- Three routes need no followers (UGC videos for brands, brand deals and your own TikTok Shop), the TikTok Shop affiliate program needs 1,000, and TikTok's own programs need 10,000.
- The Creator Rewards Program needs 10,000 followers, 100,000 views in 30 days and videos over one minute; creators report $0.40 to $1.00 per 1,000 qualified views, and TikTok publishes no rate.
- TikTok Shop affiliates under 5,000 followers sit in a 30-day pilot capped at 3 shoppable videos a day. Sellers set the commission; 2026 guides report 5% to 30% and an average near 13%.
- In a September 2026 sample of 58 creators, the median account under 10,000 followers got 215 plays a post; all seven accounts between 10,000 and 100,000 cleared 100,000 plays over their last ten posts.
- Bought followers do not count toward any program, and 7 of the 19 top results for this exact search push a link, a hack or an income figure.
There are nine ways to make money on TikTok, and the lowest follower bar among TikTok's own money programs is 1,000 followers for TikTok Shop's US affiliate program, against 10,000 for the Creator Rewards Program. Three routes need no followers at all: UGC videos, brand deals and your own shop. Four are paid by TikTok itself, four by other people through TikTok, and the ninth is sending viewers to something you own.
TikTok pays through the Creator Rewards Program, LIVE gifts, Series and subscriptions. Other people pay through TikTok Shop affiliate commissions, sales of your own products and brand deals.
Each route below comes with the TikTok monetization requirements TikTok publishes, the page that says so, and what reputable sources report creators earn. TikTok publishes no payout rates, so every earnings figure is labelled as reported.
Every way to make money on TikTok, compared
| Route | Minimum followers | Other requirements | How you get paid | Realistic first month |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Creator Rewards Program | 10,000 | 18+, personal account, 100,000 views in the last 30 days, eligible country, videos over 1 minute | PayPal (via Hyperwallet in the US) on the 15th, once you pass $50 | Depends on views. At the reported $0.40 to $1.00 per 1,000 qualified views, 100,000 qualified views is about $40 to $100 |
| LIVE gifts | 1,000 to go LIVE | 18+ to receive gifts; account in good standing | Gifts become Diamonds, cashed out to PayPal or bank; about half of what the viewer paid, as reported | No reliable figure |
| TikTok Shop affiliate | 1,000 | 18+, US-based, identity check; under 5,000 followers you are in a 30-day pilot with 3 shoppable videos a day | Commission set by the seller, paid about 15 days after delivery | No reliable figure |
| Your own TikTok Shop | 0 | 18+, US resident, ID, tax form, bank account | Sales minus TikTok's referral fee (6% for most categories), paid 1 to 31 days after delivery | Depends. More than half of US stores recorded no sales in 2025 (Momentum Works) |
| Brand deals | 0 (1,000+ for TikTok One projects) | 18+, disclosure toggle on every paid post | Flat fee from the brand, usually per video | $50 to $200 per post for accounts under 10,000 followers, if you land one (Influencer Marketing Hub, reported) |
| UGC videos for brands | 0 | A portfolio of sample videos | Flat fee per video, paid by the brand | $50 to $150 per video at entry level (Billo, reported) |
| Series | 10,000 (or apply with proof of paid content elsewhere) | 18+, account 30 days old, 3 public videos and 1,000 views in the last 30 days | Viewers pay $0.99 to $189.99 for a bundle of up to 80 videos | No reliable figure |
| Subscriptions and tips | 10,000 (subscriptions); 100,000 (tips) | 18+, 100,000 views in the past month for subscriptions | Monthly fee; US and Canadian creators keep 70% base after app store fees | No reliable figure |
| Your own product, app or newsletter | 1,000 for a clickable bio link (0 on a business account) | Disclosure toggle if you are paid to promote it | Whatever your thing charges | No reliable figure |
Requirements: TikTok's Creator Rewards Program terms (updated 20 July 2026), TikTok Shop Creator Eligibility Policy (updated 25 September 2026); About TikTok Series, TikTok One sign-up (July 2026). Earnings: Influencer Marketing Hub (May 2026), Billo (June 2026), Momentum Works (February 2026). "Depends" means no reputable source reports a typical figure.
Creator Rewards Program
This is the program people mean when they ask how to get paid on TikTok for views. TikTok's program terms (updated 20 July 2026) ask for four things: 18 or older, a personal account in good standing, 10,000 authentic followers, and 100,000 authentic video views in the last 30 days. You also need to live in a program country; Shopify's May 2026 guide lists the US, UK, Germany, France, Japan, South Korea, Mexico and Brazil.
Only videos over one minute earn. TikTok pays on "qualified views", which are For You feed views that last more than five seconds, minus anything it judges fake or paid. Rewards arrive on the 15th of the month once you pass $50. TikTok has not published a rate. Influencer Marketing Hub puts creator reports at $0.40 to $1.00 per 1,000 qualified views, and Digiday cites a June 2026 analysis at $362 to $1,035 per million. The Creator Rewards Program guide covers what disqualifies a video.
Check what accounts your size get in your niche →
LIVE gifts
Viewers buy Coins and send you Gifts during a LIVE. The Gifts land in your account as Diamonds, which you cash out. TikTok's help pages say you need 1,000 followers to go LIVE, though it varies by region, and you must be 18 or older to receive Gifts with money value. TikTok does not state its cut; Influencer Marketing Hub's August 2026 review found creators net "roughly half" of what the fan paid.
TikTok's published payment limits for the UK and Europe, set a $1 PayPal minimum, a 1.5% plus $0.10 fee and a $1,000 daily cap. For the US, guides report different minimums, so check the Balance screen in your app. The going LIVE guide covers setup and what gets streams cut off.
TikTok Shop affiliate
You tag a seller's product in a video or LIVE and earn a commission on each sale. TikTok Shop's Creator Eligibility Policy (updated 25 September 2026) sets the US bar at 18 or older, US-based, 1,000 followers, an identity check, and no record of e-commerce permissions being revoked.
Under 5,000 followers you enter a 30-day pilot: up to 3 shoppable videos a day and 3 shoppable LIVEs a week, products only from shops with a Shop Performance Score of 95% or higher, and no campaigns. The 25 September update also lets you leave the pilot early by passing a policy quiz, earning 176 Creator Health Rating points and meeting TikTok's content benchmarks.
The seller sets the rate. TikTok's commission page (14 September 2026) gives the formula: revenue minus refunds, times the rate. Commission usually arrives 15 days after delivery, up to 31, and you withdraw it to a bank account or PayPal from $2. Hootsuite (September 2026) reports rates of 5% to 30%; Later (July 2026) reports an average of 13.07%. Free samples need 5,000 followers and a sale in the last 120 days. Refundable samples need no approval: you buy the product and get refunded if your videos hit the seller's sales goal.
Selling your own products on TikTok Shop
No follower minimum. To open a US shop as an individual you must be 18, live in the US, and upload a US ID, a W-9 and proof of address if asked. TikTok's fee page lists a referral fee of 6% for most categories (updated May 2026), 5% for jewelry and pre-owned goods, and 3% for new sellers in their first 30 days. Some 2026 seller guides claim 8%; TikTok's pages do not, so trust your Seller Center rate card. Payouts arrive 1 to 31 days after delivery depending on your shop score, with part of each order held for 30 days.
Momentum Works counted $15.1 billion in US TikTok Shop sales in 2025 across 803,500 stores. More than half of those stores recorded no sales; about 2,000 passed $1 million. The product research guide shows how to check demand before you stock a product. The how to sell on TikTok Shop guide covers the documents, fees and the two-business-day shipping rule.
Brand deals and UGC
A brand deal is a brand paying you to post about it on your account. UGC is a brand paying you to make a video it runs in its own ads, so your follower count does not matter. Both need the commercial content disclosure toggle turned on. TikTok's Branded Content Policy (effective 31 August 2026) counts gifted products and affiliate links as branded content too, and undisclosed posts can lose For You distribution. TikTok One, the official marketplace, takes creators at 18 with 1,000 or more followers for most projects.
Three 2026 guides publish rate ranges and they do not agree, so here they are side by side.
| Follower tier | Influencer Marketing Hub (Aug 2026) | Shopify (Jun 2026) | Hootsuite (Mar 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 to 10,000 | $50 to $200 | $5 to $200 | $20 to $500 |
| 10,000 to 100,000 | $200 to $800 | $200 to $1,200 | $500 to $2,000 (to 50,000) |
| 100,000 to 1 million | $800 to $5,000 | $1,200 to $15,000 | $2,000 to $20,000 |
| Over 1 million | $5,000 to $50,000+ | $7,000 to $20,000+ | $20,000+ |
Per sponsored TikTok post, as reported by Influencer Marketing Hub, Shopify and Hootsuite. Collabstr's 2026 report puts the average sponsored TikTok post at $340 and the average UGC video at $195. Billo (2026) reports $50 to $150 per UGC video for beginners and $150 to $500 with a portfolio.
Brands price on views and engagement, not followers, so know your numbers before you quote. The engagement rate calculator shows where you sit against 58 creators in your tier. The UGC creators guide shows how brands find people.
Series, subscriptions and tips
Series is a paywalled bundle of up to 80 videos, each up to 20 minutes, priced by you from $0.99 to $189.99 (Shopify lists a $99.99 ceiling). TikTok's Series page asks for 18 or older, 10,000 followers, an account at least 30 days old, 3 public videos and 1,000 views in the last 30 days. Creators under 10,000 can apply with a link to paid content they sold elsewhere. TikTok has not published its share of Series revenue.
Subscriptions opened to non-LIVE creators in September 2024 at 18 or older, 10,000 followers and 100,000 views in the past month. In September 2025 TikTok split the product into Subscriptions for videos and Super Fan for LIVE. Its Creator Academy prices Super Fan at $9.99 a month; no independent outlet we found has covered the change. From 1 October 2025, US and Canadian creators keep 70% after app store fees, plus a 20% bonus for accounts over 10,000 followers and 1 million monthly views (Social Media Today). Tips need 100,000 followers per Shopify and Sprout Social, and TikTok takes nothing beyond card processing. Video Gifts need 10,000.
Sending people to your own app, newsletter or service
The rules here are short. A personal account needs 1,000 followers to add a clickable website link; a business account can add one with zero followers but loses some sounds. If someone pays you to send people to their thing, the disclosure toggle applies. If you sell through TikTok Shop, TikTok bars you from steering buyers to DMs, outside sites, QR codes or your bio link. Some 2026 guides claim the 1,000 threshold was dropped; TikTok's account types page still stated it when we checked on 22 September 2026, and our bio link guide covers the disagreement.
Bought followers do not count. TikTok's Community Guidelines ban selling followers or likes, the Creator Rewards terms count only "authentic" followers and views, and the affiliate policy runs an identity check. You pay for numbers TikTok says it removes, and none of the routes above opens. The paid course is the other trap.
Of the 19 top results for "how to make money on tiktok" on 22 September 2026, 7 point to a link, a "hack", a foreign-account method or an income figure. Indicator traced one "watch and earn" network of 40 accounts and 71 million views to affiliate sign-up pages in January 2026. Everything a course sells is on the TikTok pages linked above, for free.
What does a creator your size get in views?
Every route above runs on views. This is what accounts of each size get, from a September 2026 sample of 58 creators surfaced by TikTok search in six niches, ten recent posts each.
| Followers | Creators | Median followers | Median plays per post | Last 10 posts total 100,000+ plays |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Under 10,000 | 5 | 813 | 215 | 1 of 5 |
| 10,000 to 100,000 | 7 | 18,000 | 12,130 | 7 of 7 |
| 100,000 to 1 million | 17 | 450,400 | 21,800 | 14 of 17 |
| Over 1 million | 29 | 3,100,000 | 102,450 | 28 of 29 |
Data: TikTok profile and post data; median plays is the median creator's median over their posts with at least one view. Tier re-cut, full sample. The sample records plays, likes, comments, shares and saves but not video length.
Read the last column against the Creator Rewards bar of 100,000 views in 30 days. All seven creators between 10,000 and 100,000 followers cleared it over their last ten posts, which in that tier spanned about 50 days. The median under-10,000 account got 215 plays a post; one of five cleared 100,000 because a single post took off. Views per follower fall as accounts grow: about 1 play per follower under 10,000, 0.3 between 10,000 and 100,000, and 0.035 over a million.
The one-minute rule matters as much as the view bar. The sample has no video lengths, so we looked at 261 ranking posts from three earlier data sets across 26 searches. Of those, 74 (28%) run over 60 seconds, and their median plays (1.09 million) match the shorter ones (1.02 million).
What people search when they want to get paid
TikTok's own search bar shows the demand. Type "make money on tiktok" and the ten suggestions include shop, live stream, videos, "with ai" and "in 2026". Type "tiktok shop affiliate" and seven of ten suggestions are about registering, signing up or a tutorial, in three languages. One is "earnings".
Typed searches add the numbers. These are the typed searches TikTok returned for "make money on tiktok" and "how much does tiktok pay" on 5 October 2026; 28 of the 40 results were TikTok topic groups that pool many searches, so they are left out.
Two of those had no videos matched to them: "how to make money on tiktok from your videos" and "how to make money by scrolling through tiktok". The second is the one to be wary of. TikTok does not pay anyone for scrolling, and offers that promise it are the kind of scheme Indicator traced in January 2026.
Data: TikTok search suggestions. Snapshot.
Find the products creators already sell in your niche
The affiliate route is the lowest door, and the usual mistake is picking products nobody has proven. TikTok's video search shows which products in your niche creators already promote, and TokConnect can pull that list for your niche in one go.
Search TikTok for products in kitchen gadgets and show me which ones creators already promote as affiliates. For the top 20 videos, list the product named in the caption, plays, saves and video length, and mark which captions carry a shop or affiliate tag. Group by product and rank by how many different creators promote it.
Works inside ChatGPT and Claude: Connect TokConnect.
How we got these numbers
Program rules come from TikTok's own pages. On 5 October 2026 we re-read the US Creator Rewards terms (unchanged since 20 July 2026), the TikTok Shop Creator Eligibility Policy (updated 25 September 2026; the core rules were unchanged and the early exit from the pilot was new) and the Diamond payment limits. TikTok's Help Center pages (LIVE, Series, Subscriptions, tips) did not load for us that day, so those rules keep their 22 September 2026 check. Every earnings figure is reported by the outlet named beside it; TikTok publishes none.
Our own data was pulled through TokConnect: a September 2026 sample of 58 creators surfaced by TikTok search in six niches (last 10 posts each), autocomplete for two seeds on 22 September 2026, and two search-count pulls on 5 October 2026 ("make money on tiktok" and "how much does tiktok pay", 20 records each). Search figures are TikTok's 7-day worldwide counts, typed searches only; a record counts as a TikTok topic group if its 7-day figure is 5,000,000 or more, or 1,000,000 or more with the week's first daily reading under 5% of its last, or TikTok files it as Featured Content. Data: search topics, tier re-cut, ranking videos, autocomplete.
Key statistics
TikTok Shop's US Creator Eligibility Policy, updated 25 September 2026, requires affiliate creators to be 18 or older, based in the United States and to have at least 1,000 followers; creators under 5,000 followers start in a 30-day pilot limited to 3 shoppable videos a day.
TikTok's Creator Rewards Program requires creators to be 18 or older with 10,000 authentic followers and 100,000 authentic video views in the last 30 days, and pays out once the balance reaches $50, under the US terms updated 20 July 2026.
Creators report earning $0.40 to $1.00 per 1,000 qualified views from TikTok's Creator Rewards Program in 2026; TikTok publishes no rate.
All 6 statistics
US TikTok Shop sales reached $15.1 billion in 2025 across 803,500 stores, and more than half of those stores recorded no sales.
All 7 creators with 10,000 to 100,000 followers in a September 2026 sample of 58 TikTok creators had at least 100,000 plays across their last 10 posts, against 1 of 5 creators under 10,000 followers.
"how to get paid by tiktok" was searched 294,688 times on TikTok in the 7 days to 5 October 2026, and "when do you start making money on tiktok" 256,176 times.
Frequently asked questions
How many followers do you need to make money on TikTok?
It depends on the route. UGC videos made for brands and selling your own products on TikTok Shop need zero followers. TikTok Shop's US affiliate program needs 1,000, and so does a clickable link in a personal account's bio. Going LIVE for gifts needs 1,000 in most regions. The Creator Rewards Program, Series, subscriptions and Video Gifts need 10,000, and the Creator Rewards Program also needs 100,000 views in the last 30 days. Tips need 100,000. Every threshold comes from TikTok's own eligibility pages, linked in the comparison table.
How much does TikTok pay for 1 million views?
TikTok has never published a rate. For the Creator Rewards Program, Influencer Marketing Hub's May 2026 review of creator reports puts it at $0.40 to $1.00 per 1,000 qualified views, so about $400 to $1,000 for a million qualified views. Digiday cites a June 2026 analysis of disclosed examples at $362 to $1,035 per million. Qualified views are For You feed views over five seconds on videos over one minute, so the number is smaller than the play count you see. Views outside the program earn nothing directly.
Can you make money on TikTok without showing your face?
Yes. The Creator Rewards Program requires original videos over one minute, not a face; screen recordings and hands-only videos with your own voice qualify, while slideshows and text-only videos do not. TikTok Shop affiliate, your own shop and UGC have no rule about faces at all. The faceless TikTok ideas guide ranks 25 niches on TikTok's own search data and notes which routes pay for each format.
How do you get paid on TikTok?
Each program pays differently. The Creator Rewards Program pays on the 15th of the month through PayPal (via Hyperwallet in the US) once your balance passes $50. LIVE and Video Gifts arrive as Diamonds that you cash out to PayPal or a bank account from the Balance screen. TikTok Shop affiliate commission lands in a separate commission account about 15 days after the order is delivered, and you withdraw it to a bank or PayPal from $2. Shop sellers are paid 1 to 31 days after delivery depending on their shop score. Brand deals and UGC are paid by the brand, outside TikTok.
What are the TikTok monetization requirements in 2026?
You must be 18 or older for every route. The Creator Rewards Program needs a personal account, 10,000 followers, 100,000 views in 30 days and an eligible country (Shopify lists the US, UK, Germany, France, Japan, South Korea, Mexico and Brazil). TikTok Shop affiliate needs 1,000 followers, US residency and an identity check. Series needs 10,000 followers, a 30-day-old account, 3 public videos and 1,000 views in 30 days. Subscriptions need 10,000 followers and 100,000 views in the past month. Any post you are paid for needs the commercial content disclosure toggle turned on.
Is it worth trying to make money on TikTok with a small account?
Only through the routes that do not depend on your audience. In a September 2026 sample of 58 creators, the median account under 10,000 followers got 215 plays a post, which earns nothing through the Creator Rewards Program. UGC pays $50 to $150 a video at entry level (Billo, 2026) with no follower count, your own TikTok Shop has no follower minimum, and affiliate opens at 1,000. Treat views as the thing to grow and pick the route that pays before the views arrive.
Sources and data
- TikTok Creator Rewards Program Terms, US (TikTok Legal, updated 20 July 2026, 5 October 2026)
- How rewards work (TikTok Help Center)
- How To Make Money on TikTok in 2026 (Shopify, 22 May 2026)
- How Much Does TikTok Pay in 2026? (Influencer Marketing Hub, updated 12 May 2026)
- How every major platform pays creators (Digiday, 1 September 2026)
- What is TikTok LIVE (TikTok Help Center)
- Virtual Items Policy (TikTok)
- Diamond Reward Payment limits and transaction fees (TikTok Legal, 5 October 2026)
- The Live Gifting Playbook (Influencer Marketing Hub, updated 6 August 2026)
- Creator Eligibility Policy (TikTok Shop US Seller University, updated 25 September 2026, 5 October 2026)
- How Standard Affiliate Commission Works (TikTok Shop US, updated 14 September 2026)
- Guide to Samples: Free and Refundable (TikTok Shop US, updated 1 September 2026)
- How to make money on TikTok in 2026 (Hootsuite, 15 September 2026)
- How To Do Affiliate Marketing on TikTok in 2026 (Later, updated 20 July 2026)
- Documents to register as an Individual Seller (TikTok Shop US, updated 17 June 2026)
- TikTok Shop Referral Fees by Category (TikTok Shop US, updated 14 May 2026)
- Dynamic Settlement and Reserve Policy (TikTok Shop US, updated 31 July 2026)
- Avoid Redirecting Traffic (TikTok Shop US, 22 June 2026)
- TikTok Shop U.S. GMV grew 68% to US$15.1B in 2025 (Momentum Works, 11 February 2026)
- TikTok Influencer Rates (Influencer Marketing Hub, updated 31 August 2026)
- Influencer Pricing in 2026 (Shopify, 22 June 2026)
- Influencer Pricing (Hootsuite, 16 March 2026)
- 2026 Influencer Marketing Report (Collabstr)
- UGC Rates in 2025: What Brands Actually Pay (Billo, 16 June 2026)
- How creators can sign up for TikTok One (TikTok for Business, July 2026)
- Branded Content Policy (TikTok, effective 31 August 2026)
- About the content disclosure setting for creators (TikTok for Business, April 2026)
- About TikTok Series (TikTok Help Center)
- Should I choose Subscription or Super Fan? (TikTok Creator Academy)
- TikTok Ups Subscription Revenue Share for US Creators (Social Media Today, 5 October 2025)
- Video Gifts on TikTok (TikTok Help Center)
- Tip a creator on TikTok (TikTok Help Center)
- Account types on TikTok (TikTok Help Center)
- Integrity and Authenticity (TikTok Community Guidelines)
- Anatomy of a TikTok scam (Indicator, 12 January 2026)
- Follower-tier re-cut of the September 2026 creator sample (snapshot)
- 58-creator benchmark sample, 21 September 2026 (snapshot)
- Top video results for "how to make money on tiktok", 22 September 2026 (snapshot)
- Search suggestions for two money seeds, 22 September 2026 (snapshot)
- TikTok search topics for "make money on tiktok" and "how much does tiktok pay", 5 October 2026 (snapshot)
