The gaming creator disclosure guide

The video is edited. The key worked. The studio approved the brief. One step remains, and it is easy to treat it as paperwork.

Disclosure takes about ten seconds to do properly. Done badly, it can draw regulatory attention and make viewers wonder what was hidden.

This is a working checklist for your next sponsored video, not a legal lecture. It covers United States guidance from the Federal Trade Commission plus the branded content rules on YouTube, Twitch, and TikTok as of August 2026. Other countries have their own rules, and none of this is legal advice.

The direct answer

Disclose every material connection, inside the content itself, in words a viewer understands, and turn on the platform's own disclosure setting as well. Cash counts. A free game key counts, even if nobody asked you to say anything nice. Put the disclosure where nobody has to click "more" to find it, say it out loud in a video, repeat it during a stream, and use plain words like "sponsored", "paid promotion", or "thanks to Acme Games for the free key" instead of "sp", "collab", or a bare "thanks".

What counts as a material connection

The FTC's test is whether a connection could affect the weight or credibility a viewer gives your opinion. Disclosures 101 for social media influencers lists the usual ones: a personal, family, or employment relationship, or a financial relationship such as a brand paying you or giving you free or discounted products.

For gaming work, that means three buckets.

Cash. Obvious, and the one everyone remembers.

A free key or free access. The one people skip. If you received a free product, a discount, or any other benefit, you disclose it even when the review is genuine and nobody set conditions.

Both. Still one connection, so write one statement covering what you got.

On Bounty Board, campaign rewards can be cash, game keys, or both, and keys are delivered automatically to your campaign chat when your application is approved. Key only campaigns also exist, with no cash reward and coverage optional. If you accepted the key and then post about the game, that key is a material connection: optional coverage does not mean undisclosed coverage.

Where the disclosure has to live

The disclosure needs to appear inside the content itself. That is where many disclosures fail.

The FTC guidance is specific. Disclosures are likely to be missed if they appear only on an about or profile page, at the end of a post, or anywhere a person has to click "more" to see them. In a video the disclosure belongs in the video, not just the description, and it lands better spoken and shown on screen, since some viewers watch muted and others never read superimposed text. In a livestream, repeat it periodically so people who join late still get it.

The clearest gaming example is the FTC's 2016 case against Warner Bros. For the Shadow of Mordor campaign, the studio and its agency paid creators, including PewDiePie, from hundreds of dollars to five figures for positive gameplay videos viewed more than 5.5 million times. Because other required information filled the description box, the vast majority of disclosures landed below the fold, visible only after clicking "Show More". Shared to Facebook or Twitter, those videos had no "Show More" button at all. The settlement barred Warner Bros. from misrepresenting sponsored gameplay videos as the objective, independent opinions of gaming enthusiasts.

The following year the FTC charged individuals for the first time: the owners of CSGO Lotto, two widely followed gaming creators who promoted the gambling service without disclosing that they owned it, and who paid other creators between $2,500 and $55,000 while prohibiting them from saying anything negative.

Hidden money plus a rule against negative coverage is the combination that draws attention.

What good disclosure sounds like

The FTC recommends simple, clear language, and says a plain explanation like "Thanks to Acme brand for the free product" is often enough when placed where people cannot miss it. "Advertisement", "ad", and "sponsored" work too.

What does not work: "sp", "spon", "collab", a stand-alone "thanks" or "ambassador", and abbreviations generally.

This is why "thanks to Acme Games" on its own fails. It reads as a shout out to a friend. The words doing the work are the ones naming what you received. Add four and it is fine: "thanks to Acme Games for the free key."

Lines that work:

• Sponsored video. In the first few seconds, spoken and on-screen. "This video is sponsored by Acme Games. They paid me to play their game."
• Free key, no cash. "Acme Games gave me a free key for this one. Everything I say about it is mine."
• Stream. Disclose in the opening minute and repeat it periodically for people who join later. "Reminder that today's stream is a paid promotion for this game."
• Short video. Put it in the first line of on-screen text and say it out loud. Do not rely on a caption hidden behind "more."

Two habits to avoid: burying the disclosure under a hashtag pile, and reading it in a tone that tells viewers it does not matter.

The platform settings, and why they are not the whole job

YouTube, Twitch, and TikTok all provide disclosure tools, and none treats its tool as a substitute for the creator's own disclosure. The FTC puts it plainly in its endorsement guides FAQ: do not assume a platform's disclosure tool is good enough; use it in addition to your own.

The steps below come from each platform's help documentation, checked in August 2026.

YouTube. In YouTube Studio, open Content, select the video, go to More options, and check the box for "My video contains paid promotion like a product placement, sponsorship, or endorsement." YouTube then shows viewers a disclosure message for 10 seconds at the start of the video. The same page is direct about the limit: you and the brands you work with are responsible for complying with local and legal obligations to disclose paid promotion.

Twitch. Twitch's branded content guidelines define branded content as content presenting products or services based on an exchange of value, and require the branded content warning tool in the creator dashboard when you produce it. Twitch does not expect the tool for incidental things: brand panels on your offline page, products in frame you are not paid to promote, an affiliate link you share when chat asks. On campaigns Twitch runs itself the "includes paid promotion" disclosure is applied for you, and Twitch still tells streamers to verbally disclose the sponsor at the start and periodically after.

TikTok. Turn on the commercial content disclosure setting before you post and TikTok labels the video automatically, "Paid partnership" when the post is on behalf of another business. TikTok's branded content policy counts gifted products, paid posts, commission arrangements, and ambassador relationships, and requires that the product you are promoting is clear without viewers visiting your profile or links. TikTok's business help center adds that the setting will not change how TikTok recommends your content, while commercial content that is not properly disclosed may become ineligible for the For You feed.

Menus move, so check the linked help page before relying on a click path.

What Bounty Board campaigns cannot ask you for

A positive opinion. A brief can require that you cover the game, hit a deadline, include a link, and post on a set date. It cannot require that you like it. The Warner Bros. order bars presenting sponsored content as objective, independent opinion, and that campaign also told creators not to disclose any bugs or glitches they found. "Do not mention the bugs" is the same request in gentler words.

A storefront review in exchange for anything. Do not make a key, cash payment, or other reward conditional on posting a Steam user review. Steam explicitly allows sending review copies to press or creators for editorial previews or reviews; the prohibited part is trading the reward for a storefront review.

Bounty Board's policy states this directly. Creators must clearly disclose paid campaign work and free product, including game keys, in the content itself. Studios must not pay for a positive opinion. Campaigns must not request, compensate, or reward storefront reviews on Steam or any other store.

Worth being honest: that is a written rule, upheld by review and by people reporting problems, not an automatic check that watches your video. If a brief asks for guaranteed positivity or a rewarded store review, decline in writing and tell whichever platform you booked it through.

Clear disclosure protects trust

Many viewers understand that creators take sponsorships. Clear wording gives them the context to judge the opinion that follows.

TikTok says its disclosure setting does not change recommendations. YouTube's brand-deal guidance confirms that checking the content declaration box does not opt the video out of AdSense.

There is a portfolio argument too. Any studio deciding whether to book you is running an informal background check, and visible, well-made disclosures show that you understand the rules. Same logic as public receipts: on Bounty Board, creator profiles show real, public, verifiable earnings from completed campaigns, and you always keep the right to show completed work in your portfolio.

Bounty Board is a younger platform with a smaller creator network than Lurkit or Keymailer, so the record you build there supplements your channel rather than replacing it. It is verifiable by a studio that has never worked with you, though, which a screenshot of a direct message is not.

The ten second version

Before you publish:

1. Did I receive money, a key, early access, or anything else of value? If yes, disclose.
2. Is the disclosure inside the content, not only in the description or caption?
3. Does it name what I received in ordinary words, with no abbreviations?
4. In a video, is it in the first few seconds, spoken and on screen? In a stream, am I repeating it?
5. Did I also turn on the platform setting?
6. Does the brief ask for a guaranteed opinion or a store review? If so, do not take the deal.

That is the whole job. If you want more paid work to apply it to, start with how gaming creators find paid indie game work and what small gaming creators earn from sponsorships. The creator page covers how campaigns, keys, rights, and payouts work here.

Sources worth reading

• FTC: Disclosures 101 for social media influencers
• FTC's Endorsement Guides: What People Are Asking
• FTC: Warner Bros. settles charges over undisclosed paid influencer gameplay videos
• FTC: CSGO Lotto owners settle the FTC's first complaint against individual social media influencers
• YouTube Help: Add paid product placements, sponsorships and endorsements
• YouTube Help: Tips for driving brand deals
• Twitch Help: Branded Content Guidelines
• TikTok: Branded Content Policy
• TikTok Business Help: About the commercial content disclosure setting for creators
• Steamworks: User Reviews