Can somebody please tell me your opinion on YouTube views?

[Silver7]

I have a video on YouTube that has 43K views and it only has 139 likes.

Even though only 139 people showed that they liked my video, could the truth be that thousands of people enjoyed the video but they chose not to like the video still or maybe they enjoyed the video but they simply forgot to leave a like?

I've seen a video on YouTube that had 23 Million views and it didn't even get 1M likes, instead it got about 308K likes.

[thecaptainwastaken]

Yeah the likes are not an exact proportionate to the views. A lot of people don't tend to like videos. I only started liking videos two years ago. It's a normal thing.

[NickRowler]

I think there are a lot of people who watch videos on YouTube but don't leave likes or comments. I am definitely one of those people. I made my YouTube account around 2009 yet I have only liked about 100 vids. Even if I don't like something physically, I still enjoy it. Similar with webcomics, some readers may enjoy your work but may not like or comment ever.

I think the like ratio is just going to depend how people feel. Here's an example of my videos. The one with more views has less likes due to it be less popular in general.

[Akarin_Rishna]

Hello there!
I would LOVE to like videos on Youtube, but apparently, liking vids will create a list of liked videos playlist on my profile. It exceeds 5k videos, and I don't want to add any more of it so I don't like any videos from that moment on = v =

[moontokkym]

A lot of people are saying most people watch without an account, which is true, but that ratio is highly irregular and tells me your video is one of 3 things, because your likes for a 43k views should be around the 1-3k mark on average.

• A tutorial → tutorials have a much higher percentage of non-account watchers than other videos, and people come back to rewatch to get the information again, so views are always much much higher than likes
• you've been botted → someone has paid for views on that video using the cheapest package that does not pay for likes or comments either. If this was you, knock it off, it's against youtube tos, if not, you're being targeted by a bad actor who wants your account suspended for fraud because again, lookup Youtube tos.
• people disliked the video → since the dislikes were hidden the ratio is not public, but you can see it on the backend. I'm going to be honest and say that I think this is the most likely option and you just didn't notice. Most Youtube videos have a 80-100% like/dislike ratio, anything under that usually means your video was offensive in some way, incorrect about stuff, or found an audience who just inherently dislikes you (think "video about racism being posted on 4Chan")

Hope this helps because 139 likes for 43k is unusually low.

[Lensing]

A lot of video creators remind their viewers to subscribe and leave a like because most people (me included)
just watch the video without clicking the like button

[ThunderChicken]

I rarely log into Youtube. When I watch a video it's a casual thing, a link somebody sends me or something that shows up in my feed that piques my interest, so I don't bother. Youtube requires logging in before you can like or subscribe or comment, so I rarely do any of that.

Also, if there was ever a way to discourage me from doing any of that, it's for the video to ask me to do any of that. Especially when they ask in an obnoxious way. A subtle "If you like our stuff, please like our stuff" won't turn me off, but if it is in my face (such as by having a "Like & subscribe" thing shown through the whole video), I won't do it just out of spite.

I should point out, however, that I am a video curmudgeon. I do not like videos in general. If I google something (say, how to reset the maintenance reminder in a 2022 Mercedes GLE450), I will scroll past all the videos on how to do it until I get to a link in which I can read how to do it. As a rule, if I see that a link leads to Youtube (say, a review of a new car) I will not click it. I have adjusted the settings in my Brave browser so that videos do not autoplay. If I want to watch them I will click on them, and I rarely want to watch them. When I am on the internet I just want to read in peace and quiet. My preference for reading over watching is one of the reasons why I come to Tapas.

Yeah, I know. I'm an "Old man yells at clouds" type of person.