YouTube subscriber counts can be important for business use or just a reason to brag. On Tuesday, the video site detailed an upcoming change to how subscribers numbers will be displayed and some YouTubers aren't happy.
A blog post from Team YouTube laid out the changes to how subscriber counts will look on channels. Instead of displaying the entire number of subscribers, the planned change starting in August will show an abbreviated number if the subscriber count is over 1,000. For example, if an account has 4,398 subscribers then the new abbreviated display will be 4.3K while accounts with more than 10 million subscribers will show 10M until the channel reaches the next million to show 11M. The full subscriber number will be available to channel owners whenever they log into their YouTube Studio account.
Currently, public sub counts are abbreviated in most but not all places across YouTube. In August, we’ll make this more consistent by always showing abbreviated sub counts publicly.
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) May 21, 2019
Creators: You’ll still see your full sub count in Studio!
Learn more → https://t.co/ldguF5Ussf pic.twitter.com/pmaKk4EU4k
Many people on YouTube expressed their disapproval over this change via Twitter.
Nobody wants this.
— Trad (@TaggableName) May 21, 2019
Nobody cares. Fix subs so that our subs are notified. Fix the algorithm so that people can say the f-word. Stop prioritizing Jimmy Fallon over independent creators.
— Tolarian Community College (@TolarianCollege) May 22, 2019
WHY?!? You are literally the most backwards company I've ever seen.
— CavemanFilms (@CavemanFilms) May 21, 2019
Another item mentioned in the company's blog post is that third parties that use YouTube's API Services will also see the abbreviated subscriber number. YouTube analytics site Social Blade tweeted it is unsure how the changes will affect its data.
Upon closer look, it might affect our data display, but only time will tell.
— Social Blade (@SocialBlade) May 21, 2019
When questioned on Twitter why it was making a change, Team YouTube tweeted the reason for the switch is to have consistent numbers displayed on the site. The company declined to comment further.
