YouTube star Rachell ‘Valkyrae’ Hofstetter has been streaming for years as her dream came true. Now she’s looking to find balance in her life, pulling back her streaming schedule to “do other things” outside of going live.
Popular 100 Thieves streamer Valkyrae has been in the streaming game for around eight years now. She’s grown into a giant in the industry, boasting over 3.7 million subscribers and a recipient of TGA’s Content Creator of the Year Award.
Though she’s created a robust community of viewers through streaming, she has a lot of other variables in her life keeping her busy — thereby warranting her desire to decrease her livestream hours.
Since moving to YouTube from Twitch, Valkyrae has been streaming mostly gaming content due to the difficulty in getting IRL streams together. This was brought up in a recent broadcast — before leading to a bigger discussion.
“On YouTube, there’s an extra step the IRL backpack has to go through,” she explained. “And it’s just, the delay is too much. Reading chat is unbearable for me. I can’t even communicate with chat when I IRL stream.”
It’s not just IRL streaming though, but playing games on broadcast and everything in between. The star was quick to assert that she still enjoys the job, but she’s trying to expand her horizons and find balance.
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“Some people think I don’t like streaming — I do like streaming. It’s just, I’m trying to do other things with my life now.”
Valkyrae then talks about her burnout from streaming: “We’ve been full time streamers for over eight years. And when we first started streaming, I had multiple jobs and streamed nine hours a day every single day.”
She may return to streaming her usual hours, but there is a requirement — finding something enjoyable and new again, like Among Us or Valorant at their peaks.
“I think once there’s a really really fun game that I’m excited to play, I’ll over stream a bit? As of right now, there isn’t anything new or exciting for me.”
Keep in mind, Valkyrae wants to stream less, but that doesn’t mean she’ll be making less content: “I don’t have to make YouTube videos, but I’ve been enjoying it. So I’m just trying to do things that I enjoy, balancing and stuff.”