From February 1, 2027, new creators need 8,000 qualified public watch hours within a rolling 365-day period to qualify for ad revenue sharing \u2014 up from the current 4,000 hours.
What Counts as Qualified Watch Time
Only public, valid watch hours count toward this threshold \u2014 private or unlisted videos, and invalid or bot traffic, are excluded.
What This Looks Like Daily
Averaged out, 8,000 hours over 365 days works out to roughly 22 hours of watch time accumulated every single day across your channel.
How to Prepare
Focus on videos with strong retention (not just views) since watch HOURS, not view counts, are what actually count toward this threshold.