Here’s the big question. Why should this matter? Obviously, there are plenty of entertainment services like Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Prime… but are they free? Not everyone has the funds to spare on leisure, but they still want to relax. What’s the solution you may ask? YouTube. The variety of content, free service, and unique personalization is what sets YouTube apart from any other entertainment service.

My first claim is variety of content, there are so many genres of videos to the point where you will never get bored. As of 2019 according to MediaKix, the are the top 20 genres of videos on YouTube:

Clearly, they’re all very different topics. From my experience, I’ve gone from watching an educational video to a Buzzfeed Tasty baking video. With hundreds of hours of videos being uploaded to the website every minute (yes, every minute) the options are basically endless. The fact that there are so many videos to choose from, billions of views are accumulated everyday worldwide.

Of those daily viewers, the age groups vary greatly. The fact that at least 50% of each age group uses YouTube shows that there are videos for everyone, not just a specific audience. Unlike younger people who are hooked to the internet and social media, older adults tend to not care much… but as you can see, there is still a large portion of middle-aged people who use YouTube. This is because the content on YouTube isn’t specifically uploaded for a younger audience, but intended to be for an audience of all ages. Content creators range from teenagers to adults, so they’ll know what videos to create based on the interests of their own age group.

To show the diversity, I asked 9 of my friends for their favorite things to watch on YouTube, and they each had different answers. The genres ranged from mukbangs, games like Valorant and Minecraft, K-pop, educational videos like Crash Course, baking videos from Tasty, makeup videos, cooking videos, and lifestyle vlogs.

Why’s it important for the videos to be diverse? It’s so that there isn’t a targeted audience, instead, the videos are made for everyone. YouTube aims to cater to all kinds of people to bring in the most views, activity, and to decrease boredom. If there was only one specific type of content on YouTube, people would get bored and leave.

My next claim is that YouTube provides free service. There’s unlimited access to billions of videos! They provide free service but with advertisements. The average duration of ads is 15-30 seconds but The good thing is that you can skip them after 5 seconds. In some cases, there are 1-2 minute ads but don’t worry, the option to skip them after 5 seconds still applies. Sometimes there are ads that are un-skippable, but those ones are at most 6 seconds so you won’t have to worry about waiting for too long.

Not only does YouTube have billions of videos, but they also have movies. Some people will say, “Why not just use Netflix or Hulu to watch movies?” Well, Youtube allows you to buy/rent movies with no ads, but you can also watch them for FREE with some ads. You can’t compare Netflix’s cost of $13.99 per month and Hulu’s cost of $5.99 per month to a free movie and sparing a few seconds by watching an ad. Keep in mind, Hulu’s $5.99 price still includes ads and movies/shows are restricted for premium users only.

The best thing about YouTube is that you can experience and watch events for free. For example, there are full live streams of the 2021 Milan fashion week for the people who don’t have the opportunity to get an invitation. It’s the same thing as going yourself, but at home getting a VIP experience for free. Another example is that they have free videos of full matches/games with great views, but they also have highlights and compilations too. Especially for students and teachers, it’s convenient that there are full TED talks on YouTube because it’s easy for us to watch it in class or at home because it’s practically impossible for us to actually attend the TED talk.

Why doesn’t YouTube charge their viewers? If YouTube allows people to watch their videos without charge, how are they supposed to benefit? The more activity, the better. Their goal is to develop a larger audience and have more people view the videos on their website so that they can get more money from ads. Majority of their revenue is from ads because they can put them in the beginning and middle of videos. The more people that are watching videos, more people are seeing the ads, so they get more money. In the end, it’s a win-win because the service is still free while YouTube is earning money.

My last claim for why YouTube is the best entertainment service is because of the unique personalization for each account.

Once again, I asked some of my friends to show me what their recommendations section looks like on their YouTube home page. As you can see, everyone had different videos recommended to them based on their subscriptions and what videos they normally watch.

What’s the point in personalizing recommendations? Well, if YouTube just gave everyone the exact same recommended videos, not everyone would be interested in watching them because not everyone has the same interests. It’s necessary for them to advertise videos according to people’s specific tastes to draw them in and make them watch more videos. The longer they stay on the website, there’s more activity which creates more money for YouTube. Personally, I have definitely experienced the hypnotizing downward spiral of being hooked on YouTube recommendations several times. It’s similar to how people go to Target to buy one thing but then leave with a cart full of items.

Others may argue against YouTube being the best entertainment service because of how many ads there are.

It’s true that sometimes the ads on YouTube can be tiresome, but they aren’t the worst. There are billions of videos on YouTube at accessible at all times for the cost of sitting through an ad for 5 seconds. Patience is key, and much better than paying monthly for no ads. If you don’t want to wait, then you can always solve your issue of impatience by downloading an adblocker extension for Chrome or whatever web browser you us on your computer.

In conclusion, YouTube’s content diversity, zero cost videos, and recommendation algorithm is what makes it the best entertainment service.