Ryan's World (formerly Ryan ToysReview) is a children's

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

channel for children aged 2–6 featuring Ryan Kaji along with his mother (Loann Kaji), father (Shion Kaji), and twin sisters (Emma and Kate). The channel usually releases a new video every day. One of the channel's videos, titled as ''Huge Eggs Surprise Toys Challenge'' has over 2.0 billion views as of November 2020, making it one of the 60 most-viewed videos on YouTube. As of November 2020, the channel has over 33 million subscribers, and its videos have garnered over 45 billion views. The channel is one of the Top 10 most-subscribed YouTube channels in the United States. ''

The Verge ''The Verge'' is an American technology news website operated by Vox Media, publishing news, feature stories, guidebooks, product reviews, consumer electronics news, and podcasts. The website launched on November 1, 2011, and uses Vox Media' ...

'' has described the channel as "a mash-up of personal vlog and 'unboxing' video, a blend of innocent childhood antics and relentless, often overwhelming consumerism." According to ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...

'', Kaji earned $11 million between 2016 and 2017 as the eighth highest-paid

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influent ...

, and in 2018 and 2019, was listed as the highest-paid YouTuber, earning $22 million and $26 million respectively from his videos and product line.

History

Ryan Kaji's parents Shion and Loann met as undergraduate students at

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas. Established on , and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the main institution of the five-institution Texas Tech University Sys ...

. Shion moved to the United States from Japan in high school and is the son of a microchip executive. Loann's family fled from

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

as refugees, and she grew up in Houston hoping to become a teacher, which she later did. Shion left Texas to get a master's in engineering at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

, but returned soon after Ryan's birth, completing the degree online. Kaji began making

videos in March 2015 after watching other toy review channels and asking his mother, "How come I'm not on YouTube when all the other kids are?" Kaji's mother decided to quit her job as a high school chemistry teacher to work on the YouTube channel full-time. Before going live on YouTube, the family replaced their real-life surname with the on-screen surname Kaji. In 2017, Kaji's parents signed a deal with

PocketWatch A pocket watch (or pocketwatch) is a watch that is made to be carried in a pocket, as opposed to a wristwatch, which is strapped to the wrist. They were the most common type of watch from their development in the 16th century until wristwatc ...

, a startup children's media company that was founded in 2016 by Chris Williams and

Albie Hecht Albie Hecht is a film and television producer and media executive. In 1997, Hecht was the president of film and TV entertainment for Nickelodeon before becoming president of the television channel Spike TV in 2003. In 2005, he founded and was C ...

. PocketWatch does the

marketing Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...

and merchandise for Ryan's YouTube channels. In 2018, Ryan ToysReview, in cooperation with PocketWatch and

WildWorks WildWorks (formerly Smart Bomb Interactive) is an United States of America, American game development studio based in Salt Lake City, Utah. The studio was assembled from game industry veterans, co-founded by Kris Johnson, Clark Stacey, and Jeff Ami ...

, created an app called ''Tag with Ryan'', an endless runner game targeted towards children, for

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

and Android. In 2019, Ryan ToysReview and PocketWatch produced a 20-episode television series for preschoolers titled ''

Ryan's Mystery Playdate ''Ryan's Mystery Playdate'' is an American live-action children's television series created and produced by the company PocketWatch, Inc. The series is based on the Ryan's World YouTube channel, which signed an advertising deal with PocketWatch ...

''. On November 1, 2019,

Outright Games Outright Games Ltd. is a British video game publisher focused on licensed games, mainly based on family-friendly properties similar to GameMill Entertainment. The company was co-founded in 2016 by Terry Malham as well as his children, Terry Malha ...

released a

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

titled ''Race with Ryan'', a

racing game Racing games are a video game genre in which the player participates in a racing competition. They may be based on anything from real-world racing leagues to fantastical settings. They are distributed along a spectrum between more realistic rac ...

featuring Kaji and characters from the ''Ryan's World'' brand, for

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013 in ...

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a Tablet computer#Gaming tablet, tablet that can either be docking station, docked for use as a home video ...

and

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

. The channel announced that they will premiere a hybrid live-action and animated series titled ''Super Spy Ryan'' on November 27, 2020, at Amazon Kids+. On December 4, 2020, it was announced that Ryan's World would be launching an official game on the gaming platform ''

Roblox ''Roblox'' () is an online game platform and game creation system developed by Roblox Corporation that allows users to program games and play games created by other users. Created by David Baszucki and Erik Cassel in 2004 and released in 20 ...

''. On 4 March 2022, Outright Games released a second ''Ryan's World'' licensed video game titled ''

Ryan’s Rescue Squad Jimmy Ryan's was a jazz club in New York City, USA, located at 53 West 52nd Street from 1934 to 1962 and 154 West 54th Street from 1962–1983. It was a venue for performances of Dixieland jazz.''Jazz A-Z'', by Peter Clayton & Peter Gammond, Guinn ...

'', an

action-adventure game The action-adventure genre is a video game hybrid genre that combines core elements from both the action game and adventure game genres. Typically, pure adventure games have situational problems for the player to solve to complete a story ...

for

PlayStation 5 The PlayStation 5 (PS5) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 4 in April 2019, it was launched on November 12, 2020, in Australia, Japan, New Zealand, North Ame ...

, Xbox Series X|S,

, and

Stadia Stadia may refer to: * One of the plurals of stadium, along with "stadiums" * The plural of stadion, an ancient Greek unit of distance, which equals to 600 Greek feet (''podes''). * Stadia (Caria), a town of ancient Caria, now in Turkey * Stadi ...

Influence

Kaji has impacted the toy industry through the high view counts of his toy reviews, which will sometimes affect toy sales. Chris Williams of PocketWatch compared Kaji to

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television television channel, channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its List of assets owned by Param ...

SpongeBob SquarePants ''SpongeBob SquarePants'' (or simply ''SpongeBob'') is an American animated comedy television series created by marine science educator and animator Stephen Hillenburg for Nickelodeon. It chronicles the adventures of the title character a ...

. At the

Toy Fair The North American International Toy Fair (formerly the American International Toy Fair and also known as Toy Fair New York) is an annual toy industry trade show held in mid-February in New York City's Jacob K. Javits Convention Center and at to ...

2018 in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, Kaji announced a line of toys, branded as ''Ryan's World'', in cooperation with PocketWatch and Bonkers Toys. The toys were first released exclusively at

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

on August 6, 2018. The Ryan's World channel has been listed in 2018 and 2019 as the highest-earning

channel by ''

''. ''The New York Times'' reported that the Kaji family earn at least $25 million from their "Ryan's World" merchandise sales, which totaled over $250 million in 2021. The channel's description mentions that most of the toys reviewed are later donated to charity. His mother told ''

Tubefilter Tubefilter, Inc. is a privately held company based in Los Angeles, California that operates media businesses focusing on the online entertainment industry. Tubefilter is best known for Tubefilter News, a blog targeted at the fans, creators, pro ...

'' that "Ryan doesn't keep all the toys he gets — we give a lot of them away to friends and family, and also a lot of them away to charity."

Controversy

On August 28, 2019, a complaint was filed by Truth in Advertising and the

Federal Trade Commission The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is an independent agency of the United States government whose principal mission is the enforcement of civil (non-criminal) antitrust law and the promotion of consumer protection. The FTC shares jurisdiction ov ...

due to its sponsored videos not being properly disclosed. Truth in Advertising has claimed that "Nearly 90 percent of the Ryan ToysReview videos have included at least one paid product recommendation aimed at preschoolers, a group too young to distinguish between a commercial and a review." These advertisements often depict unhealthy foods. The latter complaint resulted in the FTC suing

and

Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...

for $170 million; this resulted in YouTube adopting new rules on children's content to comply with the

Children's Online Privacy Protection Act The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA) is a United States federal law, located at (). The act, effective April 21, 2000, applies to the online collection of personal information by persons or entities under U.S. juri ...

Awards and nominations

References

External links