Nuum, we hardly knew ye What the end of another ‘YouTube killer’ reveals about Russia’s online video market
In December 2023, Russia’s largest cellular network operator, MTS, launched a video hosting platform called Nuum. The site was meant to be yet another domestic alternative to YouTube alongside the services VK Video and RuTube — but just over a year later, its story is already ending (while YouTube is still standing). In early 2025, reports emerged of staff cuts and a revised development strategy at Nuum, and on March 20, MTS representatives announced that the platform would be shut down in the coming months. Meduza takes a look at what Nuum managed to achieve and where Russia’s other “YouTube killers” stand today.
Even before the full-scale war in Ukraine, MTS was investing in domestic streaming platforms. In March 2019, the company launched WASD, a gaming-focused service billed as Russia’s answer to Twitch. MTS representatives touted two key advantages over Western analogues: they claimed it was easier for new content creators to gain popularity on WASD than on YouTube or Twitch, and they promised better support for Russian streamers, arguing that competitors primarily catered to North America and Western Europe.
MTS never disclosed traffic figures for WASD, but it did occasionally share successes. One report stated that between March and August 2022 — after the full-scale war had begun — traffic increased by 120 percent compared to the same period in 2021. However, data from the analytics firm Similarweb showed that WASD’s website traffic dropped by half in February 2023 compared to the previous month, falling to just 1.3 million visits. For comparison, Twitch’s average monthly audience at the time was estimated at 240 million unique visitors.
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MTS had planned to relaunch WASD with a broader focus beyond gaming, hoping to attract YouTube and TikTok users who faced restrictions or lost monetization due to the war. Instead, in December 2023, the company announced that WASD would be “put on hold,” directing users to its new video platform, Nuum.
Functionally, Nuum closely resembled YouTube but included some TikTok-like features. Users could upload and watch both short and long videos, vertical clips, and live streams. The launch announcement claimed that “bloggers from various categories have already joined the platform,” though didn’t mention specific names. Ahead of the rollout, MTS ran an extensive promo campaign, even advertising Nuum on YouTube itself.
In March 2024, Nuum introduced hashtag searching and a donation feature. MTS also launched a partner program, promising content creators 55 percent of ad revenue from vertical videos. To qualify, users needed at least 50 subscribers and five hours of total watch time per month — relatively low requirements that suggested Nuum had struggled to gain traction.
In May 2024, project head Natalia Bratchikova told RBC that MTS had allocated six billion rubles for Nuum’s development. She also said that as of April, the platform’s monthly audience had surpassed five million unique users — higher than WASD’s peak but still far from Western competitors.
By early 2025, signs of trouble emerged. In February, Vedomosti, citing sources at MTS and former employees, reported that around 250 people — roughly 70–80 percent of the team working on Nuum — had left since the start of the year. While the company had no immediate plans to shut down the platform, the sources said, its development strategy was being completely overhauled. One current employee also noted that MTS had “significantly cut funding” for the project.
In mid-March, Nuum announced the shutdown of its partner program, and just days later, an MTS representative confirmed that the platform itself would soon be discontinued. Users would be able to download their content until June 1, 2025.
A tall order
Right now, in the “Top Channels” section on Nuum’s homepage, only one account (Rozetked) has more than 10,000 subscribers, and half of the featured channels have fewer than 1,000. The videos themselves struggle to gain traction — most receive only a few dozen to a few hundred views, with only rare exceptions reaching the low thousands. The livestream section paints an even bleaker picture, with most streams attracting just one viewer or none at all.
Even piracy hasn’t provided much of a boost. Nuum has a dedicated hashtag for full-length uploads of Oscar-nominated films from this year, yet the most popular uploads barely surpass one or two thousand likes. The short-form vertical video section, designed for endless scrolling like TikTok, performs slightly better, but videos with more than 100,000 views are extremely rare.
These numbers are especially unimpressive considering that the Russian authorities have been throttling YouTube since August 2024 and restricting TikTok since the start of the war. But despite the absence of major Western competition, MTS has struggled to attract creators and viewers. Experts have said the problem extends beyond just Nuum.
“Creating a platform that dominates the market is nearly impossible — not just technically, but in terms of marketing and audience growth,” Denis Kuskov, head of the outlet TelecomDaily, told RBC. He said there’s currently little demand for new video platforms in Russia; even if some users are initially attracted, they generally return to YouTube at the first opportunity. “Ultimately, this raises doubts about the viability of any similar platforms in Russia,” he added.
Alexey Zamesov, head of special projects at RuCenter, echoed this view, saying that launching yet another platform that simply replicates existing ones is a losing strategy. “You either need massive marketing investments or a unique feature that sets the service apart,” he explained. “The best approach is to introduce a new format or concept that the market sees as truly different. MTS didn’t manage to do that.”
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Nuum isn’t the only Russian YouTube competitor struggling to attract an audience. In July 2024, just before the government began throttling the U.S.-based service, a new service called Platforma launched in Russia. Developed by Rteam, a company owned by ANO TV-Novosti (the organization behind Russia Today), Platforma turned out to be an exact clone of YouTube, down to its interface design.
The platform’s creators openly acknowledged their copycat approach, claiming it was intended to ensure users wouldn’t have to change their habits. However, in the months since its launch, news about Platforma has been sparse, with only occasional mentions in lists of alternative services amid reports about YouTube’s throttling.
In its early days, most of Platforma’s videos barely reached 10 views. The most popular bloggers had a few hundred subscribers, but their videos struggled to surpass 1,000 views. Not much has changed since then. The platform’s homepage is still dominated by videos with only a few dozen to a few hundred views, and many videos have never been watched at all. The type of content uploaded — whether it’s propaganda, pirated sports streams, or illegal movies — doesn’t seem to matter; Platforma’s small audience just isn’t engaging.
Rutube is in slightly better shape. The platform has channels with over a million subscribers, and some videos draw tens or even hundreds of thousands of views, occasionally reaching the million mark. However, its live streams and short vertical videos face similar challenges to those on the other services. Most broadcasts attract only a few dozen viewers, and even the most popular YouTube Shorts-style clips reach only tens of thousands of likes.
Rutube’s representatives call it “the most actively growing video platform in Russia.” According to the company, in February 2024, it had 77 million active users, and total views had increased fivefold compared to the previous year.
The only platform with viewership numbers approaching YouTube’s, however, is VK Video. In December 2024, this platform claimed a monthly audience of 92 million, surpassing YouTube’s numbers in Russia for the first time — though the accuracy of these figures is doubtful.
But VK Video faces more pressing issues. Many bloggers who migrated to the platform due to the YouTube throttling have expressed frustration over its complicated analytics tools, flawed monetization system, and recommendation algorithms, which allegedly favor creators partnered with VK while sidelining independent users. VK’s massive investment — reportedly in the hundreds of millions of rubles (or millions of dollars) — into securing exclusive content has also failed to pay off. The company posted a net loss of 94.9 billion rubles ($1.13 million) in 2024, and many creators have started returning to more familiar, user-friendly platforms.
Despite Rutube and VK’s impressive official numbers, the Russian authorities aren’t satisfied with how users are shifting to domestic platforms. Even the Digital Development Ministry has acknowledged that the impact of YouTube’s throttling “could have been greater.”
Officials believe the problem is not a lack of quality but rather a shortage of content. Some, for example, have expressed a desire to see more “classics of Russian cinema” on the platforms. “If users had been welcomed more ‘hospitably’ on our platforms, they could have been more successful,” Ekaterina Larina, head of the Mass Communication Development Department at the Digital Development Ministry, told state media.
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