How Much Does TikTok Pay? Unlocking TikTok Earnings Potential

Are you tapping into your creative flair on TikTok and wondering how you can turn your passion into profit? It’s no secret that TikTok is one of the largest social platforms in the world, amassing revenues of $16 billion in the USA alone.

Figuring out how to make money on TikTok is a smart move for anyone ready to leverage their talents and grow their audience.

There's no shame in aiming to monetize your TikTok presence. In fact, with the right strategies, you can transform your content creation efforts into a rewarding income stream.

In this comprehensive guide, I’ll delve into the essentials of TikTok monetization, answering the pivotal question: “How much does TikTok pay influencers?”

We'll also explore effective methods to maximize your earnings on TikTok.

Understanding TikTok Payouts: How Much Can Influencers Earn?

TikTok's payment for video views averages between two to four cents per 1,000 views, notably lower than platforms like YouTube.

For instance, a viral TikTok video with a million views may only earn $20-$40. This payout rate highlights that substantial earnings per view are often exclusive to top-tier TikTokers.

Don’t expect to make a lot of money per view at first, as that’s mostly reserved for the most famous TikTokers.

Almost half of the total TikTok creators make less than $15,000 a year. Here’s a graph with the average salaries of TikTok influencers in 2023:

You may wonder why videos that get millions of views only get paid such low amounts, but it’s important to understand how TikTok pays its creators.

To pay creators on TikTok, the company created the TikTok Creator Fund in 2020, but replaced it with the Creativity Program in December 2023 in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and France. This program is currently running in these countries in the beta stage before a larger launch.

Although it still appears similar to something like YouTube’s Partner Program, it functions differently at its core.

What Was the TikTok Creator Fund?

The TikTok Creator Fund used a “static pool” — a fixed amount of money for its creators and divided it fairly among creators depending on the number of views their content garnered each month.

According to TikTok, The amount in this pool equated to a $1 billion split over three years (2020-2023), and was exclusive for creators in the USA.

That is about as much as users know because TikTok has never publicly disclosed an exact amount.

The issue with using this “static pool” system is that as the platform grows with more and more creators joining in, the pool of money allocated for them remains the same.

With more creators now sharing the fund means less money goes for each of them.Hank Green of the vlogbrothers YouTube channel explains the pros and cons of such a system and why it needs to be addressed. Watch the YouTube video below to find out:

What’s the Difference Between the Creator Fund and the Creativity Program?

The key differences between TikTok's Creator Fund and the Creativity Program (Beta) are as follows:

1. Purpose and Focus

The Creator Fund was designed to pay creators for their content based on performance metrics like the views. The Creativity Program (Beta) focuses on incentivizing longer, high-quality video content. It aims to offer real-world opportunities and higher cash incentives.

2. Earnings Potential

The Creativity Program offers the potential to earn up to 20 times more than the Creator Fund, with earnings based on qualified views.

3. Content Requirements

The Creator Fund had more general criteria for monetizable content. The Creativity Program Beta requires videos to be longer than one minute, high quality, and adhere to specific guidelines, excluding Duets, Stitches, and Photo Mode videos to be eligible.

4. Video Length and Engagement

The Creativity Program Beta encourages longer content (1 minute+), aligning with trends showing that users engage more with longer videos on TikTok.

5. Dashboard and Analytics

Creators in the Creativity Program Beta have access to an updated dashboard for tracking video eligibility, estimated revenue, and performance analytics. This provides better insights and management of their content.

How to Join TikTok’s Creativity Program

To be eligible to join the Creativity Program, you must meet TikTok’s criteria.

• Live in an eligible country. There are only a handful of eligible countries for now: the U.S., Brazil, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, and the UK.
• Be 18 years or older
• Have at least 10,000 followers
• Have at least 100,000 views on your videos in the last 30 days
• Adhere to TikTok’s content creation guidelines and ensure all content is original work

How to Earn Money on TikTok: 5 Proven Monetization Methods

While two cents per 1,000 views might not sound entirely worth it, it’s essential to keep in mind that there are ways you can monetize your content on TikTok.

Here are a few popular ways to earn money on TikTok:

1. Leverage the TikTok Creativity Program

The simplest way to make money on TikTok is through the Creativity Program. If you are eligible, joining the fund is fairly simple. Most users who become eligible will almost immediately receive a notification from TikTok like this.

From there, simply hit “Apply” and select your country and local currency.

Joining the TikTok Creativity Program is the only way you can monetize your TikTok videos on the platform itself. Once you have joined, you will receive payment for any videos you post there.

2. Use TikTok’s Live Streaming Feature to Receive Gifts

TikTok has a Live streaming feature that allows creators to actively engage with their followers on the platform. The best part is that in eligible countries, followers watching the live stream can in fact “gift” creators during the stream.

3. Become an Affiliate Marketer

Another excellent way to monetize your content and follower base is affiliate marketing. Many organizations offer affiliate programs that you can sign up for.

Once approved, you’ll get an affiliate link that you can include in the content you post on your TikTok account for your followers to click.

Most affiliate programs offer a certain amount per click, sign-up, or sale. Make sure you choose programs your target audience will be interested in, as the money you’ll make depends highly on your followers clicking the link.

4. Partner with Brands to Create Sponsored Content

Don’t be misled into thinking branded content is affiliate marketing. Although there might be similarities, sponsored content  pays more but requires a lot more work from the brand sponsor and content creator.

A brand representative and you as the content creator/influencer work together to create content that indirectly promotes the brand or straight-up advertises it.

The sponsored content you create could be as simple as a makeup tutorial using the brand’s cosmetics, or you could go all the way to create an actual ad placement inside your video.

Unlike an affiliate program, brand-sponsored content usually comes with a fixed, agreed-upon price between the creator and the brand.

5. Create and Sell Branded Merchandise

Plenty of influencers/content creators and brands create customized merchandise to sell to followers. These items fully depend on your audience profile.

Beauty influencers could, for example, launch their makeup line or collaborate with a brand to create a line of related products. Creators whose content is all about fashion can create a branded clothing line. 

One example is Smosh, a popular channel on TikTok and YouTube, that also has a website dedicated to selling merchandise. The products they sell get promoted across their channels and social media platforms.

What makes their merchandise unique is most of them come from fan-favorite sketches such as the infamous “you’re my favorite pizza place” sketch.

For more examples and tips on how to earn money on TikTok, read my full guide.

Top Earners Revealed: Who Makes the Most Money on TikTok?

There's no doubt that TikTok is one of the most popular social media platforms out there. And with that popularity, the platform attracts many public figures and agencies that earn a lot of money.Some of the biggest names on TikTok are making serious banks from the platform.

Here are the top-earning TikTokers on the platform:

TikToker	Earnings in 2023	Follower Count
1. Charli D’ Amelio	$17.5 Million	152M Followers
2. Dixie D’ Amelio	$10 Million	56M Followers
3. Addison Rae	$8.5 Million	88M Followers
4. Bella Poarch	$5 Million	93M Followers
5. Josh Richards	$5 Million	26M Followers
6. Kris Collins	$4.75 Million	50M Followers
7. Avani Gregg	$4.75 Million	42M Followers
8. Riyaz Ali	$2 Million	46M Followers
9. Arishfa Khan	$1 Million	28M Followers
10. Nisha Guragain	$1 Million	28M Followers

Boost Your TikTok Income: 3 Essential Tips for Higher Earnings

Using the right channels to earn money on TikTok is only one part of the equation. It’s also important to optimize your TikTok account and content to ensure users and followers can find and engage with your content.

Here are three ways to improve your chances of making money on TikTok:

1. Optimize Your Creator Profile to Fit Your Niche

Brands are constantly looking for ways to promote their products or services, and influencer marketing is one channel they are now using actively. You must therefore set up your profile to represent a persona good enough to become a brand advocate.

Aside from your profile, you must also create content that attracts the right brands. TikTok has created a guide to setting up your profile on their “Creator Marketplace” to help aspiring content creators.

2. Create TikTok Content That Engages Your Target Audience

Adding affiliate links and creating branded content won’t mean much if users aren’t interested in what you are selling. That means you should have a firm grasp of your audience profile and focus on creating content that interests them.

You can learn more about your audience in your Creator Marketplace.

Creating content that engages your target audience is important if you want to have higher engagement rates, and eventually more views and a wider audience. The most famous TikTok videos all share this trait.

3. Be Transparent About Sponsored Content

When creating sponsored content, you need to be open about it to your audience. Let the audience know if your video content is brand-sponsored, or if the links you share are affiliate links.

It isn’t to promote the brand or content but to keep the trust between you and your audience. It could be that your sponsored videos or affiliate links you promote are from brands that some of your followers do not like.

Not being transparent about the nature of your content and promotional links may cause them to lose confidence in you as an influencer.

Ready to Earn Money on TikTok?

TikTok has over 1.5 billion active users; becoming a content creator on the platform and just tapping into a small fraction of that audience could potentially make you a ton of money from it.

Unleash your creative mind and be thoughtful about your content to gain followers and viewership momentum. Most TikTok stars today began their journey with just one random viral video.

Know that there are plenty of people out there who are willing to spend money on quality content, so you just need to make sure that yours is up to par.Now that I’ve answered the question of how much TikTok pays, are you ready to start earning money on TikTok?