Netflix is treating YouTube like a “farm league” for creators. How’s that working out?

Netflix has been clear about its plan to add YouTube success stories to its original programming lineup. The streamer’s Co-CEO, Ted Sarandos, even called YouTube “a little bit of a farm league” earlier this year.

The YouTube-to-Netflix pipeline is still fairly new, so there haven’t been many opportunities to track the cross-platform viewership of the ported programs — until now. Netflix has released its What We Watched report for the first half of 2025, giving analysts a chance to see how creator-led Netflix shows measure up against their YouTube analogues.

Two shows that originated on YouTube can be found in the latest What We Watched data. Inside, the reality show engineered by the U.K. septet known as the Sidemen, earned 17.5 million hours of watch time and 2.4 million total views during the first half of 2025, placing it just inside the top 1000 Netflix programs globally. On YouTube, the first episode of Inside has 15.4 million views since its June 2024 premiere, while the second episode has racked up 6.9 million views.

Another YouTube transplant, Arlette Amuli‘s Pop the Balloon, has had a tougher time generating Netflix viewership. With one million hours of half-year watch time and 1.2 million views, the dating show fell short of its YouTube traffic.

The inconclusive results from Netflix’s creator push lead to an open-ended question: Do YouTube stars need Netflix, or does Netflix need YouTube stars? On one hand, the Sidemen said that they brought Inside 

to Netflix because they had already hit their ceiling on YouTube. On the contrary, Netflix needs to convert creator fanbases to its platform if it wants to avoid falling behind its rivals in the streaming arms race. YouTube has already pulled ahead in terms of market share and consumer trust, and as other platforms poach Netflix’s greatest hits, top YouTube creators will help fill the resulting void.

Sarandos has typically taken the middle ground on this subject, noting that YouTube and Netflix “feed each other pretty nicely.” Behind the scenes, however, Netflix is reportedly ramping up its overtures to creators. Deadline noted that there are “suggestions” that Netflix has had talks with major YouTube stars like Mark Rober and Dude Perfect.

The trend of YouTube creators going to Netflix is likely to continue, so accurately measuring the resulting performance of transplanted shows will be key. Both Netflix and YouTube have ways of massaging viewership numbers, so it’s hard to tell for sure if a show like Inside is more popular in its new surroundings. All we can do for now is take the What We Watched report at face value.