As of right now, Twitch streamer Emilycc holds the record for the longest subathon on the Amazon-owned livestreaming platform.
When she joined Twitch in 2016 at just 19-years-old , the Texas-based creator wasn’t planning to set any records. However, now 27 and well over 1100 days into her nonstop broadcast that kicked off in 2021, Emilycc—who withholds her last name for privacy reasons—has no intentions of stopping, especially since her community continues adding time to the bank.
“I feel very blessed,” she told Complex in an interview (that was, of course, livestreamed). “I just wanna keep going for as long as I can.”
Kai Cenat and Benny Blanco find and meet a Twitch streamer who’s been live for 3 years since November 2021.
Kai plans on getting her a new setup, and Kai urged the Streamer Awards to give her a nomination for an award ❤️
Now, after chatting with popular streamers Kai Cenat and QTCinderella, which ended with her getting invited to December’s The Streamer Awards, Emilycc is taking her streaming passion to bigger stages and greater heights. It’s a fairly big leap for someone who used to work at CVS, but not so significant when you consider that she got her associate's degree in communications with the initial goal of “doing something cool, like video games or the entertainment industry.” That “something cool” has become something really cool, periodt.
With her growing popularity and her Twitch follower count soaring past 250,000, NFD caught up with Emilycc to kiki about her newfound stardom, what it felt like talking to Kai Cenat and QTCinderella, how she maintains enthusiasm despite being live 24/7 for over three years straight, and what her family and friends have to say about all this.
(This interview has been edited and shortened for clarity.)
How are you doing?
Emilycc: I'm good. I'm, I'm not gonna lie, I woke up like 30, 40 minutes ago. [laughs] The only thing I planned today was getting a dress because I got invited to The Streamer Awards.
Oh, amazing. Yeah, I saw that clip.
Emilycc: Yeah, I haven't done anything yet today.
Yeah, I mean, it's been quite a change, right? Just, like, all of these things happening all at once. It must feel so overwhelming.
Emilycc: Oh, it definitely is. Like, I've barely been sleeping. Oh my God. I’ve barely been eating, too. Only on accident, though.
That's crazy. Having to be on all the time and especially, like, being live for three years, it's so hard to break away, right?
Emilycc: It is. I really try, but yeah, It's been hard. Especially with everything going on, it's been hard to think of things to do because my mind is just everywhere. Like, I wanna post about it. I wanna tell people I know in real life, but I haven't even been able to call that many people. I wanna, you know, plan things, but like my mind is just genuinely everywhere that it's so hard right now. [laughs]
Tell me a little bit about yourself. Who is EmilyCC?
Emilycc: The name was very random, but I joined Twitch with that name eight years ago, almost nine years ago. And I joined because I only played World of Warcraft. I needed friends and I had, like, a really crappy job at CVS. And so I just looked at Twitch as a way to make friends and maybe a little money, too. Like, I didn't even expect to make anything, but I made $2 and it was really cool.
I remember I was so excited because I couldn't believe someone gave me $2. Though small, even that felt life-changing. And I've been a gamer my whole life. My dad introduced me to video games. He worked on computers. So, gaming, streaming, talking to people, building community—these have been my passions. Like, it just feels right for me. Like, years ago, I would go on livestreaming websites like [the now-defunct broadcasting site] Stickam. I would just go on there and talk to people, so this is all surreal that it's like working out now.
You have over 250,000 Twitch followers now. You've surpassed 10,000 subscribers on the platform. How is all of this feeling as you're breaking all these kinds of records for yourself?
Emilycc: I have the most subscribers, the most followers, the most viewers—the most everything I’ve ever had since I’ve been on Twitch. It’s genuinely life-changing. It really is. I'm so appreciative and I actually feel very blessed. Like, I don't know how this happened.
It's that grit of being live for three years! Tell me about that. It's been literally three years, right? 26,000 hours or something?
Emilycc: Yeah, and I've just done everything I could to keep it going. My community has kept adding time. I won't lie, they really got me to three years. Like, even though I was a smaller channel, they got me here. They were really supportive. I’ve slept on stream for a thousand days. I’d go out, I’d go to the grocery store, I’d go shopping, I’d walk my dog. At this point, I've done everything—like indoor skydiving.
I’ve also stopped drinking during the subathon because I've done, like, club streams to keep things entertaining. But I’ve stopped doing that. I really feel like the subathon has honestly helped me. Just being home, being myself, becoming a better me. It's like some form of therapy.
You're telling me about how things have changed and it's so different now. What was life like before you started streaming?
Emilycc: I joined Twitch when I was, like, 19 years old. I was very young, I was going to school—my life was so boring. [laughs]. I got my associate's degree; I was working like my crappy part-time jobs. Like, I guess I lived a normal life. Nothing too crazy before I joined Twitch.
Then I joined Twitch and, within the first month of livestreaming, someone helped me buy a computer. At the time, I was streaming off a laptop because I couldn't afford a computer. My desk was a singular desk and I had a Staples chair; it was just a regular setup that got the job done but wasn’t great. But when that person helped me get a computer, that action helped me realize maybe I can do this. Maybe I can set this all up. Maybe I can actually do it. So, I then quit my job.
And that was a surreal moment and such a blessing, too. Like, I never even expected anything like that to happen eight years ago.
And now here you are, eight years later! How do you keep yourself from burning out?
Emilycc: Maybe caffeine. [laughs] But also, like, I just feel I really wanna do this. I've known I really wanna do this. I wanna prove myself. I've always been that type of person. I just wanna prove myself that I can do this, that I am a streamer. So I think that's why.
You were talking to QTCinderella and Kai Cenat recently. What was it like talking to the both of them? How did that feel?
Emilycc: I felt cool. I never expected either of them to call. Like, I know Kai opened up my stream, but then I saw that he wanted to call me. And that made me freak out because I haven't really talked to many streamers the past couple of years. At least not on Stream.
So, that it’s, like, one of the first streamers to call me during the subathon, and it happens to be the biggest creator on the platform? I was freaking out [laugh]. Everyone was so nice, too. It was insane.
Going back to the inspiration of you starting this stream. Why? Like, why not just stream for a couple hours, give yourself a break, then come back on the next day. Why a nonstop stream?
Emilycc: That's just what a subathon is, but when I started, I didn't think it was going to go on this long. I kind of wanted it to keep going, though. I thought it was fun. Like, every time people add subs, bits, donations—it just adds time and you're supposed to stream that. So I'm like, ‘Well, I'm gonna stream it then.’ Like I really was into it.
So, was the intention ever for it to be, like, just a 30-day subathon but then it kind of became this massive, three-year broadcast?
Emilycc: Yeah, it was a planned thing, but it was never planned to go on this long. Like, I really did wanna hit 30 days and then, I don’t know, people were being mean. They were like, ‘Oh, you can't stream for longer.’ Every streamer said this, so I was like, ‘Okay, I'm crazy. I'm going to stream for longer now because you're being mean to me.’
Hell yeah. [laughs] Doing it outta spite.
Emilycc: [laughs] I kind of did, but that was only to a hundred days. Then I was like, ‘Wait, it’s been a hundred days. This is like getting out of hand in my life.’ Like, my real life friends were concerned.
How do your family and friends feel about this stream?
Emilycc: Um, my mom still doesn't really understand, which I tried to explain to her. Like, I called her last night and she was like, ‘Oh cool.’ I was like, ‘No, you don't get it. I have 13,000 subs right now. Like, this is not normal.’ She just doesn’t quite get it. I gotta explain again, but I don't know how I'm gonna do it. That’s OK. My friends were like, ‘Come on, Emily, you need to take a break now.’ And I'd be like, ‘Can we hang out on stream?’ But, luckily, I have friends that have wanted to hang out with me and then stream with me. So I'm grateful for them.
You're never off-camera, right? Like, even when you go outside, you have a mobile setup with you and you're still streaming?
Emilycc: See, the thing with the setup, though, is I tried streaming on TikTok—I think Instagram was better—but I can't read my Twitch chat when I’m on the go. But no, it's been really hard to keep my stream on because if I wanna walk my dog, then I would have to turn off my desktop stream and turn on my phone. But I don't stream me going to the bathroom or walking my [Border Collie named Snowy] unless it's, like, a long walk.
So, it's been three years. What’s the goal? Where do you see this ending?
Emilycc: Well, with everyone that has just recently subscribed to me, I definitely wanna stream out the next 1200-plus hours. So, my goal, I guess, is to finish out the subathon and go on as long as possible.
Like, maybe another whole year? But I've already done three? I don’t know, but my goal has always been to just, like, feel like I did something, feel successful. I guess at this moment I feel that way.