Twitch has announced a new policy that will impose a 100-hour storage cap for Highlights and Uploads on all streamer accounts starting April 19, 2025. This change aims to reduce storage costs and reallocate resources toward more effective engagement tools such as Clips and the mobile discovery feed. Content exceeding this limit will be automatically deleted, starting with videos that have the fewest views, unless users manually manage their archives to comply with the cap.
Key Details of the Policy
- Affected Content: The cap applies to Highlights (curated moments from past broadcasts) and Uploads (videos created externally and uploaded to Twitch). It does not apply to Clips or Past Broadcasts (VODs), which are already subject to automatic deletion after a set period.
- Automatic Deletion: If a channel exceeds the 100-hour limit, Twitch will begin removing content until the account complies. Deletions will prioritize videos with lower view counts.
- Management Tools: To help streamers manage their content, Twitch is introducing a storage tracker on the Video Producer page. This tool includes filters for sorting videos by view count, duration, and creation date.
Rationale Behind the Change
Twitch stated that Highlights have not been effective in driving discovery or engagement compared to other features like Clips. Additionally, storing large amounts of archived content is costly. The platform claims this change will impact less than 0.5% of active streamers and less than 0.1% of total viewing hours, allowing it to invest in new features and maintain support for Highlights and Uploads.
Community Reaction
The announcement has sparked significant backlash, especially from creators who rely on Highlights to preserve important moments, such as speedrunning records. Critics argue that this move undermines Twitch’s role in archiving gaming history and point out the irony of Amazon-owned Twitch citing storage costs despite Amazon’s dominance in cloud storage through AWS.
Streamers are encouraged to download their content before April 19 to prevent losing valuable archives. While exporting videos to other platforms is an option, many users find the process cumbersome.