Top Short-Video and Live-Streaming Apps Ranked for Creators

I started going live because I couldn’t sleep. That was the whole plan. Nobody I knew was making money off it and I certainly wasn’t trying to.

Somewhere along the way that changed, and now I know people who pay their rent with gifting income. I also know people who did five nights a week for six months and ended up with enough for a pizza. Same apps. Same amount of effort, roughly. The difference, nearly every time, was that one group read the payout rules before starting and the other found out at their first withdrawal.

That’s what this ranking is about. Not which app has the nicest filters. Which one actually pays, and what it asks of you first. Then I want to talk about Likee, because it’s the app I get asked about most and the one people tend to get wrong.

The Ranking

1. TikTok

Nothing else has this many people watching. TikTok LIVE is where a big chunk of gifting money is moving at the moment, and once you’re in, growth can be absurd.

The “once you’re in” part is the problem. You need 1,000 followers before the Go LIVE option even shows up. You also have to be 18 to send or receive gifts, or 19 in a few places. So your first stretch is all short videos, no gifting, waiting for the feed to notice you. Some people crack it in a fortnight. Some never do.

How the money works: viewers buy Coins, spend them on gifts, and those gifts land in your account as Diamonds. TikTok takes its slice and you cash out the rest.

2. YouTube

Slow to start. Really slow. But nothing you post disappears. A stream you did in March can still be pulling search traffic in November, and no live-only app can say that.

The gate here is the Partner Program, and it has two levels. At 500 subscribers, provided you’ve also got 3,000 watch hours or 3 million Shorts views behind you, fans can start paying you directly through Super Chat, Super Stickers and memberships. Ad revenue, the part most full-time creators actually live on, waits until you hit 1,000 subscribers and either 4,000 watch hours in a year or 10 million Shorts views in 90 days. One more thing that trips people up: watch hours and Shorts views don’t add together. You qualify on one or the other.

3. Kick

I nearly put Kick second and I’m still not sure I was right to leave it here.

The pitch is a 95/5 split on subscriptions, and it isn’t marketing fluff. On a $4.99 sub you keep around $4.74. Twitch’s default hands you about $2.49 for the same subscriber. Kick also says it doesn’t touch direct tips at all.

Why third, then? Two reasons. If you multistream to another platform at the same time, Kick knocks the split down to roughly half. And the audience is still small. Starting from nothing on Kick feels like shouting in an empty car park. If you’ve already got a community that’ll follow you over, wonderful. If not, it’s a hard road.

4. Twitch

Still the home of gaming streams and the kind of community where regulars know each other by name. Subs, Bits, raids, all of that works, and Twitch has been running it longer than anyone.

You pay for that in two ways. The default 50/50 split, and discovery. Twitch has never been good at putting new channels in front of people, and it’s common to sit at zero viewers for weeks.

5. Likee, Bigo Live and the other gifting-first apps

These work on a different engine altogether. Forget ad revenue. You earn from gifts and that’s basically the whole model.

That sounds like a step down until you notice what it means in practice. A room of 40 people who love you can out-earn a room of 4,000 who are half-watching. On these apps engagement is the currency, not reach.

Where Likee Fits

People call Likee a TikTok clone. I think that’s lazy.

What actually sets it apart is that both formats sit in one app. You post short videos, using the effects it’s known for, and you go live, and viewers can send gifts in either place. That’s two ways to earn from a single audience, and not many apps give you that.

The currency is Diamonds. Fans buy them and spend them on gifts, everything from a simple heart up to the big animated ones. Whatever you receive becomes a cash balance under Likee’s payout terms. And like every gifting app, the hosts who show up daily are the ones who build the rooms that actually pay, which is why the serious ones treat streaming like a job. It sort of is one.

Size-wise, don’t be fooled by how rarely it comes up in Western creator chat. Likee’s own App Store page claims more than 100 million users. It’s just always been bigger elsewhere than it is at home.

There’s one recent thing you should know about. Back in April 2026 the company began switching off its short-video service in one of its largest markets. Live streaming stayed on. I’m not going to pretend I know the internal reasoning, but if you wanted a sign of where Likee thinks its money is, that’s a pretty loud one.

How a Gift Turns Into Money

Every gifting app runs the same basic loop, so learn it once and you’re set.

Someone buys the app’s currency with real money. They spend it on a gift, in your stream or under one of your videos. It shows up on your end. The platform converts it to a withdrawable balance at whatever rate it uses, and once you’re above the minimum you cash out.

How much does a stream make? Honestly, it depends so much on room size and how lively the chat is that I’d distrust anyone giving you a fixed figure.

What I’d ask before committing to any gifting platform:

• Can I see what a gift is worth to me before someone sends it?
• Do I need a certain follower count or level before gifts become cash?
• How much goes missing between the viewer’s wallet and mine?

Give me an app with no follower gate and a clear rate card over one with a huge audience and a locked door. Every time.

For Viewers: It Matters Where You Buy Diamonds

Okay, the other side of the screen. Say you’re the one gifting.

If you buy Diamonds inside the app, you’re paying the app-store markup that’s baked into every in-app purchase whether you notice it or not. There’s another route. A direct likee diamond recharge through a dedicated top-up site usually gets you more Diamonds for the same money, because it isn’t going through the same commission chain. You put in your Likee user ID, pay, and the Diamonds show up in the account.

Gift once a year? Ignore all this. A gift every week? Do the maths, it’s not small.

If You Recharge on More Than One App

I don’t know anyone who’s loyal to a single platform anymore. It’s TikTok and Likee, or Bigo and Twitch, and they end up buying currency in three or four places, each with its own markup on top.

The fix is boring but it works. Before recharging anywhere, look at one independent third-party store like Lootbar top up. It lists Likee next to Bigo Live, TikTok gift cards and a pile of games, so you can compare rates in one place, pay once, and usually come out ahead. It takes a few minutes. Do it once a month and forget about it.

The Short Version

Short video and live streaming stopped being a hobby with a tip jar a while ago. It’s a real income category now, and every platform pays on its own terms.

Likee’s two-in-one setup gives it a genuine shot, especially if live gifting is your thing. But whichever app you pick, know the currency, know the cut, and know the withdrawal rules before you sink real hours or real money in. The people who skip that are the ones buying pizza with six months of work.