What should you charge for a UGC video?

A standard 15 to 30 second UGC ad is $150 when the brand posts it organically for 30 days, $225 with paid ads behind it for a month, and $525 with no end date on any channel. Same video, same afternoon, three prices. The usage rights are the price and the filming is the deposit, which is the one thing almost every published UGC rate card leaves out.

Set the four things below and it gives you a figure, a range to negotiate inside, and a sentence to send back. Free, no account, nothing to sign up for.

1What are you making?

Pick the closest. The length is what drives it, not the platform.

2How many videos?

A batch shares a setup, so the base comes down. The licence does not.

3What can they do with it?

This is the price. Everything above it is the deposit.

4Anything else in the brief?

Every one of these is a thing you are handing over on top of the video.

5How many rounds of changes?

1 is included. Past that it is another edit and another week of waiting.

UGC rates by video type

These are base rates: one video, organic use on the brand’s own channels for 30 days, one round of changes. They are set at the bottom of what we see paid on this platform rather than the middle, because a rate somebody quotes and gets a yes on has cost them a little, and a rate nobody pays has cost them the deal.

Video type	What the brief calls it	Base rate
Hook or short cut	Under 15 seconds. One idea, one take, usually cut into somebody else's ad.	$90 a video
Standard UGC ad	15 to 30 seconds. A hook and a demo, captioned, ready to run.	$150 a video
Talking head or testimonial	30 to 60 seconds to camera. Script, performance, and you have to hold a frame.	$200 a video
How to, unboxing or sequence	45 to 90 seconds. Several setups, a real edit, and b roll you have to shoot.	$260 a video

The usage rights ladder

Multiply the base by this. It is the single biggest number on the page and the one most creators never charge for, because the invoice looks identical whether the licence was 30 days or forever.

What they are buying	How it reads in the brief	Multiplier	A standard ad
Organic only, 30 days	They post it on their own account. No ad spend behind it.	×1	$150
Paid ads, 30 days	They can put budget behind it for a month. The commonest ask.	×1.5	$225
Paid ads, 90 days	A quarter. Long enough to be a real campaign.	×1.9	$285
Paid ads, 6 months	Two quarters. Usually means it is working and they want to keep it.	×2.3	$345
Paid ads, 12 months	A year of spend on your face. Price it like a year.	×2.8	$420
Perpetuity, all channels	No end date, any platform, often plus their website and retail screens.	×3.5	$525

What to add for everything else

Each of these is a separate thing being bought on top of the video. They add to the multiplier rather than multiplying against it, which keeps the top of the range at a number brands in this market actually pay.

Add on	What you are handing over	Add
Whitelisting or Spark ads	The ad runs from your handle, so your name is on their spend.	+40%
Category exclusivity, 3 months	You cannot take a competing brand in that category for a quarter.	+30%
Category exclusivity, 12 months	A year of turning down every rival in the lane. Price the year.	+60%
Raw footage handed over	They can recut it forever into videos you never agreed to.	+25%
Turnaround under 72 hours	It moves to the front of your week and something else moves back.	+25%
You write the script	No brief to work from. The concept is the work.	+15%
A second person on camera	You are paying somebody or spending somebody's afternoon.	+20%

How to price a UGC deal in five steps

1Pick the deliverable, not the platform
A 20 second hook and demo is one price whether it runs on TikTok, Reels or a YouTube Short. Length and how many setups it needs are what cost you a day; the platform is a field in their ad manager.
2Say how many, and only discount the filming
A batch shares a setup, so the base per video comes down about 10% at two, 20% at five and 30% at ten. The licence does not come down at all, because ten videos is ten licences.
3Price the usage rights before anything else
Organic on their own account for 30 days is the floor. Paid ads for a month is about half again. Paid ads with no end date is roughly three and a half times the floor, because that is an asset they own rather than a post.
4Add for everything you hand over on top of the video
Whitelisting, category exclusivity, raw footage, a rush turnaround, writing the script yourself and putting a second person on camera are each a separate thing being bought. Add them to the multiplier rather than absorbing them.
5Quote a number and name the window in the same sentence
Send the figure with the licence attached to it: what they can do with it and for how long. A rate quoted with no window is a rate quoted for perpetuity, and you will not find out until you see the ad a year later.

Three deals, priced

One video, organic only

$150

$150 a video. 0% of it is the licence.

Three videos, paid ads for 30 days

$630

$210 a video. 36% of it is the licence.

Five videos, a year of ads, whitelisted

$3,100

$620 a video. 74% of it is the licence.

Questions people ask about UGC rates

How much should a beginner UGC creator charge?

Start at the base rate for the deliverable with organic-only rights, which on this page is $90 for a short cut and $150 for a standard 15 to 30 second UGC ad, and hold the line on usage. A first rate that is low is recoverable in a month. A first rate that hands over paid ads in perpetuity for free is not, because that video runs for years and you never get asked again.

What are usage rights in a UGC deal and why do they cost so much?

Usage rights are what the brand may do with the video after you deliver it: which channels, whether they can put ad spend behind it, and for how long. They cost more than the filming because they are the part that scales. A brand running your face as a paid ad for twelve months is buying twelve months of media, and the shoot was one afternoon. On the ladder here, perpetual all-channel rights are 3.5 times the organic-only price.

Is $150 a fair price for one UGC video?

It is fair for one standard 15 to 30 second video posted organically on the brand's own account for 30 days, with one round of changes. It is not fair for the same video with paid ads behind it, which is closer to $225, and it is well under the mark with whitelisting or perpetual rights, which take it past $300. The figure on its own is neither fair nor unfair until the licence beside it is named.

Should I charge less for a batch of videos?

A little, and only on the filming. Five videos off one setup genuinely cost you less per video than five separate shoots, so about 20% comes off the base. Nothing comes off the licence, because five videos is five videos the brand can run. A flat 20% off the whole invoice hands away a fifth of the rights for nothing.

What is whitelisting and how much extra is it?

Whitelisting, also called Spark Ads on TikTok or partnership ads on Meta, is when the brand runs paid spend through your handle rather than their own, so the ad appears to come from you. It is worth about 40% on top because they are renting your account's identity and history, and because anyone who looks up the ad lands on your profile. Charge it as a separate line with its own end date.

Does this calculator work for TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts?

Yes, and the answer does not change between them. UGC is priced on the deliverable and the licence, not on the platform it runs on, and one cut usually goes out on all three anyway. What does change the price is the number of channels named in the usage clause, which is why perpetual all-channel rights sit at the top of the ladder.

Quoting it is the easy half

The hard half is four brands paying four different ways at once, each with its own bonus, its own window and its own invoice date. UGC Flows tracks the views, works out what each deal owes and tells you who is late. There is a free portfolio page in it too, at ugcflows.com followed by your handle.

Claim the free portfolio Read the full rates guide