2025 is shaping up to be the year of the VTuber — and as audience interest in this nascent category of creator grows, advertisers are starting to buy in.
Although VTubers — livestreamers or video creators who use virtual avatars, rather than their real-life identities, as their public personas — initially became popular in Japan in the mid-2010s, this type of creator has become increasingly popular in the West in the past year, with VTubers such as the Twitch streamer Ironmouse becoming some of the most-subscribed or most-followed creators on their platforms.
Where audience eyeballs go, brands follow — and this year, brands across categories such as sports, food and even alcohol have widened their influencer marketing spend to include VTuber collaborations.
Here’s everything marketers should know about the rise of VTubers in 2025.
What do VTubers do?
VTuber stands for “virtual YouTuber.” They are much like any other creators on Twitch or YouTube, with many streaming themselves playing video games or making videos about their day-to-day lives. However, instead of revealing their real-life faces to the camera, VTubers use motion-capture or hand-tracking technology to map their movements and facial expressions to an animated avatar. That way, they can keep their identities private while still building distinct, marketable personas that fans connect with.
Since the practice originated in Japan, many VTubers’ avatars are inspired by anime aesthetics.
In addition to Ironmouse, who boasts over 2.3 million followers on Twitch, top Western VTubers include Gawr Gura — who has a following of over 4.7 million on YouTube — and Mori Calliope, whose YouTube subscriber count stands at 2.6 million.
One of the most prominent agencies that manages VTubers is Hololive Production, a subsidiary of the Japanese entertainment company Cover Corporation, with a roster of 88 VTubers that boasts a total following of over 80 million, according to figures shared by the company. In March, Cover Corporation launched its U.S. arm to capitalize on growing Western interest in VTubers. In February 2025, Hololive VTubers accounted for 51 percent of all VTuber video viewership on YouTube.
“We generally say our demographic is Gen Z,” said Cover Corporation CEO Motoaki Tanigo. “People that watch anime content are the same user base that also watch VTuber content — and as anime viewing in Gen Z has grown in the U.S., VTuber viewing has grown as well.”
The key numbers
- In Q1 2025, livestreamed VTuber content consumption reached an all-time high of nearly 523 million hours watched, according to a report by the livestreaming data platform Streams Charts.
- In April, YouTube acknowledged the rise of VTubers by publishing an official report breaking down the growing category for members of the platform’s ecosystem. In 2024, a sample of 300 VTubers on YouTube earned over 15 billion views, per the report.
- The current size of the U.S. VTuber market is roughly 2.86 billion, according to a report by Mordor Intelligence, which predicted that the market would grow to 4.5 billion by 2030.
- As audience engagement in VTubers grows, so too has advertisers’ interest in the category. Tanigo told Digiday that Cover Corporation’s licensing and brand partnership revenue had grown by approximately 30 percent year-over-year in 2025. “In Japan, this has led to contracts with major clients, while in the U.S., we’ve secured partnerships with gaming companies,” he said.
How brands are buying in
There’s no shortage of brands that have dived into VTuber marketing in 2025. In recent months, Hololive has signed sponsorship deals with restaurants such as McDonald’s and Kura Sushi, as well as a licensing collaboration with the personal computer brand iBuyPower. In June, the Los Angeles Dodgers sponsored VTubers such as Usada Pekora to show up at an official VTuber game day event.
“I often prioritize VTubers for a multitude of reasons: they have a very energetic and creative approach to their content that makes each campaign feel like a natural and organic fit,” said Tatiana Tacca, the founder of the anime and gaming brand consultancy Oni Vision. “Their audiences are also hyper passionate, resulting in great scale, engagement and click-throughs. And there is still a white space for brands, so there is a strong appreciation among the VTuber community for brands that recognize and elevate this community.”
VTuber activity differs across regional markets. In Japan, direct deals between brands and influencers are common, whereas brands in Taiwan are more likely to create their own VTuber to act as a spokesperson or appear in commercials, according to Donna Hsu, a deputy sales director for the Asian influencer marketing platform Kolr. This was the approach taken by the whiskey brand Ballantine’s, which unveiled its own VTuber spokesperson on August 9, transforming an image of its founder George Ballantine into a Fortnite-playing Twitch streamer.
Although this type of in-house VTuber requires up-front technical costs that aren’t a factor for traditional creators, including the creation of the virtual avatar and motion-capture technology, it can help a brand run repeated campaigns without racking up too many influencer activation fees.
VTubers charge similar rates to other types of creators, with a range of fees depending on the size of the creator’s following and the objectives of the campaign. VTubers offer brands access to a potentially new and growing audience — but they are not inherently cheaper or more expensive than other creator categories.
“By design, VTubers are inherently digital. This virtual nature allows for flexibility in not only the characters, but the content as well,” said Sami Barnett, senior director of gaming for the agency TMA. “Brands can experiment with creative concepts without the high costs and logistics of influencer marketing.”
Why brands are buying in
While VTubers aren’t generally pulling in the same global numbers as top traditional influencers, they are drawing loyal, hard-to-reach audiences who are niche but deeply engaged. That opens up new collaboration opportunities for brands that traditional influencers can’t match, stressed Barnett. Video game publishers, for example, can easily integrate VTuber avatars directly into gameplay – as with Usada Pekora’s recently teased cameo in Death Stranding 2 earlier this month.
VTubers aren’t a fit for every campaign, but they’ve carved out a sweet spot with younger, digital-native audiences who grew up in virtual worlds and treat animated avatars as authentic personalities, according to Barnett.
“VTubers are a great avenue for digitally innovative campaigns — especially for brands targeting Gen Z, gaming, or anime communities,” she said.
Naturally, while VTubers offer fresh ways to engage younger audiences, their niche appeal means they won’t be the right fit for every brand’s target demographic or campaign objective, added Barnett.
“I think there is still a disconnect with virtual personalities for a ton of people, perceiving them as less relatable or ‘real’ than traditional influencers, which can definitely deter a brand from going down the VTuber path,” she said.