Felix “PewDiePie” Kjelberg became the first YouTube channel to reach 70 million subscribers Saturday afternoon, beating out Indian YouTube channel T-Series, who sits closely behind PewDiePie.
The Swedish YouTuber announced the milestone via Twitter, saying his next goal was 100 million subscribers. And while PewDiePie has long been the top channel on the platform, touting the most subscribers for several years, that claim has been seriously threatened recently.
T-Series, a music label and movie studio, is in second place for YouTube subscribers, quickly rising near PewDiePie’s level by uploading music videos multiple times a day. The high-quality and frequent videos combined with the internet presence of India has made T-Series into a legitimate competitor to PewDiePie.
The Indian company is expected to reach 70 million subscribers on Nov. 15, according to a projection by social media statistics site Social Blade. The site had projected PewDiePie to hit the same marker sometime next month, but PewDiePie’s subscriber count obviously grew quicker than the site anticipated.
PewDiePie now has his eyes set on 100 million subscribers, and while he has beaten T-Series to 70 million, Social Blade isn’t very optimistic that he’ll be able to fend the Indian channel off for much longer.
According to Social Blade’s projections, PewDiePie will not only fall behind T-Series before 100 million subscribers, but he’ll be passed before 75 million subscribers. Social Blade projects T-Series to reach 75 million on Dec. 21, while PewDiePie is projected to reach the same number on March 28, 2019.
As for 100 million subscribers, PewDiePie wouldn’t get there until May 2020. T-Series is projected to reach the milestone over a year before that.
The two channels will continue to battle for the top spot on YouTube, but it remains to be seen how much longer the race will truly be competitive.
