LilyPichu Leaves Twitch After 10 Years
LilyPichu, real name Lily Ki, has led quite the storied career. With over two million followers on Twitch alone, she has achieved a level of success most content creators only dream of. As of this week, however, that tenure with Twitch reached its end. Like many other streamers in the past few years, the "Genshin Impact" voice actor elected to walk away from the platform she called home for over a decade.
Lily announced her permanent departure from Twitch in a video, spelling out her intention to stream exclusively on YouTube Gaming from now on. The reveal arrived a little over a week after the streamer's 10-year Twitch anniversary celebration (via Twitter). Between the video, follow-up tweets, and her first post-Twitch livestream, LilyPichu has given fans a glimpse into the next stage of her career and why she chose to change platforms.
LilyPichu opens up about her big decision
The streamer's announcement carries a humorous brand of tension throughout: Should she press the purple (Twitch) button or the red (YouTube) button? After much deliberation and input from her dogs, LilyPichu chooses YouTube. Her reveal has gained a lot of attention thus far, even prompting the Twitter accounts for YouTube and YouTube Gaming to welcome her. Following the video, Lily thanked her supporters and Twitch itself on social media. But she shared little on her decision for leaving Twitch.
Lily addressed fans more directly during her first YouTube-exclusive livestream. "I felt like I wasn't really going anywhere on Twitch — financial stability, change of space," She said. "... If I'm gonna fall off, I might as well fall of on YouTube where I get paid ... It's kind of cool because I went full circle. I started with YouTube, and now I'm ending with YouTube."
Lily is hardly the first high-profile name to jump ship. TimTheTatman, Ludwig, Sykkuno, and more have already left Twitch. Sykkuno, who shared on Twitter that LilyPichu herself inspired him to take up live-streaming, believes others share his reasoning. According to him, Twitch disrespects its top performers, treating them like they're expendable. After migrating to YouTube Gaming, Ludwig described a similar situation. It has certainly created an odd disconnect given how Twitch's year-over-year revenue reportedly continues to grow because of its streamers (per Business of Apps).
The full-time move of LilyPichu to YouTube will almost assuredly not mark the last high-profile Twitch defection. But it has marked a new beginning for Lily.