Are top Kick streamers viewbotting? Here’s what we know

Some Kick streamers can wrack up hundreds of thousands of views, but how many of those are a result of viewbotting?

As one of the main competitiors to Twitch, Kick has managed to establish itself as a prominent streaming site in its own right. The platform is unique in that almost all of its subscription revenues go directly to its creators. Bigger names such as Felix “xQc” Langyel and Adin Ross can even land hefty streaming contracts. However, the incentive to earn may be resulting in some streamers breaking platform rules.

Viewbotting is an issue across all livestreaming platforms, but some have wondered whether it’s a particular issue on Kick.

What is viewbotting?

Viewbotting, whether it’s performed on Kick or other streaming services, involves using automated bots to boost the viewer count of a given stream.

One of several types of fake engagement, viewbotting relies on users engaging in some sort of activity to add artificial viewers to their stream. These fake views both boost the streamer’s apparent popularity and may potentially generate revenue for any companies advertising on the platform. Both can go a long way toward increasing a user’s payout if done correctly. While users can create their own programs, plenty of websites online offer viewbots, chatbots, and more for a fee.

Most streaming services directly forbid viewbotting or any other kind of falsified engagement in large part because it ends up costing advertisers money. Content creators who fake their views can risk demonetization or even being banned outright from their chosen platform. Even more than that, the US Federal Trade Commission ruled in 2024 that those engaging in viewbotting or other fake social media engagement for profit can be hit with a hefty fine.

Trainwreckstv accuses some  Kick streamers of viewbotting

Tyler “Trainwreckstv” Nikham is one of Kick’s most well-known streamers and is an outspoken voice against viewbotting on the platform.

One of the first big names to join Kick in 2022, Trainwreckstv now has over 370,000 followers on the platform. Since the very beginning, he has been speaking out against the use of viewbotting on Kick and other popular platforms. In one of his videos from November 2024, Trainwreckstv claimed that a developer told him that some streamers are paying as much as $20,000 per month for additional views. Another time, he alleged that the the most prominent Kick streamers were all using viewbotting.

Other Kick content creators such as Yousef “Fousey” Arakat and Rangesh “N3on” Mutama have come forward in the last few months and confessed to purchasing views. In a 2024 interview, Fousey expressed that he felt there was no way to stream and be as popular on Kick as he desired without viewbotting. He claimed that Trainwreckstv’s assertion that the top streamers were all viewbotting was true and added that management didn’t seem to care. Contrary to his claim, both he and N3on faced bans after the reported viewbotting. And at least some top streamers, such as the aforementioned xQc, seem to have legitimate audiences that translate across platforms.

Kick CEO Eddie Craven has also spoken out about viewbotting in the past, stating that the platform had nothing to gain from artificially inflated viewership. He added that the company regularly rolls out anti-viewbotting processes behind the scenes, downplaying the influence of the practice on the platform.

Despite the seeming prominence of bots on Kick, Trainwreckstv has also said that believes Twitch has an even higher rate of viewbotting than Kick. He attributed the relatively greater prominence of viewbotting on Kick to the fact that the platform has fewer users overall, making the practice more difficult to hide. Most recently, Trainwreckstv accused 90% of the top 100 streamers on Twitch of viewbotting to at least some degree.