Welcome to YouTube Millionaires, where we profile channels that have recently crossed the one million subscriber mark. There are channels crossing this threshold every week, and each creator has a story to tell about YouTube success. Read previous installments here.
When we first talked to Caylus Cunningham in 2018, his main channel Infinite was just shy of 10 million subscribers.
Now? It just hit 22 million.
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And that’s not Cunningham’s only channel. His YouTube empire has grown to include his secondary channel Caylus (13.4 million subs), his Shorts-exclusive channel Infinite Shorts (3.4 million), his clips reposting channel Infinite Clips (252K subscribers), his Minecraft channel CaylusCraft (186K), and last but not least, his Spanish-language channel Caylus en Español (274K).
All of these channels together put him at nearly 40 million total subscribers (and that’s not even counting the nearly 8 million followers he has over on TikTok).
So, as you can probably guess, this is not your average installment of Millionaires. While our main focus is celebrating creators who just hit a million, sometimes we deviate to mark bigger milestones. This is one of those times.
Cunningham has been on YouTube since 2014, and has built his channels through trends like bottle flips and reaction videos. But things entered a new era for him in 2020, when he started uploading consistently to his gaming channel.
“I realized like, ‘Oh, I love doing this a lot more than the reaction channel,'” he says. “I still love making videos for Infinite, but at that point, I realized, I was like, ‘Okay, I’m back to fully loving doing YouTube and everything.’ I didn’t hate it or anything, but I just realized like, ‘Wow, I like this a lot more than reacting,’ which helped a lot.”
Gaming has become a major component of his content, and he already has a member of his team dedicated to working on a Grand Theft Auto roleplay server so he can keep pursuing this passion when the next game comes out. He’s also leaning into golf, something else he loves, and hopes that his subscribers will embrace seeing his content develop again after nearly a decade of making videos.
We’ll let him tell you the rest below.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Tubefilter: Welcome back to Tubefilter! Let’s dive right in. For anyone who’s never seen your stuff, give me a little bit of introduction about you, where you’re from, and how you ended up here.
Caylus Cunningham: My name is Caylus Cunningham or Infinite. I grew up in Spokane, Washington, a smaller town. I just always loved watching YouTube ever since I was like 10, and really, really got into it. That was the only thing I did. In my free time, I would watch all these different types of YouTubers, and I always wanted to be one. I made several channels back in the day, trying to become popular. All these different trends I would do to try to become popular.
That’s when I finally did a top five videos back in the day, because that was a really big trend in 2016. I just ended up blowing up top five water bottle flips. That was what initially blew me up, which I’ve gotten recognized to this day somehow, which is weird, but someone working at Top Golf recognized me saying, “Oh, you’re the water bottle flip guy.” I was like, “Wow, that’s really long time ago.” That was cool. That’s how I got big, did top fives and then transferred to reaction videos, commentating.
Then recently, over the past three years, I’ve been doing gaming a lot, which is my, I don’t know, new passion, I guess. I always been into gaming, but I’m glad that I can make it finally work for a YouTube channel as well.
Tubefilter: What’s inspired these various shifts in your content? Is it just keeping up with what’s doing well on YouTube or is it your passions changing and adapting?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, I would say definitely whatever is doing well is always a plus. If there’s a trend going on, then doing that is obviously going to get more viewers through channel. I’ve always tried to do that. If there’s a new game trending, I’ll play that or talk about it at least. Just putting my own twist on to any game, really. I could play a random Indie game that just came out, and then it’ll do well just because people like to see how I would play it or what my take on it would be.
Tubefilter: I’d really like to talk about the difference in–So generally, when we see people who do both long-form and short-form content, they’re along the same lines, but I feel like you have a very distinct difference between your long-form and your short-form. Your long-form tends to be more toward content compilations or reactions, and then your Shorts are distinctly different. I’m really curious what your different approach is to these different formats.
Caylus Cunningham: I don’t know what it is, but I’ve always– For my short-form like TikTok or Shorts, I’ve always done it more like the humor-focused videos instead of me reacting to videos. I don’t know. I guess I’ve noticed that stuff do much better on those platforms. I actually have more enjoyment for doing the funny short little videos instead of me just reuploading my reactions or re-uploading my gaming videos to short-form. I just rather make a funny 20-second video instead of reuploading my other content. I don’t know.
Tubefilter: Makes sense. What has the rise in short-form done for you creatively and for your channel growth?
Caylus Cunningham: Short-form has very exponentially grown the channels. I’ve noticed that Shorts and just TikTok in general or short-form, you can gain a lot of traction and subscribers, followers, very quickly. The views on short-form are just ridiculous compared to long-form, just because there are so many more people consuming short-form content. It’s been fun. It’s satisfying in a way, just seeing all the short-form videos do so well.
Tubefilter: I think when I talked to you in 2018, you had just under 10 million subscribers on your main channel, and now you’ve doubled that in five years, which is insane. You’re at quite a number. Did you ever have a goal to hit 20 million or to go above 20 million, or are you still surprised by how much growth you get?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, never ever would have thought I would get to 20 million at all, but it just keeps growing and everything, and that is great. I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing, and it seems to be working. I really want to try to focus on the gaming channel a lot. That’s been my main passion right now, is gaming. I still obviously do Infinite reacting and everything, but gaming has been a huge passion, but I love making the gaming videos. I also want to venture out to new areas of content as well. I’m doing this Minecraft channel recently, where I’ve been uploading a lot, which is still gaming.
Tubefilter: CaylusCraft, right?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, CaylusCraft. I have some other things in the works as well. I have a passion for golf.
Tubefilter: Really?
Caylus Cunningham: I’ve been doing that for the past year. I got some things in the works for content for that coming up. In the next week or so, we’re filming a video in Korea for golf, so that’ll be cool.
Tubefilter: Very cool. So your gaming channel, you’re at 13 million there. People, I feel like, really struggle to do these different niches of videos and gather a significant following across all of them, and you’re sitting at 13 and then 21 million on your main channel, so that’s interesting, how you’ve been able to draw an audience across multiple kinds of videos. Is there a secret sauce there for you?
Caylus Cunningham: I’ve seen a lot of the times, YouTubers, they do the same thing over and over again, and then they slow down because they get burnt out or something like that. I feel like a lot of YouTubers get burnt out. I don’t know, I’ve never gotten that feeling, weirdly. I’ve been doing it since 2016, and I just feel like I’ve always just loved doing what I do, and I feel like that really helps. I’ve never slowed down, so I feel like that really has to do with it. I see a lot of YouTubers slow down over time and then they don’t do as well. I don’t know. I feel like that has a big– It’s not really a secret, you just keep posting videos and adapting over time. I feel like adapting is really important for longevity.
Tubefilter: Have you ever actively thought about fighting burnout or is it just something that literally hasn’t happened to you?
Caylus Cunningham: I would say in 2020 when I started doing the gaming channel very consistently and I realized like, “Oh, I love doing this a lot more than the reaction channel.” I still love making videos for Infinite, but at that point, I realized, I was like, “Okay, I’m back to fully loving doing YouTube and everything.” I didn’t hate it or anything, but I just realized like, “Wow, I like this a lot more than reacting,” which helped a lot. I don’t know, I’ve never really felt major burnout where I wanted to stop. I just feel like I could never just quit full-time or quit for like a month. I don’t know, I just feel like taking breaks. I don’t know, I just wouldn’t do it.
Tubefilter: I did want to ask, because I know reaction videos can be contentious. How have you been able to navigate inside that niche? What makes you so interested in doing reaction content? Do you feel like it draws a significant portion of your audience?
Caylus Cunningham: I feel like doing reaction videos, it’s just it’s cool. I feel like anyone can watch it. A lot of people I know, people fall asleep to it because it’s relaxing. I’ve been told I have a relaxing voice, which is cool.
Tubefilter: [laughs] The ASMR?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes. I have done some ASMR videos in the past as well. I just feel like, I don’t know, it’s very easy content to watch. Anyone in the world can watch it. It doesn’t matter your age. I try to keep it family-friendly always.
Tubefilter: Then take me through what the process is like to put together a reaction video. How long does it take you from conception to upload?
Caylus Cunningham: I now have a team for the Infinite channel and all other channels, but the Infinite channel, I have a guy who helps me get ideas. Then I have another guy who gives me clips and everything so I can react, so it’s my genuine reaction instead of like looking up all the clips myself and then faking the reaction. I have a guy who sends me clips, and then I just put them all together in a link and then react back to back to back. Sometimes clips won’t make it. I’ll react to it and it wasn’t good enough or something, so I’ll just cut those. That’s the process. Then I send it off to my editors and they get it back to me in like two days.
Tubefilter: I feel like some viewers still don’t realize that that’s how a lot of creators do it–they have other people put together packages of clips for them to react to. I feel like everybody assumes that it’s faked reactions, but a lot of the times it’s not.
Caylus Cunningham: Yes. Back in the day when I didn’t have a team, to get clips, I would open up a clip, watch maybe a few seconds of it just to see what was going on to see if it was good enough to react to, and then I would just react to the whole thing. I never wanted to fake my reactions. I just feel like it’s not as good if you do that.
That’s why I like the whole gaming thing, because you can’t really fake– Say I’m playing a horror game. It’s not like I’ve played it before. I can’t really fake it a reaction. That’s why I like doing the gaming stuff, because it’s like, a jump scare’s really going to scare me, and it’s just genuine.
Tubefilter: That leads right into my next question, which was: How do things work differently for a gaming video? You still have a team? Do you have an editor that works with you? How does it work on the production end of things?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, same editors for that channel. My editors are really good with every category, I would say. They’re probably going to do the golf channel most likely, we’ll see. For that channel, it is a lot of me trying to figure out what to do for the videos instead of someone else getting game ideas. Yes, I don’t have any idea guy or anything for that channel. It’s just me looking up stuff, whatever’s trending. A lot of GTA 5 lately. Just waiting for GTA 6 to come out. That’ll be great for videos.
Tubefilter: How do you choose which games to play? Is it, again, just what interests you most?
Caylus Cunningham: I’ll usually go on a website called itch.io that a lot of indie games are on there. Then just scroll through there, and whatever looks popular or looks interesting, I’ll choose, or I’ll go on Steam and choose. I’ll do recent releases and just do whatever is just released or whatever is doing well around that week.
Tubefilter: Got you. This might be a tricky question. Obviously, you’re producing a lot of content across a lot of channels and a lot of platforms. What does the average day look like for you in terms of production and how much time you’re putting in?
Caylus Cunningham: Average day, I would say like six to eight hours maybe. I wake up to do my thumbnail, which yes, I create all my thumbnails still. I don’t know why, I’m just really picky with that stuff. I learned Photoshop, actually, recently. I used to use an off-brand Photoshop. I create all my thumbnails. Then I’ll get ideas for the day. Then maybe I’ll go grab lunch, come back, film for like six hours, five hours-ish. I’ll do like two gaming videos, two reactions, or three gaming videos, one reaction. Then maybe I’ll do a short or a TikTok as well. It really depends. Some days I’ll just do gaming, just reactions, stuff like that.
Tubefilter: Yes. Do you have a set posting schedule or is it just what you’re feeling, what you’re able to get done?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, I do not have a schedule at all. I really need one. [laughs] I just don’t. I don’t know why I can’t stick to a schedule. I feel like it’s always because we’re just everywhere. One day we’ll be golfing, so I can’t– I don’t know, I just feel like we randomly just do things constantly and traveling, really.
Tubefilter: It seems like it’s working out for you.
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, it could be. I feel like it could be probably better with a schedule. I feel like that would be great for me. One of these days I’ll stick to one fully.
Tubefilter: I feel like I get split answers. Whenever I ask somebody if they have a schedule, they’re like, “No, it’s horrible. Schedules are terrible. Every time you post on a schedule, it never works.” Then the other half is like, “If I post off my schedule, YouTube won’t show my videos to anybody.”
Caylus Cunningham: Really?
Tubefilter: Yes.
Caylus Cunningham: No, for posting on YouTube, it’s just whenever my video’s ready. I made a thumbnail, before this interview, I posted 10 minutes before because I just finished and it was like, “All right, post it.”
Tubefilter: Have you noticed any patterns in posting time? Does it matter when you post?
Caylus Cunningham: From what I’ve heard and from what I’ve witnessed myself for posting, it doesn’t matter. It might matter for the first couple of hours of video, say, if you post it like 2:00 AM, but the next day, it’s going to do just as well as it would have if you posted at 2:00 PM. I don’t know. I think over time, it doesn’t matter. A lot of people say it does matter, but I think over time, it doesn’t matter at all.
Tubefilter: Interesting! Do you have any upcoming projects you want to talk about?
Caylus Cunningham: Yes. One of the upcoming projects was the golf content that I’m doing. I’m doing that with a couple of other friends, which I’ll say, one of our friends, we just met, Michael DiCostanzo. He’s a big TikToker. He’s really good at golf. Then another friend, Kaz, ex-FaZe member. He’s pretty big on YouTube, and then my girlfriend Kiera. We’re all going to work on that together because we just love golf. That’s just been our passion for the last year.
We might as well film it. I feel like we have some really interesting ideas coming up. We’re not going to be going down the regular golf channel YouTube direction. We’re going to be doing it a lot different. That’ll be very interesting. That’s one project that we’re working on. That’ll be coming very soon.
Next one, CaylusCraft, really want to amp that up and make that be just as big as Caylus. I’m going to be getting a big team going on that very soon. I got a couple. Whenever GTA 6 comes out, which I’ve been hearing the trailer’s launching this month, next month, don’t know, could be fake, though, once that’s ready, we’re going to be getting a– Well, we already have a huge team being created and that’s going to be massive. I’m going to be working on that. I’m just not going to be leaving my house for months. I’m just going to be grinding that a lot, GTA 5 RP or GTA 6 RP, is going to be huge. Then I would say another project I’m working on is, I’m releasing a mystery box. Hopefully, that will be– We’re trying to get that into stores.
Tubefilter: Is there a theme for it?
Caylus Cunningham: There’s many themes. Each plushie is a different theme. There’s a rare type one, and it’s going to be cool, it’s going to be fun.
Tubefilter: How did you come up with the idea to do that?
Caylus Cunningham: I just always liked the whole mystery concept, like mystery box. I’ve done videos about mystery boxes, mystery wheels, anything mystery. I feel like it’s just exciting, like you don’t know what you’re going to get. The whole concept of rarity is cool to me. A while back, I had one fan get a mythic plushie, like a golden plushie, and he’s the only one who has that plushie in the world. I don’t know, I just feel like it’s cool just to have rarity as well involved with it.
It’s going to be a busy next year, that’s for sure.
Tubefilter: What has been the most significant change in you personally or in you creatively since you started YouTube?
Caylus Cunningham: Biggest change. I would say what’s really helped me lately this past year or so is just the team I’ve built, helping me throw out everything. When I first started YouTube, I didn’t have anyone, and I would have to do everything myself, and it was hard. It’s definitely doable, but getting a team, I feel like, is very important, whenever you can. If you’re a small YouTuber, try to build up a team ASAP because it just helps you so much. It’s crazy. Yes, I would say that getting a team really helped me.
Tubefilter: How big is your team?
Caylus Cunningham: The team, I have, I think six to seven editors for the main channel, Caylus channel. Then I have a full different team of editors for CaylusCraft. Then I have a video idea guy. I have a video clips guy for Infinite channel. I have a guy working on the GTA 5 server for RP. Let’s see, I have my manager, Travis, obviously. I feel like I’m missing someone, but it’s-
Tubefilter: It’s pretty big. It’s a sprawling team then.
Caylus Cunningham: Yes, it’s getting there.
Tubefilter: Since you do your own thumbnails, do you have three top pieces of advice for a good thumbnail?
Caylus Cunningham: I’m still working on trying to make the best thumbnails. Over the years, I’ve learned that you need to– The eyes see one thing first and then they see all the rest after. I learned that from MrBeast too. His thumbnails, they’re very like, you see one thing and then the you see rest and then it just flows good. I don’t know, make it pop as well, obviously, with colors.
I’ve learned over the years for my reaction videos– I used to make my face and then my shirt really colorful and then me reacting and then whatever’s on the side. Then I was like, “Why am I making my shirt really colorful? I don’t want them to look at my shirt first. I want them to look at the thing that I’m showing first.” There’s a lot of little things, but yes.
Tubefilter: It’s an art.
Caylus Cunningham: You can say that!
