One of the coolest non-monetary perks of running a successful YouTube channel is receiving YouTube’s Creator Awards when you hit key subscriber milestones. These shiny, metallic plaques, often referred to as YouTube Play Buttons, are pretty revered within the YouTube community, given that they represent all the hard work and dedication creators put into growing their channels.

However, Reddit user Meroyma recently revealed just how different the new award looks. In their post, they pointed out that the plaque awarded for reaching the one million subscriber mark is now considerably smaller in size. They also shared a photo comparing the older, larger plaque with the new, downsized version to highlight the difference in size, which has, expectedly, sparked a wave of comments about this new form of shrinkflation.

The Redditor who made the post seems to think that this is in response to more creators becoming eligible for YouTube Creator Awards, thanks to the rising popularity of YouTube Shorts. This new form of video content allows creators to post more videos and, in turn, quickly amass more subscribers. Since it’s hard to tell whether a creator gained subscribers through their long-form videos or via Shorts, the platform seems to be downsizing its awards to accommodate the increasing number of creators reaching the milestones. It’s worth noting that YouTube has updated its YouTube Creators page to note that new awards will be lighter but will retain the same quality and design.

At least on Reddit, this move has attracted mixed reactions. While some users seem to think that such a change is natural, given that a creator gaining a million subscribers is more common now than it was over a decade back, others feel the new plaque is a little too small to adequately reflect the magnitude of the achievement. What do you think? Do you know anyone who has received the new, downsized plaque? Let us know below.