Twitch CEO Dan Clancy has published an open letter detailing the company’s plans for 2025, including new ways of collaborating, mobile improvements, and more monetisation.
After thanking the streaming community for an “amazing” 2024 – “More than ever, in today’s world, we all want and need to find belonging and connection with other people,” said Clancy – the CEO listed new tools and opportunities for streamers, as well as new ways of building connection.
Collaboration is a “core part of Twitch”, so following the Stream Together feature added last year, the company is working on shared hype trains and shared sub goals to drive revenue collaboratively. In addition, shared chat will be manageable in the mobile app for IRL streamers.
Speaking of mobile, last year Twitch re-launched its mobile app (as announced at TwitchCon Europe), adding a Discovery Feed to find streamers based on recommendations. This year it will continue to revise the app, adding the ability to stream in both landscape and vertical video, and investing in the feed to aid discovery. Clips – short videos of a streamer’s best moments – will also be easier to edit.
Perhaps most interestingly, Twitch is opening up monetisation for “most” streamers, such as subscriptions and bits. Usually streamers need to reach Affiliate status before monetisation tools kick in, but this year streamers will be able to start earning immediately. Of course, Twitch takes a cut of all monetisation, so it’s as much of a benefit to the company as to streamers themselves.
Elsewhere, the company is launching a new tool for streamers to let brands know they want to collaborate (sponsored streams are often more lucrative to streamers than subscriptions), and will also launch more promotional events.
Importantly, Twitch is continuing to focus on safety. This month, Twitch updated its enforcement rules; next it’s looking to provide more detail on violations, and will expand moderator tools to make it easier to protect streams.
Lastly, Twitch will expand more of its Guilds (such as the Pride Guild) to a global community and include Ambassadors from around the world.
It’s been a quieter start for the year for Twitch compared with 2024. It began last year with over 500 layoffs as Clancy admitted the platform isn’t profitable.
A report later in the year claimed staff were concerned about more layoffs on the way and the future of the platform.
At TwitchCon Europe last year, I spoke with VP of product Jeremy Forrester about the sustainability of the platform.