Did you meet YouTube’s requirements for monetization, but your channel is still under review?

You need at least 1,000 subscribers and at least 4,000 hours of YouTube Watch Time to become eligible for monetization.

At that point, you can request YouTube to accept your monetization.

Many people are having problems with this. YouTube is taking a long time to review your channel for YouTube monetization.

This guide will tell you why that happens and how you can speed up the process!

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Why is Your YouTube Channel Not Monetized Yet?

It could be because you haven’t met the full eligibility requirements yet.

Look through the requirements and make sure you meet them all:

• More than 1,000 subscribers to your channel
• More than 4,000 valid public watch hours during the last 12 months on your channel
• A linked AdSense account
• No active Community Guidelines strike on your channel
• Follow all of the YouTube channel monetization policies
• Living in a country or region where the YouTube Partner Program is available (121 countries)

Another reason could be that you don’t have enough public videos. If most of your videos are public, then the watch hours won’t count.

The videos need to be public to meet the eligibility requirements.

Finally, your YouTube channel could still be under review for monetization because there aren’t enough policy specialists available.

They haven’t gotten to your channel yet, but they will.

Below, you’ll find a more detailed explanation of all three reasons:

1. You have insufficient public videos on the channel

The YouTube Partner Program helps you monetize public videos, not private ones.

So, when you apply for YouTube monetization, the policy specialists will only consider your public videos.

They’ll ignore the private ones.

Thankfully, you can change the privacy settings of your videos to Public. However, you must still meet the 4,000 watch hours and 1,000 subscriber count.

You can still have a few private videos on your channel, but more views should be public.

Even if your private videos have many views and, in total, they exceed 4,000 watch hours, they won’t count.

It’s easy to change the videos’ privacy settings to public.

Open YouTube, and then go to Library (at the bottom of the navigation bar).

You’ll then get to your Library of created videos and playlists.

Tap on “Your videos” to look at your list of created videos.

In the following window, you should see a list of all your videos, public or private.

Find the one you want and tap on the three-dot icon next to the video’s name.

Then, tap on “Edit”. Finally, tap on “Private” – “Public”, and then “Save”.

This will change the privacy setting of your private YouTube video to Public.

Save the changes, and you’re done!

2. You haven’t met the minimum eligibility requirements

These are all the eligibility requirements for the YouTube Partner Program (monetization).

Meet all of them, apply for monetization, and YouTube will eventually greenlight your account for monetization.

The Review Process is pretty simple, though.

According to YouTube’s official guidelines, it should take at least a month before your channel can monetize its videos.

However, it might take more than a month due to system issues, an insufficient workforce, or high application volumes.

Be careful about the minimum requirements, though. Even if you miss just one requirement, your application will be rejected.

You won’t be able to monetize your channel.

For instance, the YouTube monetization policies are quite varied, and you might have broken one without realizing it.

If your YouTube channel mainly focuses on adult content, it might not be monetized because this breaks YouTube’s policies.

You can apply as many times as you want for monetization, though. So, it’s not a problem if you fail to meet the requirements during your first application.

It’ll just take longer for you to get monetized.

3. Insufficient workforce – policy specialists

When you send your application for monetization to YouTube, their policy specialists will analyze your case.

Imagine that there are thousands of such applications sent regularly.

YouTube officially says that they don’t have enough policy specialists.

Every application is reviewed manually by a human, not an algorithm.

They don’t automatize this process because it’d be a hit and miss.

Moreover, if a policy specialist thinks your channel doesn’t meet the requirements, the channel may undergo another review by another specialist.

This takes time.

Generally, it should take more than 30 days for your application to be accepted and your channel to be monetized.

Conclusion

The YouTube Partner program helps you monetize your channel and video content but applying for it can be a pain.

Waiting for an entire month to monetize your channel and video content means losing money.

At times, you may have to wait even more than a month due to unforeseen technical issues on YouTube’s part.

It may be one of those situations if you don’t receive any updates for 30 days.

All you can do is ensure your account meets all the eligibility requirements and the policy specialists have no reason to disagree on your eligibility.

FAQ

Can you speed up the YouTube monetization review process?

Officially, no. YouTube says you can’t speed up the process because your application is placed in a queue.

When the policy specialists get to your application, they’ll assess it.

Before that, you have other applications to take care of.

However, sending feedback to YouTube via the YouTube Studio doesn’t hurt.

Some creators managed to speed up the process and were approved for channel monetization the next day after sending feedback.

It would be best if you told them that you’d met all the requirements and you’re eligible for monetization of your YouTube account and video content.

Ask for assistance and ask them if they can speed up the process.

You never know. Maybe they just needed a push, and a policy specialist hurries the process and approves your application faster.

They’re humans, after all. If you ask them politely, they may make an exception and do some extra work to include your application for the day’s quota.