Monetisation & Revenue
Virtual Gifting
Also called: gifting, live gifts, virtual gifts
YouTube runs this as Jewels and Rubies. A viewer buys Jewels, spends them on a gift that animates over the stream, and the creator accrues Rubies worth one US cent each, paid out through the Partner Program. Access sits in the fan funding tier of YPP alongside memberships, Super Chat and Super Thanks, and TikTok, Twitch and most live platforms run an equivalent under another name.
Understand the gap between what a viewer pays and what a creator receives before planning around it. The app store takes a cut and so does the platform, so the headline value of a gift is never the sum that lands.