YouTube on Thursday shared its list of most popular creators and videos in India in 2021. The platform also shared India’s watching trends with gaming and comedy gaining focus.
“In 2021, gaming levelled up emerging as a rich and diverse ground for storytelling and community building, with a notable presence across Top Creators, Top Breakout Creators, Top Women Breakout Creators and even, Top Shorts Creators,” Satya Raghavan, Director – YouTube Partnerships, India said in a blog post.
A five-hour long gaming livestream of the FreeFire World Series Final in 2021, became one of the most popular videos in India this year on the platform.
In terms of comedy, while Round2Hell’s 40-minute long horror-comedy zombie apocalypse short film became the number one trending video, comedy did just as well in short-form video.
“Gaming content evolved from gameplay style videos to comedy, pranks, challenges and even festival-themed music videos. Interestingly, Gen Z gaming became democratised and the gaming audience also expanded outside of the metropolitan areas in India,” Raghavan said.
Gaming and comedy also emerged as popular genres among Gen-Z while Web series and scripted content also recorded significant interest.
The platform also saw a new range of scripted content with web shows gaining popularity.
Top shows
Additionally, Dhindora, a web series from Bhuvan Bam (BB Ki Vines), the Viral Fever (TVF) web-show Aspirants, along with other scripted content including Dice Media’s Operation MBBS and Clutch, Telugu shows like 30 weds 21 by Girl Formula and Surya featuring Shanmukh Jaswanth in the lead emerged as some of the top shows this year on YouTube.
Hyperlocal creators, and the characters they’ve created like Jkk Entertainment’s Chotu Dada and CS Bisht Vines’ Paagal Beta also witnessed growing popularity, further reiterating this trend.
“Telugu channels Filmymoji and Funmoji scripted the rise to popularity of Animoji and avatar-based content,” added Raghavan.
YouTube also shared a list of top Shorts creators. YouTube’s short video format was first launched in India last year and later expanded globally.
“Both new and existing creators reached viewers across a broad range of topics with short-form content that tapped into the humor and familiarity of everyday life,” said Raghavan.
“Some of the most popular Shorts creators in 2021 went beyond the well-understood techniques of editing videos to music and transitions, and have given rise to new and innovative formats of short-form storytelling across themes including family and friendships, language skills, motivation and men’s grooming content and social messages,” he added.
The platform also shared trends in terms of music on the platform.
“The break-out success of the Tamil sensation Enjoy Enjaami, set off a drumbeat of content inspired by the Tamil Hit reaction videos, cover songs including some in Hindi and Malayalam,” said Raghavan.
“With a dearth of film music this year, many independent songs released this year were accompanied by music videos with distinct storylines, featuring popular movie actors,” he added.
It also saw the continued rise of Bhojpuri music with artists Ankush Raja and Shilpi Raj topping the charts.
YouTube also shared a list of top women breakout creators representing multiple genres and languages.
Here is the list of most popular creators and channels on YouTube in India in 2021
Top Creators (Channels)
Total Gaming
Techno Gamerz
Jkk Entertainment
Crazy XYZ
A_S Gaming
LOKESH GAMER
MR. INDIAN HACKER
Village Cooking Channel
Round2hell
Gyan Gaming
Top Shorts Creators
A2 Motivation {Arvind Arora}
Dushyant kukreja
Sanjoy Das Official
Ajay Sharma
baseer gaming
English Connection
LittleGlove
Mr Gyani Facts
Shivam Malik
Tsuriki Show
Breakout Creators
Harpreet SDC
ADITECH
The Viral Fever
Family Fitness
STAR GAMERS
Jeki khan khatri
Flight Gamer
Rai Live
Dance with Alisha
Ayush Yadav
Women Breakout Creators
Dance with Alisha
PAYAL GAMING
Suhani Shah
Kashika Sisodia
Lakshmi Nakshathra
Aditi Sharma
Mamatha natural food
DEVIKA GUPTA
Priyanka hard-work
Deepthi Sunaina
