YouTube Trends 2020: how not to go crazy while staying at home. TOP 5 content formats of this year
So, the strangest year in history is coming to an end, it’s time to recap it. December, as you know, is the best month to look back and see how we survived this year, and how we handled it. And judging by the numbers, YouTube played an important role in 2020. Quarantine and the subsequent self-isolation determined the main trends of YouTube and our pastime. Mediacube, one of the largest official partners of YouTube, working with creators around the world, tells us about what YouTube trends determine our lives today.
“YouTube today has become one of the most important platforms where we not only spend our free time and have fun, but also learn the latest news, discover new products, etc.” representatives of the mediacube company say. “Here are just a few figures that prove that our relationship with YouTube is serious and long-lasting: more than 5 billion videos are watched by the inhabitants of our planet every day, and this is 2 billion active users per month, about 28% of whom watch YouTube for more than 10 hours a week. What interested viewers the most in 2020?”
How to do it?
The main trend of 2020: do it yourself, do it at home. The coronavirus has forced even the most active travelers and sociable extroverts to self-isolate. How to cook scrambled eggs, how to fix a leaky faucet, how to make a slime yourself, and even how to pay for housing and communal services — all this is searched for on YouTube and there are answers to everything there. How to do your hair or get a haircut at home? Plus 70% views compared to 2019. Educational videos where creators and experts tell you how to do something yourself is one of the main trends of 2020. By the way, Google calculated that the number of search queries on YouTube starting with the words “ how-to-do” also increased by 70%.
This section includes not only practical tips on how to do something but also a large block of training videos that help you acquire skills and learn new information. The number of views on how-to-do videos increased by 120% compared to 2019, and the number of search queries on how to do something at home increased by 50%. One of the record-breaking topics is foreign languages, videos about them collected 500% more views than last year.
Belly and head
Cooking videos have been popular on YouTube before, but this year especially. Gatherings in cafes and dinners in restaurants have become forbidden pleasures and generally dangerous activities. At the same time, not everyone can afford the delivery of ready-made food to your doorstep, so that in self-isolation people began to cook more in general and bake in particular.
And in general, you always want something delicious, and culinary YouTube channels reveal to us a simple truth: we can arrange a feast on our own, without leaving our home. So in this context, the popularity of cooking videos has soared. Some dishes even went viral: for instance, frog bread that blew up on TikTok and became a meme, or Dalgon coffee from South Korea, videos about them have hundreds of thousands of views.
Sounds of weather
The cat purrs, the wood in the fireplace crackles, the girl slowly and tastefully eats a crispy pickle… YouTube may be a video platform, but there’s a place for auditory lovers here, too. ASMR videos take a variety of forms: maybe you’d rather fall asleep to a gentle male whisper? Or maybe you’re strangely comforted by the sound of fingernails on wood? Or do you get goosebumps when you are quietly unobtrusively told that you are doing well, doing everything right, being proud of you? The ASMR format became so popular that it took the 3rd place in the top search queries on YouTube worldwide. And that’s almost 14 million requests, and the year isn’t even over yet! Only BTS (1st place) and PewDiePie (2nd place) overtook ASMR — you should agree, it’s a pretty powerful lineup.
All in all, ASMR for every taste is another 2020 trend that isn’t even related to the coronavirus. Maybe a little bit: experts also note that with the help of ASMR, some people cope with stress, as with the help of yoga, for example. Anti-stress videos received 35% more views this year than last year.
And yes, the crispy cucumber wasn’t a joke — this video now has more than 35 million views.
Movement is life
Only it’s hard to move when you’re trapped in four walls. But this is only at first glance: YouTubers have shown before that you can work out at home as effectively as in the gym. And finally, the audience fully tasted home sports activities. And even more fitness creators appeared: since the beginning of the pandemic, 55% more sports videos were uploaded to YouTube than before. Plus, as already mentioned, yoga received 35% more views than last year.
There are two pieces of news: good and bad
The good news is that viewers have become more interested in the current agenda, looking for alternative sources of information. The bad news is the news this year was, to put it mildly, not great.
According to YouTube, the most viewed video of 2020 (not counting music videos and children’s content) is dedicated to just one of the sad events that the whole world, as well as YouTubers around the world, were talking about. More than 29 million views were received by the video of Dave Chappelle, an American actor and stand-up artist, dedicated to the death of George Floyd.
Even though this crazy year is coming to an end, some of it will obviously stay with us in 2021. For example, our patience for online learning or home sports. These are the positive skills we have acquired this year. In general, YouTube has become an important part of our lives, and this is only a growing trend that will continue to develop in the coming years.
