How much do cooking YouTubers make?
This page looks at the food & cooking band ($2–$7 RPM from ads) and applies it to the real view counts of the top 5 videos ranking for "meal prep for the week".
David BattersbyData as of The short answer
Cooking channels sit in the Food & cooking band, commonly reported at $2–$7 RPM for videos over 8 minutes. That is $2–$7 of ad revenue per 1,000 views, after YouTube's share.
That is the parent category's band, not a cooking-specific figure: YouTube publishes no RPM data, so the honest unit is the commonly reported spread for the category, with the reasons it varies stated below. This is ad revenue only. Sponsorships, affiliates and memberships come on top.
What the top 5 cooking videos would earn from ads
The top 5 videos YouTube ranks for “meal prep for the week”, their public view counts, and what the food & cooking band would pay for those views if every view were monetized and paid at the band's edges. A hypothetical per video, not what these channels earned.
Top 5 YouTube results for “meal prep for the week” · US ·
| # | Video | Length | Views (public) | Ad revenue at $2–$7 RPM |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 Quick & Easy Meal Prep Ideas for Busy Weeks!Dollar Tree Dinners | 40:00 | 143K | $286–$1,000 |
| 2 | Meal Prep For The Week In Under An Hour | Sweet and Sour ChickenChef Jack Ovens | 6:35 | 11M | $22,727–$79,546 |
| 3 | 5 Wraps For The Week Meal Prep | Cheaper Than TakeawayChef Jack Ovens | 5:08 | 156K | $312–$1,090 |
| 4 | Cheap And Healthy Meals For The Week, Done In 1 HourJoshua Weissman | 11:24 | 8.6M | $17,207–$60,226 |
| 5 | Mix and Match Meal Prep - 5 Recipes and over 10 MealsFit Men Cook | 8:29 | 534K | $1,069–$3,740 |
View counts are the public figures at snapshot time. The range assumes every view was monetized at the band's low or high edge; real payouts fall inside it, vary by month, and exclude non-ad income.
Cooking YouTube earnings calculator
The band is preselected. If you already know your RPM from YouTube Studio, tick the box and use your own figures instead.
Estimated ad revenue
Per month
$200 – $700
Per year
$2,400 – $8,400
Based on 100K views/month at an RPM of $2.00 – $7.00 per 1,000 views (food & cooking).
This is a range, on purpose. YouTube publishes no RPM data, so nobody — us included — can tell you what a given video will earn. The same channel routinely sees its RPM double between January and December, and shift again with viewer country, video length and which ad formats are switched on. Any calculator that hands you one exact number is guessing with more confidence than the data supports.
This covers ad revenue only, and only for views on a channel already accepted into the YouTube Partner Program. Sponsorships, affiliate links, memberships, Super Thanks and merch are usually the larger half of a working creator's income and aren't counted here.
Why Shorts are left out of cooking earnings
Videos of 3 minutes or under are treated as Shorts and left out when the top 5 is captured (30 skipped for “meal prep for the week”). 3 of the 5 run 8 minutes or longer, the threshold for mid-roll ads.
Shorts are paid from a separate pool at roughly $0.03–$0.15 RPM regardless of niche, so a Short with the same view count as a video above would earn a small fraction of the range shown. Pick "Shorts (any niche)" in the calculator to see it, and read how Shorts monetization works for the mechanics.
Why cooking YouTube earnings vary so much
Cooking channels earn inside the Food & cooking band; the spread inside it comes down to who watches and for how long. The five videos ranking for meal prep for the week show the range: three are under nine minutes, one is 11 minutes and one is 40 minutes, and only three of them clear the eight-minute mark that allows mid-roll ads.
Views are just as uneven. The Chef Jack Ovens sweet and sour chicken video from November 2022 has passed 11 million views and the Joshua Weissman video from January 2023 sits above 8 million, while the two newest entries, a July 2026 wrap video and a September 2025 Dollar Tree Dinners episode, are at about 156,000 and 143,000.
A channel whose meal prep audience watches for weight loss or bulking sits closer to fitness advertisers than a general recipe channel, and lands elsewhere in the same band.
How cooking channels reach YouTube monetization faster
YouTube Partner Program thresholds (per YouTube's eligibility page): ad revenue sharing needs 1,000 subscribers plus either 4,000 valid public watch hours in the last 12 months or 10 million valid public Shorts views in the last 90 days. The earlier fan-funding tier needs 500 subscribers, 3 public uploads in 90 days, and 3,000 watch hours or 3 million Shorts views.
Watch time is harder to bank in this niche than in a long tutorial category: three of the five ranking videos are under nine minutes, so a viewer who finishes one adds well under ten minutes toward the 4,000-hour threshold. The 40-minute Dollar Tree Dinners episode is the outlier, and its comments praise the single-serving portions and the timer on each recipe.
The faster route is to answer what the winners skip. Around eight comments ask how to reheat prepped meals without drying them out, about twelve ask how long meals keep and what to pack separately, and six want a version that works without a sous vide or a full kitchen. A video that cooks the meals, then reheats them on day three on camera, serves demand none of the five top videos covers. VidHalo shows you the exact video to make to grow toward the threshold faster.
VidHalo shows you the exact video to make to grow toward the threshold faster.
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between RPM and CPM?+
CPM is what advertisers pay per 1,000 ad impressions, before YouTube's cut and before videos that showed no ad. RPM is what lands in the creator's account per 1,000 video views, after all of that. RPM is the number that turns views into money, so it's the one used here. It's also why you should never multiply a CPM by your views.
Why can't you tell me an exact figure?+
Because nobody outside YouTube Studio can. RPM varies with viewer country, season (Q4 is often double Q1), video length (mid-rolls need 8+ minutes), which ad formats are on, and advertiser demand on the day. Any page or calculator that gives you one exact number is guessing. We give the commonly reported range for the parent category and show it applied to real view counts, so the arithmetic is transparent.
Does a 40-minute meal prep video earn more than a six-minute one?+
At the same view count it usually can, because a video over eight minutes can carry mid-roll placements and a six-minute one cannot. In this set the 40-minute Dollar Tree Dinners episode has about 143,000 views while the six-minute Chef Jack Ovens video has over 11 million, so views decide it here, not length.
More on Cooking
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Free tools for this step
Go deeper
- How to Make Money on YouTube: 9 Strategies That WorkNine ways YouTube channels actually earn — affiliate, sponsorship, ads, memberships and more — ordered by when each one starts working, not by what it eventually pays.
- YouTube Shorts Monetization: How It Works in 2026How YouTube Shorts monetization really works: the pooled revenue share, the 45% split, the views you need to qualify, and why Shorts pay so much less than long-form.
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