1 billion subscriptions and counting

UPDATE 7/29/13: We've released a new version of this widget that replaces the ones described below. You can read about it here or dive into the technical details here.

Early on (we're talking '06 here, people!), the yellow subscribe button made its debut so the latest videos from your favorite channels could make a beeline to your YouTube homepage/eager eyes. Today, the button that’s been immortalized as a throw cushion hits an important landmark: it’s been clicked over one billion times. And who was the lucky channel to get that billionth hit? It was MachinimaSports, who are, not coincidentally, on our homepage on Friday.

In fact, there is so much subscription activity that over a billion subscription updates are sent to our users' homepages every week, and 15 YouTube channels have crossed the one million subscriber mark: fred, nigahiga, kassemg, shanedawsonTV, shanedawsonTV2, smosh, universalmusicgroup, machinima, sxephil, mysteryguitarman, davedays, kevjumba, realannoyingorange, raywilliamjohnson, collegehumor and failblog.

So what’s next for subscriptions? Turns out, we’ve got a spankin’ new widget that any video-maker can embed on his/her website or blog. It lets people subscribe to your YouTube channel with a single click, without having to leave your site to log into YouTube or to confirm their subscription. The entire process happens in the widget.

Give it a try! All you need to do is embed the code below into the source code of your website or blog, in the same way you embed a YouTube video.

Update: See the latest documentation here.

And if all this is new to you, let us suggest you check out this video, in which dear Cuddles tells you all you need to know about subscriptions: