• by Colin Kirkland , May 28, 2025

YouTube will no longer need to review individual content uploads for ad suitability in order for content creators to begin making money from their posts, ultimately streamlining the monetization process via automation. 

Typically, when YouTube’s system is in the process of checking an uploaded video against the company’s advertiser content guidelines, creators must often wait to find out if their video is approved for monetization. While videos can gain approval within minutes, some videos receive a “Limited or no ads” rating (or a yellow icon), which then demands an additional round of reviews. 

Additional reviews, which YouTube says “aim to improve the stability and accuracy of monetization assessments” can take up to 24 hours. 

To offset the wait time and reliance of creator appeals regarding YouTube’s decision for additional reviews, the Google-owned company has begun sending videos with a “Limited or no ads” rating to receive an automatic review “that may be completed by a human.”

A “minority of videos” may still take up to a day to review, but YouTube says the final decisions will be more accurate.

“The aim of this update is to support creators to monetize faster, with improved accuracy on our monetization decisions,” the company says, adding that creators will still be allowed to appeal YouTube’s decision to restrict ads on their videos. 

The choice to streamline and improve creator monetization efforts aligns with YouTube’s recent decision to make mid-roll ads more engaging and lucrative for advertisers by highlighting brands during a video’s natural break point.