Influencer Advisory™Free: YouTube creator rates
Know what a YouTube creator should cost before you answer their price
597 prices YouTube creators quoted us between March 2026 and October 2026, sorted by channel size and by what each price buys, next to 51 pay numbers brands said on podcasts.
Dennis Ksendzov, founder of Influencer Advisory. These are the prices creators sent us when we asked to sponsor them.
Check a price before you answer it
The starting numbers are an example. Put in the channel and the price they sent you.
On the channel that quoted you.
Compare like with like.
For one video or post.
Inside the middle half
$3,000 is higher than 72% of the 89 prices channels with 100K to 500K subscribers quoted us for integration in a video.
Half the prices were lower than the typical one and half were higher. The low end and the high end hold the middle half, so one wild quote does not move them.
What creators charge, by channel size
Every price, split by what it buys. A row with under 10 prices is a rough guide.
Under 100K subscribers
| What it buys | Typical | Middle half | Prices |
|---|---|---|---|
| Integration in a video | $1,000 | $400 to $2,000 | 54 |
| Dedicated video | $1,000 | $370 to $3,000 | 9 |
| YouTube Short | $2,500 | $1,000 to $2,500 | 3 |
| Agency roster price | $3,250 | $2,500 to $4,250 | 8 |
| Instagram or TikTok post | $3,350 | $1,500 to $10,000 | 6 |
| Everything together | $1,000 | $500 to $2,500 | 116 |
100K to 500K subscribers
| What it buys | Typical | Middle half | Prices |
|---|---|---|---|
| Integration in a video | $1,500 | $750 to $3,000 | 89 |
| Dedicated video | $1,500 | $850 to $3,500 | 7 |
| YouTube Short | $1,495 | $1,000 to $6,000 | 5 |
| Agency roster price | $4,500 | $3,000 to $7,000 | 80 |
| Instagram or TikTok post | $2,400 | $1,500 to $14,000 | 11 |
| Everything together | $3,000 | $1,200 to $5,000 | 230 |
500K to 1M subscribers
| What it buys | Typical | Middle half | Prices |
|---|---|---|---|
| Integration in a video | $3,000 | $2,000 to $7,500 | 21 |
| Dedicated video | $16,000 | $12,000 to $20,500 | 4 |
| YouTube Short | $2,000 | $2,000 to $2,000 | 1 |
| Agency roster price | $7,250 | $4,000 to $10,000 | 50 |
| Instagram or TikTok post | $8,000 | $3,500 to $9,000 | 5 |
| Everything together | $6,000 | $3,000 to $10,000 | 93 |
Over 1M subscribers
| What it buys | Typical | Middle half | Prices |
|---|---|---|---|
| Integration in a video | $10,000 | $4,500 to $20,000 | 54 |
| Dedicated video | $29,500 | $24,000 to $35,000 | 2 |
| YouTube Short | $5,500 | $3,500 to $20,000 | 4 |
| Agency roster price | $7,000 | $4,250 to $12,500 | 59 |
| Instagram or TikTok post | $4,250 | $2,600 to $35,000 | 8 |
| Everything together | $8,062 | $4,000 to $18,750 | 158 |
What creators charge, by topic
Every kind of price together, for each topic with 10 or more prices. Channel size moves a price more than topic does, so the typical channel size sits beside it.
| Topic | Typical | Middle half | Typical channel | Prices |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Entertainment | $5,000 | $2,000 to $10,000 | 1,230,000 | 81 |
| Lifestyle | $3,500 | $1,500 to $8,000 | 173,000 | 62 |
| Technology | $1,500 | $400 to $5,000 | 162,000 | 46 |
| Business | $2,000 | $1,000 to $3,500 | 126,000 | 37 |
| Education | $2,500 | $500 to $5,000 | 128,000 | 34 |
| Finance | $4,000 | $1,200 to $21,600 | 257,000 | 33 |
| Automotive | $7,000 | $4,000 to $9,000 | 469,000 | 33 |
| Health | $1,800 | $900 to $4,500 | 231,000 | 30 |
| Gaming | $3,500 | $1,000 to $10,000 | 540,000 | 19 |
| Sports | $2,750 | $2,000 to $5,000 | 204,000 | 18 |
| Travel | $4,500 | $1,600 to $12,500 | 322,000 | 17 |
| Food | $4,500 | $800 to $7,500 | 1,475,000 | 14 |
| Music | $2,000 | $1,000 to $6,500 | 133,000 | 10 |
What brands say they pay
51 pay numbers brands and agencies said on 22 podcasts and YouTube shows, each read by hand. A number is what one brand said about itself, not a price list.
A flat fee for a video or post
Big influencers at $3,500 a post are awareness plays with no ROI.
BWG Connect, TikTok Shop agency CEO Navi Singh on sampling, affiliates and the P&L, September 2026
For net new brands, the payment model is a percentage of what they bring in, with a flat fee of $50 to $200.
Limited Supply, Verified: Social Commerce Insights, September 2026
Jeremy: pay top creators $500 or $1,000 instead of the $100 to $200 competitors pay, backed into the revenue they bring.
Social Snowball, Laura Geller, BK Beauty and two agencies on TikTok Shop affiliates, July 2026
Payout model by partner type: big YouTubers need flat fees (about $3,000 to make a video), paid content sites need CPL or CPC, some content sites never take revenue share.
Dustin Howes, HubSpot, Instantly, Everflow panel on building B2B affiliate programmes, July 2026
$100, $150, $200: flat fees tested for creator content usage, with two hundred the accepted rate.
Marketing Operators, What We Learned at Meta’s Performance Marketing Summit (Real Talk), June 2026
At Ridge's scale the unlock is now one big influencer ad, two months of work, ten cut versions, $1.5M spent behind it and a $200,000 creator fee.
Marketing Operators, The Meta Playbook That Took True Sea Moss Beyond Nine Figures, May 2026
Katie pays creators only about $200 and gets multiple videos to test on Meta, YouTube and TikTok.
Operators Podcast, Operators panel: the five hardest ecommerce hires, incl. influencer, May 2026
Ridge pays creators $80, $100 or $200 a video, and counts that as internal since over 95 percent of it is briefed.
Marketing Operators, Performance Creative in 2026: What We’ve Updated and Why, February 2026
$20,000: the traditional flat fee for one post from a creator with a million followers.
Marketing Operators, New Organic-to-Paid Flywheel, Creator Volume & Product Seeding, February 2026
Authentic, high-converting creators can cost $1,000 per video.
Brando Monetti, Spartan Root Activator shampoo ad breakdown, January 2026
Unlike a UGC marketplace at $100 a video, a TikTok Shop sample creator gets no revisions and will not spend 3 hours on a $20 product.
Limited Supply, Zainit's Zain on TikTok Shop for supplements, Goli and sampling volume, November 2025
Whitelisting ads can be paid up to $26,000 per video.
Commerce Roundtable, Instant Hydration: Building Subscription Growth Engines, November 2025
A $300 flat fee usually comes with 10% commission versus about 15% commission only, and enough creators still want performance deals.
Jordan Doughty, SOA agency founder Navi Singh on the TikTok Shop sampling playbook, August 2025
Wish paid a small flat fee and high commissions, and creators who asked for a $3,000 flat fee were told she would not pay over a hundred; TikTok Shop's commission model was why it appealed to her.
Jordan Doughty, SOA agency founder Navi Singh on the TikTok Shop sampling playbook, August 2025
Rate card: about $10 per thousand followers per post, $50 to $100 for 5,000 to 10,000 followers.
Teddy Smith, Stack Influence's William Gasner on micro-influencer seeding for books, July 2025
The company pays creators typically $100 to $200 for one video.
Brando Monetti, Sola Wave marketing breakdown, March 2025
$3,000 to $5,000 per video: Jones Road's typical creator rate.
Marketing Operators, E046: Is Meta Still Incremental? Matt Bertulli on Paid Media & Scaling Beyond Facebook Ads, February 2025
$15,000 per video: the rate for the larger creators taking 25% of Jones Road's creator budget.
Marketing Operators, E046: Is Meta Still Incremental? Matt Bertulli on Paid Media & Scaling Beyond Facebook Ads, February 2025
$700 to $15K: the price range per sponsored video across those creators.
Marketing Operators, Jones Road's first paid YouTube creator buy, and hiring, February 2025
Nano rate up to about $100 a post at up to 10,000 followers; micro up to about $250 at 10,000 to 50,000.
Winning With Shopify Podcast, Afluencer's Brett on gifting nano and micro influencers for Shopify, November 2024
A price per 1,000 views (CPM)
sub $10 CPM: the CPM HexClad got on the Benny Blanco organic content.
Marketing Operators, Marketing Operators on AI vs UGC, cart upsells, incrementality, August 2026
Do the CPM maths on a quoted rate: $5,000 for a reel averaging 1 million views is a $50 CPM, cheaper than the $70 CPMs he pays on Facebook.
Honest Ecommerce, Sathi and Saral founder on affiliate tracking, fraud and creator rates, July 2026
20 30 $40 CPM: what Connor thinks is acceptable for a YouTube integration.
Marketing Operators, Episode 100! The Big Rocks We’re Focusing on for 2026 Growth, February 2026
He refuses to pay $25,000 for a $100 to $120 CPM organic deal, but would pay 25 grand for a $1 or $5 CPM, pricing influencer deals like any other media.
Marketing Operators, Black Friday Cyber Monday Recap & The Forecasting Process Behind Ecom Profit - with Richie Mashiko, December 2025
His worked example: pay $500 flat, and even at $10 CPM if a clip goes from 500,000 to 10 million views, you don't pay more.
Open Residency, Why 99% of Creators Will Be Replaced by AI (And How to Be the 1%), September 2025
YouTube placements showed proportionally better results than individual influencers on Instagram, with higher conversion rates (0.2-0.3%) and more humane CPMs (€30 to €50).
Moritz Lambrecht, Wtin founder on clean ingredient protein, August 2024
$198,000 for 206 million impressions: six months of Jones Road influencer spend and the resulting 96 cent CPM.
Marketing Operators, Marketing Operators on 25 DTC hot takes, seeding and YouTube, July 2024
Deals are priced as a flat fee back-solved from recent average views at an assumed CPM, call it $10.
Marketing Operators, E014: YouTube Deep Dive: Ads, Organic Growth, Partnerships & More, July 2024
$40 to $100 CPM: what HexClad was quoted for YouTube creator deals.
Marketing Operators, E014: YouTube Deep Dive: Ads, Organic Growth, Partnerships & More, July 2024
$12 to $15 CPM: what Ridge pays YouTube creators now.
Marketing Operators, E014: YouTube Deep Dive: Ads, Organic Growth, Partnerships & More, July 2024
$8 CPM: the CPM on gaming stream content Connor MacDonald recommends to HexClad.
Marketing Operators, E014: YouTube Deep Dive: Ads, Organic Growth, Partnerships & More, July 2024
A fee plus commission, or how they talked the price down
His hybrid model negotiation: if the rate card says $10,000, offer 2,500 dollars plus 10 percent commission on all revenue they bring.
Seize This Growth , Acceleration Partners' John Clayton on influencer and affiliate merging, October 2026
The counter to a $10,000 media kit is their CPM baseline, a meet in the middle, and a kicker if it performs.
Open Residency, How To Get Rich Running An Ecom Business (3-Hour Masterclass), September 2026
$10,000 plus 2.5 to 4%: his proposed creator deal, an upfront fee plus a cut of ad spend.
Marketing Operators, Marketing Operators on AI vs UGC, cart upsells, incrementality, August 2026
Base plus bonus: instead of a $700 flat fee, pay $300 up front plus a 10% uncapped commission, so the creator might make $1,000.
Honest Ecommerce, Sathi and Saral founder on affiliate tracking, fraud and creator rates, July 2026
$10,000: what they knock off a rate card by removing the organic deliverables.
Marketing Operators, Channel Diversification in Ecommerce: Biggest Mistakes & Wins, March 2026
Hybrid flat fee plus commission pays creators more than flat fee alone 95% of the time.
Sidewalker Daily, Grin's Megan Vasquez on how brands find, vet and pay creators in 2026, January 2026
Paid flat fees have become hit or miss: $20,000 for $300 return, $300 for $100,000.
Unstoppable Marketer Podcast, Final Boss Sour's London Lazerson on Keith Lee, seeding and TikTok Shop, March 2025
$100,000 plus $200,000: the hybrid creator deal structure replacing a $300,000 flat fee.
Marketing Operators, E048: Scaling with Affiliate Marketing: What’s Working for Leading DTC Brands, with Aaron Paul, February 2025
$2,500 vs $3,000: per video rate with and without a three month commitment.
Marketing Operators, E041: Influencer Marketing Strategy: Product Seeding, Building Partnerships & Measuring EMV, January 2025
HexClad concentrated 85% of its flat fee creator deals in cooking, the most expensive possible category for it.
Marketing Operators, E014: YouTube Deep Dive: Ads, Organic Growth, Partnerships & More, July 2024
Commission-only beats a $1,000 upfront fee for both sides now that rates are higher.
Ecomm Breakthrough, Gracey Ryback on Levanta, LTK and TikTok Shop commissions, May 2024
A content creator new to affiliate typically asks for a flat fee, such as 1,000 pounds for a blog; the counter is 500 pounds, a 50% discount, plus performance pay with the chance to earn more than the original 1,000.
Silverbean, Silverbean and Breezy on recruiting new affiliate partners in 2023, April 2023
She pays only warm creators already posting organically, bonus if they are on an affiliate or ambassador setup; proven $25,000 in sales justifies a $2,500 fee.
Down To Chat Podcast, Graza's social lead Kendall Dickieson on seeding, whitelisting and rates, March 2023
A whole budget, and how it is split
Flat-fee programmes: about $100K a month buys 5 to 25 creators of 75,000 to 100,000 plus followers, usually through agents.
SourceForge, Superfiliate founders on affiliate, flat fee and partnership ads, September 2026
A founder at his event, in year two of a $180 million supplement brand, pays creators variable, some $60,000 to $70,000 a month.
Open Residency, How To Get Rich Running An Ecom Business (3-Hour Masterclass), September 2026
Launch budget: 35% recruitment and seeding, 20% flat fees, 15% commission, 5% gamification, 25% infrastructure.
Yash Chavan - SARAL & SATHI, The One Metric That Tells You If Your Affiliate Program Is 'Healthy' | Alaa Rhouma, August 2026
almost $50,000: Ridge's fixed monthly creator content cost, excluding paid amplification.
Marketing Operators, What We Learned at Meta’s Performance Marketing Summit (Real Talk), June 2026
He puts influencer marketing, ambassador marketing and paid creators together as the core acquisition engine, priced at 25 to 40 percent of revenue, roughly $300k on a million dollars in revenue.
Marketing Operators, DTC OG Ezra Firestone on How the Game Has Shifted and What’s Working Now, August 2025
$50K a month for 3 months: Jones Road's paid creator test budget.
Marketing Operators, E046: Is Meta Still Incremental? Matt Bertulli on Paid Media & Scaling Beyond Facebook Ads, February 2025
These storytelling ads are helping Hollow scale drastically, with four creators signed and $20,000 per month spent on creator fees, with plans to increase to 10 creators by January 1st.
Marketing Operators, Marketing Operators: Zach Stuck on e-commerce growth, November 2024
The best free guides on creator pay
The 3 best of the 1,173 free guides we collected and ranked, each read whole. The lines are ours; each guide belongs to the company that made it.
Refunnel, about Swoveralls
How Swoveralls Built a $11.63-Per-Post Content Machine
- Swoveralls got 420 creator posts for $11.63 a post, and that price already counts the product and the shipping.
- Instead of a fee, each creator got $120 in store credit to pick out their own product.
- The creators gave unlimited, perpetual rights to use their posts, and they were offered cash only if a post got picked for a partnership ad.
- A Meta ad made from these posts cost $51 a purchase, in a range of $31 to $51.
Insense
How to compensate creators + pricing recommendations
- If you only want the content and the creator doesn't post it, prices start at $150 for one edited video, $100 for raw footage and $50 for 1 to 3 photos.
- The guide puts a TikTok post at $125 to $300 under 10K followers, $300 to $500 from 10K to 50K, and $500 to $1,100 from 50K to 100K.
- If you want to run a creator's post as your own ad, through Meta Partnership Ads or TikTok Spark Ads, it starts at $100 to $150 a month.
Superfiliate
Field guide: influencer contracts
- When creators push back on a contract, it's over usage, exclusivity and payment terms.
- At Oura the default is 30 days of paid usage, and exclusivity often gets talked down to 7 to 14 days.
How to read it
- Typical, low end, high end
- Typical is the middle price: half are lower, half are higher. The low end and high end hold the middle half of prices, so one wild quote does not move them.
- What the price buys
- An integration is a paid spot inside a normal video, often 60 seconds. A dedicated video is all about you. An agency roster price is the list price on an agency's sheet, before anyone negotiates. Compare like with like.
- Where a range was given
- When a creator gave a range, like $800 to $1,200, we use its middle.
- Who is named
- Nobody. A channel shows only its size and its topic.