It happened quietly, buried in an Alphabet earnings report. But make no mistake — YouTube just became the biggest media company on the planet, surpassing Walt Disney for the first time in history.
According to research firm MoffettNathanson, YouTube pulled in an estimated $62 billion in revenue during 2025. Disney’s entire media business — everything from ESPN to Disney+ to Hulu — generated $60.9 billion. That’s not a rounding error. That’s a coronation.
The numbers tell a story of relentless compounding. YouTube’s ad revenue alone hit $11.4 billion in Q4, totaling over $40 billion for the year. But advertising is only part of the machine. YouTube Premium, YouTube Music, NFL Sunday Ticket, and YouTube TV — which now boasts roughly 10 million subscribers — form a subscription empire that’s on track to overtake pay-TV leaders Charter and Comcast within the next few years.
MoffettNathanson now values YouTube between $500 billion and $560 billion as a standalone entity. For context, Netflix’s entire market cap sits around $409 billion. YouTube is worth more than Netflix, and it’s not even its own company.
What makes this particularly interesting for investors is the growth trajectory. YouTube’s revenue jumped from $50 billion in 2024 to $62 billion in 2025 — a 24% leap. The platform has now paid out more than $100 billion to creators, music companies, and media partners, cementing its role as the backbone of the creator economy.
CEO Neal Mohan is betting heavily on AI tools that will let creators produce more content faster and cheaper. Think AI-assisted editing, set design, visual effects — the kind of production value that used to require Hollywood budgets, now accessible to anyone with a camera and a YouTube account.
“Unlike almost any other asset we cover, we strongly believe that YouTube will be a major beneficiary of both the structural tailwinds and headwinds facing technology and media companies,” wrote analyst Michael Nathanson. In a media landscape where nearly everyone else is stuck in neutral, YouTube and Netflix are the only two still accelerating. The difference? YouTube doesn’t need to spend billions producing original content. Its 50 million creators do that for free.
For Alphabet (GOOG) shareholders, this is the hidden gem that keeps getting bigger. YouTube alone is worth more than most S&P 500 companies. And it’s still growing at 20%+ annually. That’s the kind of asset that makes you wonder why anyone bothers arguing about Google’s search business anymore.