“Scary times”: MrBeast voices concern for YouTube creators amid rise of AI-Generated videos

MrBeast bemoaned how well AI videos can pass for real ones in an October 5, 2025, tweet. The 27-year-old YouTuber expressed that the growth of AI would affect legitimate creators and their source of income:

"When Al videos are just as good as normal videos, I wonder what that will do to YouTube and how it will impact the millions of creators currently making content for a living.. scary times."

MrBeast’s comments about AI content come after he received backlash for launching an AI tool that helps users generate YouTube thumbnails.

MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, published the AI tool on his YouTube creator help website, Viewstats.

The thumbnail-generating app was only made available to those who had subscribed to Viewstats Pro.

It was supposedly a good way to help small creators generate video thumbnails.

MrBeast received criticism for his thumbnail AI app, and other creators, including PointCrow and Jacksepticeye, pointed out that the thumbs maker might affect the jobs of real-life artists.

MrBeast swiftly took down the post announcing the launch of the thumbs maker and posted this instead:

"Hey! Thanks for all your feedback on the ViewStats Al thumbnail tool. We pulled it and added a funnel for creators to find real thumbnail artists to commission."

"I thought people were going to be pretty excited about it, but I definitely missed the mark": MrBeast on introducing AI thumbnail tool

MrBeast recounted his failed AI prompts project in a June 27, 2026, video, adding that he was optimistic that people would receive his invention, but was wrong:

 "A week ago, I launched an AI thumbnail tool that helps small creators create better thumbnails," he says in the clip.

He added that he scrapped the entire AI thumbnail project:

"Going forward, there is no AI thumbnail tool. Anyone, from now on, who signs up for Viewstats Pro, there will not be an AI thumbnail tool; it just doesn't exist. We pulled it down."

MrBeast concluded his video by announcing that in place of the AI Thumbnail, he had included a link to real thumbnail artists and their portfolio:

"And on top of that, I wanted to go one step further to really show artists out there that I care: If you go on Viewstats.com, under our More Tools section, it will say "Hire a Thumbnail Artist", and if you click that it will take you to a page of artists' portfolios where you can commission a real thumbnail artist to make you a real thumbnail."

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