The fight lasted for several months, and now PewDiePie admits defeat. In a kind of diss track, he “congratulates” the now largest YouTube channel.
This is what happened: The YouTube channel of T-Series is now the largest channel with 92,122,899 subscribers. It overtook the YouTuber PewDiePie, who has 92,101,581 subscribers. (As of April 1, 10:00 AM)
It is not the first time that the YouTube channel of T-Series is larger than that of PewDiePie. Now, however, the lead has lasted several days, which is why the race is considered over.
PewDiePie officially admits defeat. He uploaded the video “Congratulations”, in which he congratulates T-Series in a kind of diss track. In the video, there are repeated jibes and accusations:
- T-Series would have “only needed to upload every song from Bollywood”
- PewDiePie hopes that T-Series did not build its business on the sale of stolen songs, as one reads on Wikipedia
- Furthermore, PewDiePie hints in the video that the CEO of T-Series has committed tax evasion
Who is it about? The YouTuber Felix “PewDiePie” Kjellberg was for a long time the largest channel on the video platform YouTube. In August 2018, the YouTube channel of T-Series drew attention, rapidly catching up in subscribers.
After PewDiePie noticed that a serious competitor is on the field in T-Series, he asked his fans for support. He wanted to remain the number 1 on the platform. The movement “Subscribe to PewDiePie” started shortly thereafter.
This is how the battle between the channels unfolded: Since 2013, Kjellberg with his channel was considered the biggest YouTuber. Then came the big competition with T-Series. The subscription numbers of the Indian channel skyrocketed. As Polygon reports, this is due to several factors. The channel comes from India, where 225 million people use YouTube every month. Additionally, the channel is considered the largest Bollywood source on YouTube. Anyone searching for Bollywood entertainment or their favorite artists from India ends up there.
PewDiePie’s fans spread the words “Subscribe to PewDiePie” across the internet. On Reddit, YouTube, Twitter, and other social networks, one saw this again and again. The community tried to reach as many people as possible so that they would subscribe to the Swede and secure his lead over T-Series.
- In December 2018, the service of GTA Online was hacked. Every player suddenly saw the message “Subscribe to PewDiePie” on their screen
- YouTuber colleagues bought advertising with the slogan “Subscribe to PewDiePie”, even for 1 million dollars in Times Square (via YouTube)
- In February, PewDiePie streamed the battle royale “Fortnite” to reach a large community that holds many potential subscribers for him
Since February 2019, the subscriber gap between the two YouTube channels has been small. Often, the ranks 1 and 2 switched only for a few hours. Now, however, T-Series seems to be definitively in the lead.
Update: The tide has turned again. Apparently, PewDiePie’s fans do not want to accept defeat and are giving the Swede some subscriptions again. So many that PewDiePie is now back in the lead. On April 1 at 5:16 PM, PewDiePie leads the race with 33,704 subscribers.
Due to clicks and subscriptions on YouTube, there are now major problems:
