YouTube is home to more than just classic videos like “Charlie Bit My Finger” and “How Animals Eat Their Food.” Besides some laughs, YouTube houses advertising opportunities to connect with the platform’s sizeable audience.

But to successfully engage with YouTube’s users through your advertising, you have to know who you’re reaching out to.

In this article, we’re taking a look at the YouTube demographics that make up the platform’s audience through some audience and user statistics. Plus, we’ll give you insight into how to start reaching out to those unique YouTube users.

Why advertise on YouTube?

While its content is limited strictly to videos, YouTube offers plenty of opportunities to connect with its audience. At the beginning of 2022, YouTube’s U.S. audience boasted over 240 million users. Globally, almost 2.6 billion users are active on the platform. That’s a lot of people to reach!

Because of this, many marketers see YouTube as a huge asset to their digital and social media marketing strategy. Don’t believe us? Check out these two mind-blowing statistics about marketers’ YouTube marketing strategies:

• Nearly 79% of marketers say YouTube is the most effective video marketing platform
• 69% of marketers plan on increasing their use of YouTube video marketing

YouTube is a social media platform marketers shouldn’t overlook. So far, YouTube has seen over $7 billion in advertising revenue globally in 2022.

Who are you advertising to on YouTube?

If you’re looking to start advertising on YouTube, you need to understand exactly who you’re advertising to. Besides your target audience, you must understand the diverse people that make up YouTube’s user base. This means understanding YouTube’s demographics.

Take a look at some YouTube demographic statistics, as well as some general YouTube user statistics, to get to know the video platform’s large audience.

YouTube demographics by age

• 95% of 18–29 year-olds in the US use YouTube
• 91% of 30–49 year-olds in the US use YouTube
• 20% of active YouTube users are 25–34 year-olds
• 16% of active YouTube users are 35–44 year-olds
• 14% of active YouTube users are 18–24 year-olds
• 11% of active YouTube users are 45–54 year-olds
• 9% of active YouTube users are 65+ years old
• 8% of active YouTube users are 55–64 year-olds

Gender-related YouTube demographics statistics

• 54% of YouTube’s user base identifies as male
• 46% of YouTube’s user base identifies as female
• 12% is the number of users between the ages of 25 and 34 who identify as male
• 9% is the number of users between the ages of 25 and 34 who identify as female
• 9% is the number of users between the ages of 34 and 44 who identify as male
• 7% is the number of users between the ages of 34 and 44 who identify as female

Bonus: General YouTube user behavior statistics

• Over 1 billion hours of YouTube video content is watched daily
• 80% of parents in the U.S. say their kids under the age of 11 watch YouTube videos
• 70% of users watch what is suggested to them by YouTube’s algorithm
• 41% of YouTube watch time is done on mobile devices
• 35% of parents who say their kids watch YouTube videos say they do so several times per day

What do these YouTube demographics statistics mean for marketers?

All of these YouTube statistics reveal a key detail every marketer should be aware of when creating a YouTube marketing plan: YouTube appeals to younger audiences.

Almost 35% of its active users are between the ages of 18 and 34. As a marketer, this means you should be keeping in touch with ideals that appeal to these age brackets. This includes staying on top of trends, popular and influential public figures, and knowing what ideals and attitudes the people who make up these age brackets value most.

Avoid generational marketing

While these age ranges include millennials and Gen Z, we recommend you stay away from generational marketing tactics because it just doesn’t work. There are too many issues associated with structuring marketing campaigns around specific generations.

For one thing, you could do a thousand Google searches and come up with a handful of different “official” years where each generation starts and ends. Not to mention, each generation has a lot of stereotypes attached to them (often put there by people outside those generations).

To save yourself the inevitable headaches, stick to marketing to the people within these ages rather than the generational titles put on them. Trust us. You’ll thank us later.