million views to date.
Across May 2021, KKS Street Food earned 448 million monthly views, which was good for 84th best in the world over that time period. As someone who loves good food and celebrates the breadth of content that is available on YouTube, I’m happy to see KKS doing well. I only wish that I could peel this street food off the screen and shove it into my mouth.
Channel Distribution
Here’s a breakdown of the Top 100 Most Viewed channels this month in terms of their countries of origin:
- United States: 36 channels in the Top 100.
- India: 26 channels in the Top 100.
- Pakistan, Russia, and South Korea: 4 channels in the Top 100.
- Canada and United Kingdom: 3 channels in the Top 100.
- Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Israel: 2 channels in the Top 100.
- Belarus, Italy, The Philippines, Romania, Serbia, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and Vietnam: 1 channel each in the Top 50.
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Gospel Stats provides transparent social media stats you can trust. For more information visit GospelStats.com.
